Recently, the three-meter wingspan imitating manta ray submersible independently developed by the School of Marine Science and Technology of Northwestern Polytechnical University successfully completed a 1,025-meter deep gliding and flapping wing propulsion sea trial.

A team from Northwestern Polytechnical University carries out sea tests on its submersible. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

It has become the world's first bionic underwater vehicle with the ability to accomplish such a task, and will play an important role in marine environmental protection in the future.

Northwestern Polytechnical University is located in Xi'an, capital of Northwest China's Shaanxi province.

This imitating manta ray submersible is capable of long operating hours and has high mobility, large load capacity, strong concealment capabilities, and a good biological affinity, and can be used in various areas, such as underwater environment monitoring, ocean big data collection, and ocean pasture breeding.

A submersible developed by Northwestern Polytechnical University [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

It can also swim with fish in ocean pastures and monitor the health status of fish in ocean pastures. In addition, its acoustic and magnetic sensing loads can be increased for other applications, according to Pan Guang, the project leader.

Since 2016, the underwater vehicle team of Northwestern Polytechnical University has been focusing on the needs of future ocean development, and is committed to solving problems that limit the effective use of underwater vehicles.

The team has independently developed four types of bionic underwater vehicle engineering prototypes, and successfully carried out pool, lake and sea trials.

The underwater vehicle team of Northwestern Polytechnical University poses for a group photo. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]