The Royal Navy has unveiled a series of futuristic submarine
concepts which mimic real marine lifeforms and radically change the
way underwater warfare could look in 50 years. With a crewed
mothership shaped like a manta ray, unmanned eel-like vessels
equipped with sensor pods which dissolve on demand to avoid enemy
detection, and fish-shaped torpedoes sent to swarm against enemy
targets, these concepts aim to inspire the world's future
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The Royal Navy has unveiled a series of futuristic submarine
concepts which mimic real marine lifeforms and radically change
the way underwater warfare could look in 50 years.
With a crewed mothership shaped like a manta ray, unmanned
eel-like vessels equipped with sensor pods which dissolve on
demand to avoid enemy detection, and fish-shaped torpedoes sent
to swarm against enemy targets, these concepts aim to inspire the
world's future underwater combat environment.
The UK's brightest and most talented young engineers and
scientists came up with the designs after being challenged by the
Royal Navy to imagine what a future submarine would look like and
how it would be used to keep Britain safe in decades to come.
The whale shark/manta ray-shaped mothership would be built
from super-strong alloys and acrylics, with surfaces which
can morph in shape. With hybrid algae-electric cruising
power and propulsion technologies including tunnel drives
which work similarly to a Dyson bladeless fan, the
submarine could travel at unprecedented speeds of up to 150
knots.
Commander Peter Pipkin, the Royal Navy's Fleet
Robotics Officer, said: "With more than 70 per cent
of the planet's surface covered by water, the oceans
remain one of the world's great mysteries and
untapped resources.
"It's predicted that in 50 years' time there will be
more competition between nations to live and work at
sea or under it. So it's with this in mind that the
Royal Navy is looking at its future role, and how it
will be best equipped to protect Britain's interests
around the globe.
"Today's Royal Navy is one of the most technologically
advanced forces in the world, and that's because we
have always sought to think differently and come up
with ideas that challenge traditional thinking. If only
10 per cent of these ideas become reality, it will put
us at the cutting edge of future warfare and defence
operations."
This mothership would be capable of launching unmanned
underwater vehicles shaped like eels, which carry pods packed
with sensors for different missions. These pods can damage an
enemy vessel, or dissolve on demand at the end of an
operation to evade detection.
The project, named Nautilus 100, was set up to mark the 100th
anniversary of the launch of the USS Nautilus, the world's
first nuclear-powered submarine.
Rear Admiral Tim Hodgson, the Ministry of Defence's
Director of Submarine Capability, said: "We want to
encourage our engineers of the future to be bold, think
radically and push boundaries. From Nelson's tactics at the
Battle of Trafalgar to Fisher's revolutionary Dreadnought
battleships, the Royal Navy's success has always rested on
a combination of technology and human skill.
"The pace of global innovation is only going to increase,
so for the UK to be a leader in this race it needs to
maintain its leadership in skills and technology. Hopefully
this project has inspired the next generation of British
scientists to be bold in their ambitions and I congratulate
them for their inspiring work."
Young British scientists and engineers from UKNEST, a
not-for-profit organisation which promotes science,
engineering and technology for UK naval design, answered
the challenge. More than 20 of them took part in the
project, 'visioneering' a new submarine fleet for the
future Royal Navy.
Gemma Jefferies, 21, from Bristol, is an engineering
assistant with L3 Marine Systems UK. Gemma, who took part
in the project, said: "It was amazing to see a whole
manner of disciplines coming together in this project. It
was great to let our imaginations run with crazy ideas,
some that may not actually be considered science fiction
in the near future."
Unlike the submarines of today, which perform multiple
roles in one hull, it is envisaged that the Royal Navy of
the future would operate a family of submarines of various
shapes and sizes, both manned and unmanned, to fulfill a
variety of tasks.
The science and engineering graduates and apprentices, aged
16-34, took the complex systems required by an advanced
submarine and applied the latest technological ideas to
make them easier to construct, cheaper to run, and more
deadly in battle.
1. The Nautilus 100 mothership
- The young engineers behind Project Nautilus 100
visualised a future submarine with a whale
shark-styled mouth and manta ray body, allowing a
combination of speed and stealthiness unmatched by
today's technology.
-
Role: When looking at the role of
the vessel, it became clear that a 'mothership'
type submarine was needed to act as a major command
and control hub, information collector and
disseminator, weapon carrier, and underwater
flagship.
-
Build: Its 3D-printed hull
would be a combination of light but strong acrylic
materials bonded to super strong alloys capable of
withstanding the extreme pressure of depths of
1000m or more.
-
Sound: Anechoic coatings,
which deaden sound and reduce enemy submarines'
sonar returns, would be created with nanometre-thin
graphene scales which would be layered to create an
outer skin. The scales would be bonded together
with a piezoelectric material allowing dynamic
control of the scales. This would allow real-time
alignment of the scales to reduce drag in transit
and absorb sound during silent operations.
-
Crew: The mothership would have a
reduced crew of around 20 people, capable of
brain-computer control of the submarine's command
system. This allows control of multiple systems by
the power of thought. They would live on board in
comfortable surroundings for weeks or months at a
time, undertaking missions then docking with
underwater space stations located at strategic
points in UK controlled waters around the
world.
-
Propulsion: There would be
two propulsion systems - one for silent and
efficient cruising for thousands of miles at up to
30 knots, and the other for short bursts of high
speed in a 'fight or flight' scenario. Powered in
cruise mode by hybrid algae-electric propulsion,
the final drive would use a large-scale tunnel
drive that works similarly to a Dyson bladeless
fan. It would suck water in through the bow (front)
and then expel it smoothly from the stern (back).
Precise control of depth and direction is achieved
by flexible wing tips which use biomimicry -
technology which uses nature as a model for human
innovations - to alter their shape.
In battle situations, where high speed is
necessary, the mothership would be powered for
short bursts by a Casimir force battery, which uses
zero point energy to produce enormous power. The
submarine would be cloaked in a supercavitating
bubble of air, reducing drag, and enabling it to be
boosted to speeds of up to 150 knots. The air
pocket would be formed by bubbles created by laser
emitters which boil the water in front of the
submarine. Outlets, which look like gills,
stabilise and direct the flow over the submarine's
entire surface.
-
Weapons and sensors: The
mothership would have advanced multi-spectral, low
power, active and passive sensors moulded into its
hull to help hunt for enemy vessels. A recovery bay
in the underside would act as a docking station for
the transfer of people, weapons payloads and
general stores, and weapons bays integrated into
the top of the submarine. The payload bays would be
multifunctional, holding a variety of weapons and
sensors, plus conventional torpedo tubes for
self-defence decoys which can be 3D-printed on
board.
2. The Eel Unmanned Underwater Vehicle
(UUV)
- These eel-like UUVs would be the main sensors and
secondary weapons carriers launched from the weapons
bays on top of the mothership. Capable of complete
autonomy, they could travel hundreds of miles in near
silence using an eel-like sine wave propulsion
motion. This disguises them as real marine lifeforms
in the eyes of an enemy's sensors.
- Their main purpose would be to eject individual
sensor pods, each using blue-green laser energy to
communicate, forming a self-meshing underwater
network with secure command and control hundreds of
miles apart. These multi-purpose sensors would also
listen for residual sound energy or electro-magnetic
disturbances, sharing vast amounts of data using
artificial intelligence to provide battle-winning
automated assessment and decision making for
defensive and offensive operations.
3. Dissolve-on-demand micro drones
- The eel UUVs would be equipped with a variety of
micro drones, made from cold saltwater-soluble
polymers like the liquid capsules used in your
washing machines. They can be released in blooms, and
communicate with each other and the eels, providing
detail reconnaissance of targets.
- The pods can produce a constant supply of sensors
and drone swarms via 3D printers which would gather
biological material from the ocean and use it to
build new sensors. These micro drones can play a role
in escort duties when the Royal Navy is required to
shadow foreign submarines or vessels detected in
British waters. The micro drones would follow and
escort them until they were back in international
waters.
- They would be engineered to dissolve after a
predetermined period of time, so if deployed in enemy
waters they would be undiscovered. The drones would
also have adhesive properties in their semi-dissolved
state, and could be directed to enemy ships to block
their uptakes and intakes, rendering the vessels
inoperative.
4. Flying fish swarm drones
- Flying fish drones replace traditional torpedo
and missile systems and provide an adaptable weapon
effective against ships, submarines and land targets.
They have interchangeable payloads which could
include shockwave emitters, electromagnetic pulses,
cluster missiles or individual warheads.
- They would use their wings to fly close to the
surface and then dive below the water, using fins to
stay close to the top. This means they can always
operate right on the surface of the waves, an area
which radar systems struggle to identify threats due
to the choppy sea surface and noisy underwater
areas.
- If an enemy radar locks on to a flying fish drone
above the surface, it can immediately dive
underwater, emerging back to the surface if detected
by underwater sonar. Powered by microturbines in the
air, their intake and exhaust vents would open and
close as they dive back into the water to then be
powered by plasma batteries.
Notes to editors
- The graduate scientists and engineers who took
part in this project came from the following
companies or organisations: Atlas Elektronik,
Babcock, BAE Systems, BMT, DSTL, L3, Lockheed Martin,
MOD, QinetiQ, Rolls Royce, SAAB Seaeye, and
Thales.
- UKNEST is a not-for-profit association that
promotes the engineering, science and technology
aspects of UK Naval Defence. Its member organisations
include Lloyds Register, Defence Equipment &
Support, DSTL, the Royal Navy and UK industry.
Tony Graham, the chairman of UKNEST, said: "This
project is a perfect demonstration of how teamwork
between the private and public sectors instills a
shared purpose and stimulates innovation. Tomorrow,
the Royal Navy must aspire to dominate the deepest
oceans and UKNEST aims to attract the best people
to the naval enterprise to deliver that
vision."
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