# ENDURUNS: An Integrated and Flexible Approach for Seabed Survey Through Autonomous Mobile Vehicles
## 4 Discussion  
One favourable characteristics of the ENDURUNS system is the data science approach that analyses MBES data and images. Automated data processing extracts the key features from a scanned seabed-region and builds the corresponding seafloor-maps containing semantic classification outputs (e.g., accurate bathymetry data, seabed characterization, organism detection and classification) without human intervention. ENDURUNS units can be endowed with a more general data-acquisition scope, without alteration of their main characteristics. For instance AUV/USV units promise to be an efficient and cost-effective automatic replacement for expensive and time-consuming human-led surveys, in domains like fishery, marine biology and geology, mineral exploration. This is relevant because of its combination of prolonged autonomy and flexible remote controlling, AUV/USV units are well suited to execute sound survey protocols, based on pre-planned probability-sampling schemes. The latter is an increasingly demanded requirement, for instance (and not exclusively), in fishery sciences [86]. In order to demonstrate the effectiveness of ENDURUNS approach, three missions will be performed in the application contexts of the habitat mapping and infrastructure monitoring. An habitat mapping mission will be carried out along the South Adriatic basin (Italy) characterized by a complex geomorphological and oceanographic settings and by the presence of relevant and vulnerable habitats such as the cold water corals (CWC). This area is shown in Figure 6.  
Two survey areas will be considered: the Bari canyon and the smaller incisions along the continental slope off-shore Monopoli. These areas represent two sites under annual monitoring [87] within the EU Marine Strategy framework Directive (MSFD) survey activities, especially for the presence of CWC Habitat and the seafloor physical damages caused by human activities. A second habitat mapping mission is planned in the Baltic sea into a site close to the city of Klaipeda (Lithuania). Within this mission a submerged forest sited into an archaeological area [88] will be investigated. The area contains about 32 Mesolithic tree stumps and lying trunks. Within this  
Figure 5: Schematic representation of the SEACUBE standardised third party module. scenario bathymetry and seafloor backscatter intensity data will be acquired. MBES data will be used for detecting relevant objects lying on the seabed like for examples, tree stumps and trunks. The third mission will be performed in the Venice Lagoon (Italy), the largest coastal transitional ecosystem in the Mediterranean Sea and, at the same time, one of the UNESCO World Cultural and Natural Heritage sites. The lagoon is characterized by a maze of channels (maximum depth exceeding 15 m), which cut across a large area of shallow waters (average depth of 1 m), tidal flats fens and salt marshes. In this area, the MBES will be used for inspecting infrastructures of the Venice harbour and debris abandoned in the lagoon [61]. An example of mission parameters and power consumption of the ENDURUNS AUV is shown in Table 6 regarding the Bari Canyons area in the South Adriatic basin (see Figure 6). \begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{l l l l} \hline \hline
**Parameters** & **Large Area** & **Zoom 1** & **Zoom 2** \\ \hline Min Depth (m) & 130 & 315 & 506 \\ Max Depth (m) & 850 & 782 & 613 \\ Distance form the Seafloor (m) & 200 & 50 & 50 \\ MBES Swath Width (km) & 0.8 & 0.2 & 0.2 \\ MBES Footprint (m) & 3.5 & 0.9 & 0.9 \\ Area Long Side (km) & 5.0 & 1.1 & 1.0 \\ Area Short Side (km) & 5.0 & 1.2 & 1.2 \\ \hline Time (h) & 10.5 & 2.2 & 2.0 \\ MBES Storage Size (GB) & 38.0 & 8.0 & 7.0 \\ MBES Power Consumption (KW) & 0.42 & 0.09 & 0.08 \\ AUV Thruster Power (KW) & 4.2 & 0.88 & 0.80 \\ \hline Total Power Consumption (KW) & 4.62 & 0,97 & 0.88 \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular}
\end{table}