The idea behind TANDEM is to combine different types of marine robots to operate together in offshore environments such as wind farms and fish farms. The system will integrate an Autonomous Surface Vehicle (ASV) with a bi-manual Intervention Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (I-AUV), allowing coordinated operations with a level of autonomy not previously demonstrated in these scenarios.

Our planned work focuses on several technological and scientific challenges. We will develop multimodal interfaces for remote operation, advanced control methods, and strategies for multi-vehicle coordination. We will also explore multimodal communication in underwater environments, map complex marine structures, and implement systems for defect detection and operational monitoring.

At ViCOROB, we will coordinate TANDEM in collaboration with our long-term partners at the Universitat Jaume I (UJI) and the Universitat de les Illes Balears (UIB). Our collaboration with these institutions goes back to 2008, and together we have participated in six national and one European project in marine robotics. This shared experience will allow us to tackle the technical complexity of TANDEM efficiently.

During the initial stages, we anticipate one of the main challenges will be ensuring reliable coordination between the surface and underwater vehicles, given the difficulties of underwater communication and navigation. We plan to carry out extensive simulations and lab tests to optimise control strategies and communication protocols before deploying the robots in offshore conditions. Another important challenge will be developing bimanual manipulation capabilities for the I-AUV, enabling precise interventions on underwater structures.

By addressing these challenges, we aim to demonstrate a fully integrated heterogeneous robotic system capable of autonomous inspection, maintenance, and repair in complex offshore environments. TANDEM represents a step forward in marine robotics research, combining advanced technologies, multidisciplinary expertise, and long-term collaboration across institutions.

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In one of its experimental efforts, the University of Girona is exploring how these advanced robotic systems can autonomously assemble structures underwater—tasks that have traditionally depended on human-operated systems.

Underwater Assembly: From Vision to Reality
The current focus of the project is on assembling a structure made of multiple pipes, simulating tasks such as constructing underwater frameworks or infrastructure. This is being tested inside the CIRS water tank.
The Girona500 Intervention-AUV (I-AUV), equipped with two robotic arms is taking the lead. Using its arms, the vehicle can pick up and connect individual pipe sections, carefully aligning and inserting them to build larger assemblies.

A Glimpse into Cooperative Underwater Robotics
As the assembly grows longer and heavier, a key challenge arises: the structure becomes too large for a single robot to handle efficiently. At that point, a second robot will join the operation. Working together, the two robots will lift and stabilize the growing structure, allowing the dual-arm robot to continue the assembly process with precision and safety.
This approach will demonstrate how teams of underwater robots can dynamically adapt to the task, seamlessly shifting from solo operations to collaborative manipulation when needed.

Towards Safer, Smarter, and More Autonomous Ocean Missions
These experiments are paving the way for a future where autonomous robots can perform complex intervention tasks underwater, such as assembling parts of offshore infrastructure, maintaining underwater observatories, or supporting renewable energy installations.

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During this time, we have worked to design an intelligent full-body scanner capable of capturing contactless skin images and combining them with the patient’s medical, demographic, and genomic information. This holistic analysis makes it possible to calculate each person’s risk and offer an early, accurate, and highly personalised melanoma diagnosis, as well as to carefully monitor it over time and improve skin cancer detection.

iToBoS is an international consortium made up of twenty partners and has received 12 million euros in funding from the Horizon 2020 programme.

Now, coinciding with the final project meeting in Girona, the results of this collaborative research have been presented.

Digital press

Un projecte de la UdG desenvolupa una eina de detecció precoç del melanoma. Ciència, Girona – 5 març 2025. El Punt Avui. https://www.elpuntavui.cat/societat/article/2514376-un-projecte-de-la-udg-desenvolupa-una-eina-de-deteccio-precoc-del-melanoma.html

Un projecte liderat per la UdG desenvolupa una eina de detecció precoç del melanoma. 5 març 2025. Diari de Girona. https://www.diaridegirona.cat/girona/2025/03/05/projecte-liderat-per-udg-desenvolupa-114965734.html

iToBoS, liderado por UdG desarrolla una herramienta de detección precoz del melanoma. Girona, 5 març. EFE. La Vanguardia https://www.lavanguardia.com/vida/20250305/10448737/itobos-liderado-udg-desarrolla-herramienta-deteccion-precoz-melanoma-agenciaslv20250305.html

Un projecte liderat per la UdG desenvolupa una eina per detectar preventivament el melanoma.Girona, 5 març. ACN. La Vanguardia https://www.lavanguardia.com/local/girona/20250305/10448344/projecte-liderat-per-udg-desenvolupa-eina-per-detectar-preventivament-melanoma-agenciaslv20250305.html

iToBoS, liderado por UdG desarrolla una herramienta de detección precoz del melanoma.Girona, 5 mar (EFE). La Vanguardia. https://www.lavanguardia.com/vida/20250305/10448737/itobos-liderado-udg-desarrolla-herramienta-deteccion-precoz-melanoma-agenciaslv20250305.html

Radio and TV

Radio4. Un escàner intel·ligent millora la detecció precoç del melanoma amb intel·ligència artificial.  L’entrellat. 11/03/2025. https://www.rtve.es/play/audios/lentrellat/entrellat-escaner-intel-ligent-millora-deteccio-precoc-del-melanoma-amb-intel-ligencia-artificial/16486128/

COPE. Cómo saber a simple vista si un lunar puede ser un melanoma: la Universidad de Girona crea un sistema inédito para el cáncer de piel. Ciencia con Jorge Alcalde.19/03/2025. https://www.cope.es/programas/la-linterna/ciencia-con-jorge-alcalde/audios/simple-vista-lunar-melanoma-universidad-girona-crea-sistema-inedito-cancer-piel-20250319_3116352.html

RTVE Noticies. L’hospital Clínic prova un escàner amb IA per detectar el cancer de pell. 20/03/2025. https://www.rtve.es/play/videos/linformatiu/hospital-clinic-escaner-ia-detectar-cancer-pell/16500412/

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The University of Girona used the Girona 1000 AUV to perform the experiments, done between 70 and 350 meters of depth on the Catalan coast from Palamós to Barcelona. The goal of the projects is to develop several technologies to improve the methodology for monitoring the demersal habitat by using a set of robotic systems. The team of Girona was able to successfully test acoustic communications at different frequencies with different emitters and hydrophones, AUV navigation based on ranges, target detection and mapping, and optical communications. Also, the team was in charge of operating the Girona 1000 for testing the developments of other teams.

Girona 1000 AUV recovered after a validation experiment.

The campaign was very successful, all goals were achieved, and the results will now be used to continue the work for preparing the final oceanographic campaigns of both projects planned for 2025.

Members of the campaign in front of the Sarmiento de Gamboa vessel in Palamós.

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The first activities took place at the CIRS, where the we and Iqua Robotics group have our facilities.

In summary, the objectives of the campaign were the verification of part of the electronic design, hardware and programming of the background stations, Landers, and surface proxy stations (UPC), the navigation of the Girona1000 underwater vehicle (UdG and Iqua Robotics) through its location referenced to the back-end stations and the development of firmware middleware (UPM) that implements the communications between the different devices and allows the interaction between them.

After the pool tests at CIRS (Girona), for the following days, the team moved to the port of Sant Feliu de Guixols, which would become the centre of operations for the rest of the campaign. From the port and employing two boats, the deployments of the bottom, surface and underwater robot equipment were carried out in Cala Vigatà to, in this case, carry out the tests in the open sea, in an environment much more similar to the final environment of the project, which are the marine protected areas (MPAs). Communications, file transfer, detection and geolocation tests of the vehicle’s background and navigation stations were carried out.

This milestone campaign not only propels marine technology but also underscores the PLOME project’s ambitions. To delve deeper into our journey and discoveries, visit the official PLOME Project website at https://plomeproject.es/.

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Breast screening has had a significant impact in reducing mortality rates, with standard mammography being the most commonly used method. However, there is still room for improvement, especially in certain women populations, which can be achieved through emerging imaging modalities and computer aided diagnosis systems. These systems are based on deep learning and have shown comparable results to radiologists, but their robustness remains an issue.

The team behind the project is made up of experts from the University of Girona and Complutense University of Madrid in medical physics, radiology, artificial intelligence, software development, and computational genomics.

The goal of the project is to develop AI algorithms based on deep learning, machine learning, and image analysis to enhance the imaging and diagnosis processes of breast cancer.

The development of AI algorithms in the field of breast cancer screening has the potential to improve the accuracy and efficiency of diagnoses and ultimately save lives.

For more information on the project click here

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The University of Girona (UDG) as project coordinator hosted and organized the 4^th General Assembly (GA) and 3^rd Project Management Board (PMB) meetings at the Auditori Manel Xifra Boada, Scientific and Technological Park of Girona.

In the GA meeting, the current status, achievements, deliverables, milestones of the 13 work packages were analysed. Thirty-five participants attended the GA meeting presentially, while nine more participated through videoconference. All nineteen beneficiary entities were represented.

Later, the PMB members discussed the next steps, updates, delays and problems to solve in the project. In this meeting have attended in total sixteen face-to-face participants and five through videoconference system, including Project Coordinator (PC), Project Manager (PM), Innovation and Exploitation Manager (IEM), Dissemination and Communication Manager (DCM), Data Manager (DM) and WP leaders.

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In the last months, it was sucesfully achieved, in an experimental way, the autonomous docking application using a non-holonomic robot on a prototype of an underwater docking station. First, it was designed and manufactured the docking station prototype. It was solved from a theoretical point of view the strategy algorithm and the controller needed in order to use a non-holonomic AUV, testing the results with numerical methods and simulation. The experimental application was developed relying only on acoustics in order to obtain a robust localization between the robot and the docking station.

These experiments were developed in the marine installations associated with the University of Girona with the objective of replying them in the installations on Viana do Castello (Portugal) in the frame of the ATLANTIS research project (The Atlantic Testing Platform for Maritime Robotics). With the future view of using these developed technologies in permanent robotic fleets dedicated to the autonomous maintenance of offshore installations, like wind farms.

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The goal of the MONTECH training was to prepare teacher trainers so they could organize training workshops for primary school teachers, with the purpose of improving of the management of diversity in the classroom through the MONTECH activities.

The MONTECH activities are gathered in a guide called “Teaching Creative Technologies using a Montessori Approach”. A guide that has been developed in the previous months with the partners of the consortium, specially the UdG, the Waterpark Montessori International and Montessori Palau.

The creation phase of the guide has culminated with the organization of the training course held in Girona, where a total of 33 teachers from schools across Europe has participated in the training accompanied by the project partners.

The trained trainers, upon completion of the guide, are expected to cooperate with the project partners in order to organize the Teacher training workshops at the national level.

The event has had the support of the Montessori Palau School, the Factoria Cultural Coma Cros of Salt and the Escola Politècnica Superior, from the UdG, which have given up their spaces in order to carry out the training.

Press Media:

https://www.ccma.cat/324/la-udg-lidera-un-projecte-per-promoure-lus-de-tecnologies-creatives-a-partir-de-la-metodologia-montessori/noticia/3143563/

http://www.elpuntavui.cat/societat/article/16-educacio/2094364-la-udg-promou-a-les-aules-les-tecnologies-creatives.html

https://www.diaridegirona.cat/girona/2022/02/03/udg-lidera-projecte-per-promoure-62284981.html

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Fishing activity is one of the main drivers of ecosystem change in the Mediterranean Sea. Beyond the potential global effect of climate change, the use of high impact fishing-gears has led to overexploitation of many populations of marine resources and a global impact on the ecosystem structure. A potential management option to preserve these ecosystem services is the implementation of no-take marine reserves where no fishing activity is allowed. These marine reserves would act as recovery areas for fragile benthic fauna and the restoration of the seabed structure and its functionality. Marine reserves would also favor the recovery of highly-exploited marine resources inside and adjacent habitats by acting as sources of larvae and adults (spillover effect), thus, supporting local and regional fisheries.

In the present coordinated project BITER (A joint effort between BIology and TEchnology to monitor and recover fishery impact species and ecosystems: augmented multiparametric landers), the collaboration among highly multidisciplinary research teams intends to evaluate the usefulness of a network of no-take marine reserves to recover commercially-important demersal fishery stocks and habitats.

https://www.icm.csic.es/ca/noticia/licm-la-udg-i-la-upc-uneixen-forces-mesurar-la-capacitat-de-les-reserves-marines-de

https://www.upc.edu/ca/sala-de-premsa/noticies/licm-la-udg-i-la-upc-uneixen-forces-per-mesurar-la-capacitat-de-les-reserves-marines-de-recuperar-especies-sobreexplotades

https://www.udg.edu/ca/udg/detall-noticies/eventid/18468

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