Design and Applications of Marine Broadband Framework for Fisheries

In recent years, though various kinds of sensor network systems and ubiquitous computing systems are becoming available, applications for ocean use is quite limited. One of the main reasons, the development of broadband in the ocean area is not yet a reality. Therein, the authors propose the construction of the Marine Broadband using wireless LAN which is usable in the costal region with the goal of the improvement of safety and productivity in marine industries. As a preliminary experiment, we set up a wireless LAN base station on a coastline and conducted a 1:1 transmission experiment with a wireless LAN equipped on a vessel. As a result, we confirmed that transmission within a range of approximately 5 km radius from the base station is possible. Also, constructing a sensor network system targeting vessel indicated that it is possible to create a bathymetric chart, which provides valuable operation support information for fisheries.