New CPD course to tackle underwater communication challenges for subsea industries

Posted on Tuesday 7 July 2026

The ocean is home to critically important industries from offshore energy and aquaculture to subsea fibre optic cables supporting global internet connectivity, and coastal surveillance and defence. This infrastructure, including pipelines and cables, must be regularly monitored and maintained, often using autonomous underwater vehicles that rely on real-time data, positioning and navigation. But reliable wireless communication is extremely challenging underwater, where radio communication and GNSS are not possible due to strong attenuation caused by conductivity of seawater. Instead, the only practical communication method underwater is using sound.

This course offers attendees practical hands-on experience from using acoustic channel modelling tools and real recorded signals to test acoustic modems, to building and testing network protocols on underwater hardware, alongside a grounding in the theory and technology behind them.

The course draws on the University of York's long-standing expertise in UACN research. The Underwater Information Systems group (led by Professor Paul Mitchell) has designed, built and delivered multiple hardware prototypes for industry funders, and is a key partner in underwater acoustic network R&D for UK defence.

Running from Tuesday 8 to Thursday 10 December 2026 at the University of York, the course is structured to suit different audiences. Day one is designed as a standalone introduction, giving stakeholders such as executives, team leaders, operators and project managers in subsea industries a grounding in the challenges, applications and current technology. Days two and three form a technical deep-dive for engineers, researchers and academics, covering signal processing, underwater acoustic modem design and network development.

The course is delivered by the Institute's Underwater Information Systems group: Dr Nils Morozs, Professor Paul Mitchell, Dr Yuriy Zakharov, Dr Lu Shen and Dr Benjamin Henson.

Course leader, Dr Nils Morozs, said: "We believe that launching this course is a timely opportunity to share our expertise with colleagues in industry and academia, and help more widespread development and adoption of UACN systems in the maritime industries."

The Underwater Information Systems group has been ranked by ScholarGPS as second in the world in underwater acoustics based on research outputs in the last 5 years.

Find out more and book your place

Find out more about ISA's Underwater Information Systems group.