At the Institute of Automatic Control Engineering (LSR) from the Technical University of Munich (TUM) a students' project started in October 2007 developing a diving robot. With a team of four students of electrical engineering, two staff members of the Chair of Biophysics at TUM and one advisor from LSR, a underwater vehicle is to be built, realizing some scientific and technological innovations. As the robot is supposed to dive into corridors of aquiferous caves and explore channels which are unknown or too narrow and dangerous for humans, it should be of small dimensions and little weight. One speleologist should be able to carry it by hand through waterless parts of the cave.

The significant technical innovation in the project is the realization of a pressure-chamberless solution. Without a pressure chamber, a considerable weight reduction is possible by saving the weight of the chamber itself on the one hand, and the weight which in conventionally solutions is necessary for the descent of the vehicle on the other hand. Furthermore a reduction in the dimension is possible, as more or less only the space for the devices is needed. The diving depth is not limited by the robustness of the chamber but by the pressure resistance of the devices, which in case of micro electrical and not mechanical devices is higher.

The most important scientific innovation is the electronic realization of the lateral-line sensory system – analogue to the lateral-line organ of the blind Mexican cave fish.