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Looks like what's happening is they've found a way to use BSEs [1] to measure small variations in the earth's gravity caused by undersea terrain, probably so that they can then use existing satelite measured data [2], to recover absolute position via Terrain Contour Matching [3] like a gulf war tomahawk missle.

Edit: Seems like there's another company that's doing the same thing [4] with BSEs [5].

[1] https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/570707/why-is-ru...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TERCOM

[3] https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/87189/seafloor-feat...

[4] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZiUfw6ftq4

[5] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7Y7MikUS4M



What does BSE stand for? Your link doesn’t mention it.



> measure small variations in the earth's gravity

This would be incorrect.

It is just a very accurate, unproven in the field, accelerometer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XwKKOPd-5cU - "Royal Navy's experimental ship carries out first trial of quantum navigation system"

"The quantum accelerometer uses ultracold atoms to make highly accurate measurements. When cooled to extremely low temperatures the atoms start to display their ‘quantum’ nature, resulting in wave-like properties. As the atoms move through the sensor, an ‘optical ruler’ is formed by using a series of laser pulses. This allows the acceleration of the atoms to be precisely measured."


Naive question: don't need a precise initial location to tell subsequent locations using an accelerometer? This doesn't fully obviate GPS then?


Ports don't move very often.


Ports are big so that wouldn't be very accurate.

I bet they do have GPS, they're just less dependent on it.


Acceleration would include changes in gravity.




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