Modeling Non-Invasive Attachment Mechanisms for Cetacean Biologging Tags

Abstract

In order to better understand marine mammals like dolphins and whales, researchers obtain physiological and acoustic data for analysis. Attaching biologging tags to the mammals is one method to obtain this data without perturbing the animals. These tags use suction cups to affix to the skin. The purpose of our project was to design a suction cup that will withstand twice as much normal loading than the previous cups used in our sponsor's lab. To support this, our team created a systematic approach using finite element analysis (FEA) and performed experiments in the lab to verify our model.