Introduced by Adam Cantor, the Vice President of Engineering and Chief Roboticist at RSE, the RSE Guardian LFI Mark 3 is a robot specifically designed to safely capture the Red Lionfish without harming the coral reefs or other fish inhabiting the area.

Historically, the only way to cull Lionfish has been through spearfishing. The process is taxing, and divers are limited in how many Lionfish they can physically carry and in air supply. But the RSE Guardian LFI robots are capable so far of catching up to 10 fish in one trip and of reaching depths of up to 300ft. While there have been only two specific hunting missions completed so far, Cantor has hope that these robots could offer scientists, fishermen and subtropical communities a new way to protect their coastal reefs from this invasive species.

The robots use electrofishing panels, which are non-contact and low power, to stun the Lionfish. After, a capture system essentially sucks the fish into the main body of the robot. The Mark-3 uses a six-degree of freedom navigation system and has a surface tether device in place in case of a system failure. Cantor told the audience that he wanted to design the robot so that it can be operated by anyway, so in lieu of complicated controls, it uses a regular game controller.