ABOARD KEXUE VESSEL — Chinese research vessel “Kexue” left the port of Xiamen in East China’s Fujian province on July 23 to continue its scientific expedition in the South China Sea.

During the second stage of its mission, scientists will test the performance of the country’s self-developed underwater robot which will conduct collaborative operations with an unmanned submersible, said Sun Song, a scientist with the program.

Meanwhile, the unmanned submersible will carry the domestically-developed raman spectrometer to collect marine physical and chemical parameters and take camera images of marine benthos’ activities, according to Sun.

Kexue left Qingdao in East China’s Shandong province on July 10 for a maritime scientific expedition and stopped in Xiamen to resupply on July 21 after completing the first part of the mission.

In the first stage, a total of 12 Chinese-developed underwater gliders carried out scientific observations in the South China Sea and sent back real-time data. It was the largest group of gliders to perform simultaneous observations in the region.

Photo taken on July 23, 2017 shows a submersible device on China’s independently-made marine science expedition vessel Kexue at a port in Xiamen, East China’s Fujian province. [Photo/Xinhua]

Scientific researchers bid farewell to relatives and colleagues at a port in Xiamen, East China’s Fujian province, July 23, 2017. [Photo/Xinhua]

Photo taken on July 23, 2017 shows China’s independently-made marine science expedition vessel Kexue at a port in Xiamen, East China’s Fujian province. [Photo/Xinhua]

Photo taken on July 23, 2017 shows maritime scientific observation equipments on China’s independently-made marine science expedition vessel Kexue at a port in Xiamen, East China’s Fujian province. [Photo/Xinhua]