Intelligent Maritime Systems for Safe Navigation and Autonomous Operations

Dear Colleagues,

The maritime domain is undergoing a transformation driven by rapid advances in digitalization, automation, and artificial intelligence. Intelligent maritime systems are increasingly embedded in ships, ports, and shore-based services, reshaping navigation, traffic management, safety assurance, and decision-making processes. However, maritime transport faces growing pressure due to continuous increases in vessel size, higher traffic density in restricted waters, climate-driven extreme environmental conditions, and greater reliance on complex digital infrastructures. These developments are fundamentally altering the nature of maritime risk, shifting it from isolated technical failures or human errors towards tightly coupled socio-technical interactions across ship–shore interfaces. In this evolving context, maritime safety cannot be addressed solely through conventional regulatory compliance or incremental technological upgrades. While the introduction of Maritime Autonomous Surface Ships (MASS), advanced decision support systems, intelligent maneuvering algorithms, and smart port concepts brings new operational opportunities, it also introduces new vulnerabilities. Within decision support systems, these include degraded or manipulated situational awareness, starting with positioning and timing information; cyber threats such as GNSS spoofing and jamming; limitations in human–automation interaction; and challenges related to mixed traffic environments where autonomous and conventionally manned vessels coexist. Ensuring safety and resilience under such conditions requires an integrated approach that combines intelligent systems, risk assessment methodologies, advanced simulation, and adaptive traffic management frameworks.

Recent research and operational experience show that intelligence and automation alone do not automatically lead to safer maritime operations. Instead, safety outcomes depend on how intelligent systems are embedded within broader operational, organizational, and regulatory contexts. Advanced Vessel Traffic Services (VTS), Sea Traffic Management (STM), and intelligent maneuvering systems are increasingly adopting predictive, route-based, and context-based decision-making for traffic coordination. Meanwhile, maritime simulators are evolving into cyber-physical test beds for validating autonomous behavior, human–automation interaction, and emergency response under non-nominal conditions. While these developments create new opportunities for evidence-based risk management, they also highlight the need for interdisciplinary research that brings together engineering, human factors, cybersecurity, and maritime governance.

This Special Issue aims to present and disseminate recent advances in intelligent maritime systems, with a particular focus on safety, risk management, and autonomous operations. We welcome contributions on the design, validation, and operational integration of intelligent and autonomous maritime technologies, as well as their decision-support interaction with human operators, ports, and traffic management services. This Special Issue seeks original research articles, case studies, and review papers that offer theoretical insights, methodological innovations, or practical evidence to support safe, resilient, and sustainable maritime operations in increasingly complex, mixed-traffic environments.

Topics of interest for publication include, but are not limited to, the following:

Intelligent and Autonomous Maritime Systems

• Maritime Autonomous Surface Ships (MASS) and remote operations.
• Advanced Intelligent Maneuvering and decision-support systems.
• Intelligent collision avoidance and COLREG-compliant autonomy.
• Multi-sensor fusion and resilient navigation architecture.
• Human–automation interaction and supervisory control concepts.

Maritime Safety, Risk, and Cyber Resilience

• Safety and risk assessment for autonomous and mixed traffic environments.
• GNSS vulnerabilities, and spoofing and jamming impacts on navigation and VTS.
• Cybersecurity of maritime cyber-physical systems.
• Non-nominal and emergency scenarios (loss of propulsion, degraded PNT, and communication failures).
• Safety equivalence and risk-informed regulatory approaches.

Smart Ports, VTS, and Simulation-Based Validation

• Smart ports and digital twins for safety and traffic optimization.
• Evolution of VTS toward predictive and route-based traffic management.
• Sea Traffic Management (STM) and data-driven coordination.
• Maritime simulators as cyber-physical test beds.

Dr. Marko Perkovic
Dr. Franc Dimc
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Journal of Marine Science and Engineering is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• intelligent maritime systems
• maritime safety
• risk management
• maritime autonomous surface ships (MASS)
• vessel traffic services (VTS)
• sea traffic management (STM)
• smart ports
• cybersecurity in maritime navigation
• mixed traffic environments
• maritime simulation