Rutgers University in New Jersey is launching what it hopes will be the first robot to travel around the world underwater.

The five-year mission aims to gather reams of new data about Earth's oceans, and their effects on weather patterns and the Earth's climate.

Assuming it doesn't get eaten by a huge shark or attacked by a giant squid, and if it can avoid being struck by passing ships or entangled in rogue fishing nets, the device, called Redwing, could greatly increase humanity's understanding of the ocean and the planet as a whole, improving our ability to predict severe weather.

"We have more platforms in space than we do in the ocean," said Oscar Schofield, a biological oceanographer with Rutgers and one of two lead scientists on the project. "The ocean regulates our weather and our climate. But it's the most undersampled place on Earth."

Redwing was loaded onto a research vessel that set out Oct. 10 from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts. On Oct. 11, the glider was launched from the vessel to begin its mission at sea.

The Slocum Sentinel glider is the most advanced autonomous commercial subsea glider ever developed. It will cruise through different depths of the ocean all around the globe, without a human being on board.

The glider has sensors that measure how salty the ocean water is, how warm it is and how deep it goes. These measurements will help scientists understand how the ocean moves and how it affects the atmosphere.

The information will help scientists predict hurricane intensity, heat waves in the ocean and changes in marine life.

Larger, faster and more powerful than its predecessors, with a carbon fiber hull, the glider moves by adjusting its buoyancy, sinking and rising in a graceful zigzag pattern that conserves energy.

It works like this: The device sucks about two coffee cups' worth of water into its nose, changing its buoyancy just enough to make it move downward. Fins on the exterior of the glider help it move more effortlessly through the water column.

When it reaches the desired depth, the glider spits the water back out, changing its buoyancy again, causing it to now rise through the water.

This up-and-down trajectory is more energy-efficient than simply powering it with additional batteries, which are heavy and expensive. There are plenty of batteries on the device already, making it more important to be energy efficient where possible.

The glider is owned by Teledyne Marine of Falmouth, Mass.

"This is a truly historic mission," said Brian Maguire, the company's chief operating officer. "It will pave the way for a future where a global fleet of autonomous underwater gliders continuously gathers data from the oceans.

"These will deliver early warnings of extreme weather, and will track the impact of shifting ocean currents so that we can refine long-term climate projections in a way that scientists have dreamed of for decades," he said.

The glider will surface and send batches of data every eight to 12 hours to scientists on shore, who plan to share it widely.

It also will carry a fish tracker that can detect tagged marine animals in the open ocean, offering rare glimpses into migration patterns.

On the first leg of its journey, Redwing will ride the Gulf Stream from south of Martha's Vineyard toward Europe, before sweeping south to stop at Gran Canaria off the coast of Northwest Africa.

Its next leg will take it to Cape Town in South Africa, before crossing the Indian Ocean to stop at West Australia, then on to New Zealand.

It will then navigate the Antarctic Circumpolar Current -- the most powerful on Earth -- taking it on its longest leg to the Falkland Islands of Argentina. From there it may stop in Brazil and the Caribbean before heading back to where it started in Massachusetts.

What could go wrong?

"It could get stuck in a storm; it could get hit by a ship," said Scott Glenn, a Rutgers oceanographer and co-leader of the mission team.

"It could get caught in a fishing net, and there is the possibility of a shark attack," Schofield said. "With its wings, it kind of looks like a seal from below."

Schofield said previous gliders have tussled with giant squids, which try to eat the devices like corn cobs.

"You could see the circular scratch marks on the body of the glider," he said.

Theoretically, a rescue mission to go get the glider and repair it is possible, the oceanographers said. But it would have to be weighed against the cost of getting there and doing the work.

The glider itself cost over $1 million, and support for the five-year research mission will cost another $1 million, they added.