Instead of one autonomous robot to fly, another to drive on land and one more to navigate on water, a new hybrid drone can do all three. To carry out complex missions, scientists are increasingly experimenting with drones that can do more than just fly. Continue reading
Category Archives: Research
Study Finds 415,000 Drones Flying in Germany
There are currently 415,000 drones in Germany. With around 360,000 drones, most are used privately. However, this proportion has been declining for several years. In contrast, the use of drones in the commercial sector has almost tripled since 2019 and increased by 197 percent to around 56,000 drones. Continue reading
How Can Flying Insects and Drones Tell Up from Down?
A team of European researchers has established a new principle that explains how flying insects determine the direction of gravity, without using accelerometers. These results are an important step towards the creation of tiny autonomous drones. Continue reading
Investigating 5G-Connected Drones Performance in Non-Urban Areas
Researchers at Cornell University have just published a paper which examined the performance of 5G-connected low-altitude drone communication. They found that the already deployed mid-band 5G is a promising candidate for aerial communication, even without any change in the network setting. They now plan to investigate the mmWave 5G performance for drone communication as a future direction. Continue reading
Quantum Systems and Airbus Defence and Space to Research AI and Swarming in Tactical UAS
The Planning Office of the German Armed Forces has awarded Airbus Defence and Space GmbH, Quantum-Systems GmbH and Spleenlab GmbH with a research endeavour to demonstrate and analyze the AI building blocks required for swarms of tactical UAS in a real-world scenario. The project, titled KITU 2 (Künstliche Intelligenz für taktische UAS; Artificial Intelligence for tactical UAS), is funded by the German Ministry of Defence. Continue reading
FireDrone Supports the Fire Department
Researchers from Empa and Imperial College London are developing a heat-resistant drone that can analyze the source of danger at close range in the event of a building or forest fire. This allows firefighters to optimize the strategy of a high-risk operation before entering the danger zone. Continue reading
Spying on Antarctic Moss Using Drones, MossCam, Smart Sensors and AI
The Antarctic continent conjures visions of white ice and blue sky. But not far from Australia’s Casey Station, 3,880 km due south of Perth, moss beds emerge verdant and green. Sadly, the health of these moss beds is declining due to changing climate conditions, ozone depletion and heatwaves. Continue reading
Thrust Vectoring Control for Heavy UAVs
A team of Spanish researchers has published an 11-page study which addresses theoretical and practical controller platforms, offering novel solutions to the vital control issues that arise when combined with communication problems in the case of multi-UAVs for remote sensing operations. Continue reading