A drone crash halts Swiss package delivery, AI used to detect drone faults and locate/track other drones, swarming nano-drones, mesh networked drones for precision agriculture, a drone mesh for event security, UAS for airport and public safety, and the reliability of drone sightings from aircraft.
In May, a 22-pound Swiss Post drone crashed 50 yards away from a group of children. As a result, the drone delivery program in Switzerland has been suspended indefinitely. Swiss Post has asked Matternet to make several changes to the system: parachutes connected to the UAV by two ropes instead of one, ropes reinforced with metal braiding, and a louder emergency landing whistle.
Propeller defects in drones can cause them to fall from the sky and researchers have used different methods to perform fault diagnosis. But a new study by Italian researchers takes a different approach and focuses on measuring the noise emitted by the drone. Different noise patterns are used to build an artificial intelligence (AI) model that detects unbalanced blades in a UAV propeller. See Fault Diagnosis for UAV Blades Using Artificial Neural Network.
A Canadian study proposes target-detection and target-following using AI techniques for UAV pursuit-evasion. Deep reinforcement learning predicts the actions to apply to the follower UAV to keep track of the target UAV. A deep object detector and a search area proposal predict the position of the target UAV for tracking purposes. The proposed framework uses vision data. See Drones Chasing Drones: Reinforcement Learning and Deep Search Area Proposal.
Nano drones have been studies for several years. Draper Lab’s DragonflEye drone project was announced in 2017. A real dragonfly wears a tiny backpack fitted with electronics, sensors, and a solar cell. AeroVironment has been working on a nano-hummingbird since 2011. The market for the nano drones alone is expected to reach $13.4 billion by 2023.
Drones are being used for precision agriculture, but there are shortcomings with one drone and a big farm. Many battery changes may be required and the survey could take a lot of time. The Norwegian Defence Research Establishment and Rajant Corporation in the US are working on a drone swarming approach with decentralized...
