NASA Designed a Helicopter That Could Fly Autonomously on Mars

2021-02-19

Ingenuity’s body is the size of a box of tissues, slung underneath a pair of 1.2m carbon fiber rotors on top of four spindly legs. It weighs just 1.8kg, but the importance of its mission is massive.

Ingenuity isn’t intended to do anything complicated because everything about the Mars helicopter itself is inherently complicated already. Flying a helicopter on Mars is incredibly challenging for a bunch of reasons, including the very thin atmosphere (just 1% the density of Earth’s), the power requirements, and the communications limitations.

There are a cellphone-grade IMU, a laser altimeter (from SparkFun), and a downward-pointing VGA camera for monocular feature tracking on board. A few dozen features are compared frame to frame to track relative position to figure out direction and speed, which is how the helicopter navigates.

There is also an inclinometer that would be used to establish the tilt of the ground just during takeoff, and a cellphone-grade 13-megapixel color camera that isn’t used for navigation, but to take some pictures while flying.

Helicopter operates half-way autonomously due to its sequencing engine on board. A set of sequences, a series of commands are uploaded that file to the helicopter and it executes those commands.

The guidance part of the flights on the ground in simulation as a series of waypoints, and which are the sequence of commands that operator send to the guidance software. When operator gives a command to the helicopter to fly, the guidance software takes over and executes taking off, traversing to the different waypoints, and then landing.

Source: https://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/aerospace/robotic-exploration/nasa-designed-perseverance-helicopter-rover-fly-autonomously-mars

2023-02-28

Lancet drones forced the Ukrainian Armed Forces to switch from American M777 howitzers to Soviet models

The Ukrainian Armed Forces are urgently replacing American M777 howitzers with Soviet ones due to Lancet drones in the Kupyansk direction, the media reported.

2023-02-27

KUB-E barrage ammunition will be exported

The KUB-E guided munition complex has received export approvals, which makes it possible to promote this product abroad.

2023-02-22

Belousov headed the rights committee on drones

It also includes Maksim Oreshkin, the Presidential aide on economic issues, Alexander Beglov, the Governor of St. Petersburg, and others

2023-02-16

Triumph of the "Lancet". Use of a Russian drone in a special military operation

The Special Military Operation in Ukraine was the first use of many types of Russian weapons and military equipment.

2023-01-09

Chinese scientists develop laser-powered drone to stay aloft ‘forever’

A team of researchers in northwest China says it has developed a way to use high-energy laser beams, not to destroy drones but to keep them in the air “forever”.

2022-08-24

Reverse Conversion: the world's first project to convert shopping centers into mass drone production facilities.

General constructor of ZALA AERO has presented a new initiative - the world's first project to convert shopping centers into mass drone production facilities.

2022-06-10

Machine learning helps determine health of soybean fields

Using a combination of drones and machine learning techniques, researchers from The Ohio State University have recently developed a novel method for determining crop health and used it to create a new tool that may aid future farmers.

2022-06-08

Volocopter’s 4-Seater Aircraft Takes First Flight

German startup Volocopter announced that its four-seat electric aircraft VoloConnect made its first successful flight in May 2022. The vehicle concept spent 2 minutes and 14 seconds in the air. The prototype has all the planned aerodynamic and tactical-technical characteristics of the future commercial product.

2022-04-13

THE EFKO GROUP HAS SUCCESSFULLY TESTED A PROTOTYPE OF THE HI-FLY CARGO DRONE

The Biryuch Innovation Center conducted successful flight tests of the prototype of a new model of unmanned aerial vehicle - a cargo drone. The drone is supposed to be used in emergency situations to deliver cargoes and evacuate victims.

2022-04-08

The government has approved the parameters of the experiment on implementation of unmanned aviation in five regions

In the nearest future an experiment on implementation of unmanned aircraft systems will start in five regions of Russia. Resolutions to this effect were signed by the Chairman of the Government Mikhail Mishustin.

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Reports

2021-05-05
Development of the world market of UAV during COVID-19 pandemic

The drone market has grown steadily and continuously over the past several years. The technology is here to stay and is becoming more prevalent across numerous industries. But 2020 was a unique year due to Covid-19. Overall, respondents even felt that the changes in business models triggered by the lockdowns would actually have a positive impact on the drone industry in the long run.