Small unmanned airborne systems to support oil and gas pipeline monitoring and mapping

Acknowledgments We thank Johan Havelaar, Aeryon Labs Inc., AeronVironment Inc. and Aeronautics Inc. for kindly permitting the use of materials in Fig. 1.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

DEVELOPMENT OF AN UNMANNED AERIAL VEHICLE FOR LOW-COST REMOTE SENSING AND AERIAL PHOTOGRAPHY

The paper describes major features of an unmanned aerial vehicle, designed undersafety and performance requirements for missions of aerial photography and remotesensing in precision agriculture. Unmanned aerial vehicles have vast potential asobservation and data gathering platforms for a wide variety of applications. The goalof the project was to develop a small, low cost, electrically powered, unmanned aerialvehicle designed in conjunction with a payload of imaging equipment to obtainremote sensing images of agricultural fields. The results indicate that this conceptwas feasible in obtaining high quality aerial images

An Unmanned Lighter-Than-Air Platform for Large Scale Land Monitoring

The concept and preliminary design of an unmanned lighter-than-air (LTA) platform instrumented with different remote sensing technologies is presented. The aim is to assess the feasibility of using a remotely controlled airship for the land monitoring of medium sized (up to 107 m2) urban or rural areas at relatively low altitudes (below 1000 m) and its potential convenience with respect to other standard remote and in-situ sensing systems. The proposal includes equipment for high-definition visual, thermal, and hyperspectral imaging as well as LiDAR scanning. The data collected from these different sources can be then combined to obtain geo-referenced products such as land use land cover (LULC), soil water content (SWC), land surface temperature (LSC), and leaf area index (LAI) maps, among others. The potential uses for diffuse structural health monitoring over built-up areas are discussed as well. Several mission typologies are considere

Design in Engineering: An Evaluation of Civilian and Military Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Platforms, Considering Smart Sensing with Ethical Design to Embody Mitigation Against Asymmetric Hostile Actor Exploitation

This report is written in part-fulfilment of personal output criteria for the Visiting Research Fellowship (Sir Richard Grenville Fellowship) at the Changing Character of War Centre, Pembroke College, Oxford, and the Centre for Sea Power and Strategy, Britannia Royal Naval College, Plymouth University at BRNC, Dartmouth. In this report I undertook an extensive analysis of the maritime UAV platform systems sector of a wide range of upstream manufacturing industry and downstream end user stakeholders. I consulted a global range of military and civilian users, to inform discussions around civilian UAV platforms which could be modified by hostile non-state actors, with emphasis on the littoral maritime region. This has strategic relevance to the United Kingdom, being an island-state with over 10,000 miles of coastline, c. 600 ports, and nearly 300 off-shore oil and gas platforms. In addition the UK has 14 dependencies together with a combined EEZ of 2.5 million square miles, the fifth largest in the world

Dynamic Resource Allocation for Efficient Sharing of Services from Heterogeneous Autonomous Vehicles

A novel dynamic resource allocation model is introduced for efficient sharing of services provided by ad hoc assemblies of heterogeneous autonomous vehicles. A key contribution is the provision of capability to dynamically select sensors and platforms within constraints imposed by time dependencies, refueling, and transportation services. The problem is modeled as a connected network of nodes and formulated as an integer linear program. Solution fitness is prioritized over computation time. Simulation results of an illustrative scenario are used to demonstrate the ability of the model to plan for sensor selection, refueling, collaboration, and cooperation between heterogeneous resources. Prioritization of operational cost leads to missions that use cheaper resources but take longer to complete. Prioritization of completion time leads to shorter missions at the expense of increased overall resource cost. Missions can be successfully replanned through dynamic reallocation of new requests during a mission. Monte Carlo studies on systems of increasing complexity show that good solutions can be obtained using low time resolutions, with small time windows at a relatively low computational cost. In comparison with other approaches, the developed integer linear program model provides best solutions at the expense of longer computation time

Current Trends in Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems: Implications for U.S. Special Operations Forces

This paper assesses current trends in small unmanned aircraft systems (sUAS) technology and its applications to the Special Operations Forces (SOF) community. Of critical concern to SOF is that commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) sUAS technologies are relatively inexpensive, improving at a dramatic rate, and widely available throughout the world. Insurgents, terrorists, violent extremist organizations (VEOs) and other nefarious actors have used COTS sUAS to conduct offensive attacks as well as to develop battlefield situation awareness; these technological improvements combined with their widespread availability will require enhanced and rapidly adaptive counter-sUAS measures in the future. To understand the most current trends in the unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) technology and their applicability to SOF, this paper analyzes the definition and classification of sUAS, their major applications, and characteristics. In the military context, UAS are principally used for intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR), border security, counterinsurgency, attack and strike, target identification and designation, communications relay, electronic attack, remote sensing, and aerial mapping. As technology improves, smaller versions of sUAS will be used by both friendly operators and maligned actors (insurgents, terrorists, VEOs, nation states) as force multipliers for military operations. As armed forces around the world continue to invest in research and development of sUAS technologies, there will be tremendous potential to revolutionize warfare, particularly in context of special operations. Consequently, the use of sUAS technology by SOF is likely to escalate over the next decade, as is the likelihood of sUAS countermeasures due to the availability of the technology within nefarious organizations

A Vision and Framework for the High Altitude Platform Station (HAPS) Networks of the Future

A High Altitude Platform Station (HAPS) is a network node that operates in the stratosphere at an of altitude around 20 km and is instrumental for providing communication services. Precipitated by technological innovations in the areas of autonomous avionics, array antennas, solar panel efficiency levels, and battery energy densities, and fueled by flourishing industry ecosystems, the HAPS has emerged as an indispensable component of next-generations of wireless networks. In this article, we provide a vision and framework for the HAPS networks of the future supported by a comprehensive and state-of-the-art literature review. We highlight the unrealized potential of HAPS systems and elaborate on their unique ability to serve metropolitan areas. The latest advancements and promising technologies in the HAPS energy and payload systems are discussed. The integration of the emerging Reconfigurable Smart Surface (RSS) technology in the communications payload of HAPS systems for providing a cost-effective deployment is proposed. A detailed overview of the radio resource management in HAPS systems is presented along with synergistic physical layer techniques, including Faster-Than-Nyquist (FTN) signaling. Numerous aspects of handoff management in HAPS systems are described. The notable contributions of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in HAPS, including machine learning in the design, topology management, handoff, and resource allocation aspects are emphasized. The extensive overview of the literature we provide is crucial for substantiating our vision that depicts the expected deployment opportunities and challenges in the next 10 years (next-generation networks), as well as in the subsequent 10 years (next-next-generation networks).Comment: To appear in IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorial

Operational protocols for the use of drones in marine animal research

The use of drones to study marine animals shows promise for the examination of numerous aspects of their ecology, behaviour, health and movement patterns. However, the responses of some marine phyla to the presence of drones varies broadly, as do the general operational protocols used to study them. Inconsistent methodological approaches could lead to difficulties comparing studies and can call into question the repeatability of research. This review draws on current literature and researchers with a wealth of practical experience to outline the idiosyncrasies of studying various marine taxa with drones. We also outline current best practice for drone operation in marine environments based on the literature and our practical experience in the field. The protocols outlined herein will be of use to researchers interested in incorporating drones as a tool into their research on marine animals and will help form consistent approaches for drone-based studies in the future