Small Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Flight Planning in Urban Environments

Author(s):  
Min Xue ◽  
Melissa Wei
2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (7) ◽  
pp. 425
Author(s):  
Dimitrios Trigkakis ◽  
George Petrakis ◽  
Achilleas Tripolitsiotis ◽  
Panagiotis Partsinevelos

GNSS positioning accuracy can be degraded in areas where the surrounding object geometry and morphology interacts with the GNSS signals. Specifically, urban environments pose challenges to precise GNSS positioning because of signal interference or interruptions. Also, non-GNSS surveying methods, including total stations and laser scanners, involve time consuming practices in the field and costly equipment. The present study proposes the use of an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) for autonomous rapid mapping that resolves the problem of localization for the drone itself by acquiring location information of characteristic points on the ground in a local coordinate system using simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) and vision algorithms. A common UAV equipped with a camera and at least a single known point, are enough to produce a local map of the scene and to estimate the relative coordinates of pre-defined ground points along with an additional arbitrary point cloud. The resulting point cloud is readily measurable for extracting and interpreting geometric information from the area of interest. Under two novel optimization procedures performing line and plane alignment of the UAV-camera-measured point geometries, a set of experiments determines that the localization of a visual point in distances reaching 15 m from the origin, delivered a level of accuracy under 50 cm. Thus, a simple UAV with an optical sensor and a visual marker, prove quite promising and cost-effective for rapid mapping and point localization in an unknown environment.


2018 ◽  
Vol 41 (2) ◽  
pp. 497-505 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mingjian Wu ◽  
Tianhang Xiao ◽  
Haisong Ang ◽  
Hongda Li

Author(s):  
V. I. Goncharenko ◽  
◽  
G. N. Lebedev ◽  
D. A. Mikhaylin ◽  
◽  
...  

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (7) ◽  
pp. 1470 ◽  
Author(s):  
Abdul Majeed ◽  
Sungchang Lee

This paper presents a new coverage flight path planning algorithm that finds collision-free, minimum length and flyable paths for unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) navigation in three-dimensional (3D) urban environments with fixed obstacles for coverage missions. The proposed algorithm significantly reduces computational time, number of turns, and path overlapping while finding a path that passes over all reachable points of an area or volume of interest by using sensor footprints’ sweeps fitting and a sparse waypoint graph in the pathfinding process. We devise a novel footprints’ sweep fitting method considering UAV sensor footprint as coverage unit in the free spaces to achieve maximal coverage with fewer and longer footprints’ sweeps. After footprints’ sweeps fitting, the proposed algorithm determines the visiting sequence of footprints’ sweeps by formulating it as travelling salesman problem (TSP), and ant colony optimization (ACO) algorithm is employed to solve the TSP. Furthermore, we generate a sparse waypoint graph by connecting footprints’ sweeps’ endpoints to obtain a complete coverage flight path. The simulation results obtained from various scenarios fortify the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm and verify the aforementioned claims.


2012 ◽  
Vol 626 ◽  
pp. 440-444 ◽  
Author(s):  
Munirah Radin Mohd Mokhtar ◽  
Abdul Nasir Matori ◽  
Hj Khamaruzaman Hj Wan Yusof ◽  
Imtiaz Ahmed Chandio ◽  
Duong Tuan Viet ◽  
...  

This paper presents the preliminary work is a part of a research focusing on close range photogrammetry for landslide monitoring.The main objective of this paper is to present the Close Range Photogrammetry (CRP) technique, Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) will provide a platform to monitor the surface area This method was applied using the capabilities and power of Gatewing, Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) for data capturing with respect to UAV tracking conducted in UTP, Tronoh, Perak, on 15th March 2012 at 150m height. The Gatewing is designed for rapid terrain mapping with fully automated image processing. The result proves that data processing were conducted by Srecthout Software. Flight planning was carried out on site, where the areas to be observed are situated inside the UTP campus. The paper focus on final production of an orthomosaic. In conclusion, it is demonstrated that Gatewing, UAV is the best, fast and powerful mapping vehicle for close range photogrammetry application in future works. It shows highly excellent performance compared to other UAVs already established in the market today. Keywords: Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV); Close Range Photogrammetry (CRP); Gatewing; orthomosaic; terrain.


2015 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 1261-1299 ◽  
Author(s):  
J.-B. Renard ◽  
F. Dulac ◽  
G. Berthet ◽  
T. Lurton ◽  
D. Vignelle ◽  
...  

Abstract. In a companion (Part 1) paper (Renard et al., 2015), we have described and evaluated a new versatile optical particle counter/sizer named LOAC (Light Optical Aerosols Counter) based on scattering measurements at angles of 12 and 60°. that allows some speciation of particles (droplets, carbonaceous, salts, and mineral dust) in addition to size segregated counting in a large diameter range from 0.2 up to possibly more than 100 μm depending on sampling conditions. Its capabilities overwhelm those of preceding optical particle counters (OPCs) allowing the characterization of all kind of aerosols from submicronic-sized absorbing carbonaceous particles in polluted air to very coarse particles (> 10–20 μm in diameter) in desert dust plumes or fog and clouds. LOAC light and compact design allows measurements under all kinds of balloons, on-board unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) and at ground level. We illustrate here the first LOAC airborne results obtained from an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) and a variety of scientific balloons. The UAV was deployed in a peri-urban environment near Bordeaux in France. Balloon operations include (i) tethered balloons deployed in urban environments in Wien (Austria) and Paris (France), (ii) pressurized balloons drifting in the lower troposphere over the western Mediterranean (during the Chemistry-Aerosol Mediterranean Experiment – ChArMEx campaigns), (iii) meteorological sounding balloons launched in the western Mediterranean region (ChArMEx) and from Aire-sur-l'Adour in south-western France (VOLTAIRE-LOAC campaign). More focus is put on measurements performed in the Mediterranean during (ChArMEx) and especially during African dust transport events to illustrate the original capability of balloon-borne LOAC to monitor in situ coarse mineral dust particles. In particular, LOAC has detected unexpected large particles in desert sand plumes.


2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 172988142198955
Author(s):  
Georgy Skorobogatov ◽  
Cristina Barrado ◽  
Esther Salamí ◽  
Enric Pastor

Nowadays, it is quite common to have one unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) working on a task but having a team of UAVs is still rare. One of the problems that prevent us from using teams of UAVs more frequently is flight planning. In this work, we present the first open-source solution ( https://pypi.org/project/pode/ ) for splitting any complex area into multiple parts. The area of interest can be convex or nonconvex and can include any number of no-flight zones. Four solutions, based on the algorithm of Hert and Lumelsky, are tested with the aim of improving the compactness of the partitions. We also show how the shape of the partitions influences flight performance in a real case scenario.


Author(s):  
Oleksandr Kholodiuk

Scientific and technological progress today allows the widespread use of modern technologies in agriculture in the planning and use of agricultural technologies. Such technologies are the use of unmanned aerial vehicles as well. Now they allow to collect information about the field, make an orthophoto of the field, monitor crops and its condition at different stages of plant development, perform cartography, monitor the normalized vegetation index, spray plant protection products to control pests and diseases or make a trichogram. The object of research in this article is the process of preparation, adjustment, planning of flight missions and the use of unmanned aerial vehicle AgrasT16 for spraying work sites. The aim of the research is the effective use of the Agras T16 drone from DJI by substantiating the main measures for the timeliness and correctness of its preparation for work, setting the specified operating parameters, planning missions and calculating its productivity. The objectives of the work: to analyze the existing research on the use of unmanned aerial vehicles in Ukraine for agricultural purposes; to establish design features of the drone; to find out the basic settings and flight planning; to establish the productivity of the drone on spraying and to substantiate measures and ways of its effective use. The methods of research include the method of cognitive activity and methods of analysis and synthesis of both information from official sources and information from the works of other researchers. The scientific work deals with the different design and technical features of the Agras T16 hexacopter from the previous generation models. The practical aspects of its use in spraying, preparation for work, adjustment, selection of the necessary mode of operation, planning of fields and flight missions by means of the remote control and work with the charging station have been substantiated. The main features of different modes of its operation Manual Operation, Manual Plus, A-B Route Operation, Route Operation, which will allow you to solve various tasks have been highlighted. Particular attention has been paid to the methods of field flight planning (routes) of the drone, setting up the spray system, calibration of the compass and nozzles. According to the results of theoretical research, the productivity of the drone per hour of variable time has been established, which amounted to 8.8 ha/h. The measures to reduce unproductive time spent when spraying Agras T16 work areas have been substantiated.


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