Cyber Security

There’s a limit to how fast autonomous vehicles can fly while safely avoiding obstacles. That’s because the cameras used on today’s drones can only process images so fast, frame by individual frame. Beyond roughly 30 miles per hour, a drone is likely to crash simply because its cameras can’t keep up. Recently, researchers in Zurich invented a new type of camera, known as the DVS, that continuously visualises a sc...

Georgia Institute of Technology researchers have created a team of free-flying robots that obeys the two rules of the air: don’t collide or undercut each other. They’ve also built autonomous blimps that recognise hand gestures and detect faces. Both projects will be presented at the 2017 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) May 29 – June 3 in Singapore.

  Aerial dogfighting began more than a century ago in the skies over Europe with propeller-driven fighter aircraft carried aloft on wings of fabric and wood. An event held recently in southern California could mark the beginning of a new chapter in this form of aerial combat.

Drones have taken off in a number of industries, both consumer and industrial. Professional services network, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) predicts that there will be an explosion in drone technology, increasing from a market size of $2 billion in 2016 to $127 billion by 2020. But what is the potential for drones in manufacturing? Here, Jonathan Wilkins, marketing director at EU Automation discusses his views on the future of drones in production...

UAVAir, a CAA (Civil Aviation Authority) approved drone training academy has urged all businesses looking to perform tasks using a drone to ensure they hire a CAA certified drone operator. This news comes as The Department for Transport, Ministry of Defence and Sciencewise have recently commissioned TNS BMRM to conduct a public dialogue on the current use of drones in the UK, following on from a growing number of drone related incidents and accid...

The Pop-Up Flat Folding Explorer Robot (PUFFER) in development at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, was inspired by origami. Its lightweight design is capable of flattening itself, tucking in its wheels and crawling into places rovers can't fit. Over the past year and a half, PUFFER has been tested in a range of rugged terrains, from the Mojave Desert in California to the snowy hills of Antarctica.

In the latest issue of the journal Autonomous Robots, researchers from MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and their colleagues present a technique for preventing malicious hackers from commandeering robot teams’ communication networks. The technique could provide an added layer of security in systems that encrypt communications, or an alternative in circumstances in which encryption is impractical.

The buzzword in drone research is autonomous - having the unmanned aerial vehicle do most or all of its own flying. It's the only realistic way that drones will have commercially viable uses such as delivering that roll of toilet paper to customers, said Manish Kumar, associate professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Cincinnati's College of Engineering and Applied Science.

Drones are fast becoming an important piece of kit for many professions, now widely known for aiding photographers, videographers and emergency response teams on a regular basis. But figures from last year’s UK Drone Usage Report revealed another lesser-known industry that also relies on this technology to benefits its services.

A micro-aerial vehicle is in project focus with surprising components: an actual dragonfly insect being steered to create an aerial vehicle smaller lighter and stealthier than anything that is man made. We are used to scientists wanting to copy insects when engineering the design of aerial items. Well, here the goal of the project is to turn insects into cyborg drones. The research and development project is going on at Cambridge, MA-ba...