First Autonomous Flight for Drone with Event Camera

A few years ago, Davide Scaramuzza’s lab at the University of Zurich introduced us to the usefulness of a kind of dynamic vision sensor called an event camera. Event cameras are almost entirely unlike a normal sort of camera, but they’re ideal for small and fast moving robots when you care more about not running into things than you do about knowing exactly what those things are. Continue reading →

AeroVironment Gets $2.5M U.S. Navy Contract to Continue and Expand Blackwing Program

AeroVironment, Inc. has announced the receipt of a contract award from the United States Navy on September 29, 2017 for continuation and expansion of its Blackwing small Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) program. The contract includes orders for multiple Blackwing vehicles, sensor payloads and refurbishment kits for a total value of $2,578,822. The initial set of vehicles are anticipated for delivery by May 2018, and final delivery anticipated by November  2018. Continue reading →

Low Cost Sense-and Avoid System Successful FAA Demo

Iris Automation, a San Francisco-based, venture-backed company, has made history by demonstrating the first long range, airborne sense and avoid system for industrial UAS as part of the FAA Pathfinder initiative. Although a dozen sense and avoid companies were invited, Iris Automation was the only airborne solution that participated. Continue reading →

12 Views of Drone World Expo 2017

Commercial drones are lining up on the runway with high hopes for air traffic control systems tailored for unmanned vehicles. But a lack of appropriate regulations may keep them from getting off the ground for a while. That was the view from the Drone World Expo here. The event gathered proponents that ranged from Airbus, GE and Lockheed Martin to Facebook, Google and a White House science and technology advisor. Continue reading →

NASA to Brief Flight Demo for UAS – NAS Integration Enabling Technologies

Officials of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) issued a sources-sought notice Wednesday for the unmanned aerial system (UAS) integration in the national airspace (NAS) systems integration demonstration industry workshop — better-known as UAS-NAS — which will be 30 Nov. 2017 at the Kimpton Solamar Hotel, 435 6th Avenue at J Street, in San Diego. Continue reading →