Deep Learning-based Monocular Obstacle Avoidance for Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Navigation in Tree Plantations

Advancements in Learning-Based Navigation Systems for Robotic Applications in MRO Hangar: Review

The field of learning-based navigation for mobile robots is experiencing a surge of interest from research and industry sectors. The application of this technology for visual aircraft inspection tasks within a maintenance, repair, and overhaul (MRO) hangar necessitates efficient perception and obstacle avoidance capabilities to ensure a reliable navigation experience. The present reliance on manual labour, static processes, and outdated technologies limits operation efficiency in the inherently dynamic and increasingly complex nature of the real-world hangar environment. The challenging environment limits the practical application of conventional methods and real-time adaptability to changes. In response to these challenges, recent years research efforts have witnessed advancement with machine learning integration aimed at enhancing navigational capability in both static and dynamic scenarios. However, most of these studies have not been specific to the MRO hangar environment, but related challenges have been addressed, and applicable solutions have been developed. This paper provides a comprehensive review of learning-based strategies with an emphasis on advancements in deep learning, object detection, and the integration of multiple approaches to create hybrid systems. The review delineates the application of learning-based methodologies to real-time navigational tasks, encompassing environment perception, obstacle detection, avoidance, and path planning through the use of vision-based sensors. The concluding section addresses the prevailing challenges and prospective development directions in this domain.

LiDAR Based Detect and Avoid System for UAV Navigation in UAM Corridors

In this work, a Detect and Avoid system is presented for the autonomous navigation of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) in Urban Air Mobility (UAM) applications. The current implementation is designed for the operation of multirotor UAVs in UAM corridors. During the operations, unauthorized flying objects may penetrate the corridor airspace posing a risk to the aircraft. In this article, the feasibility of using a solid-state LiDAR (Light Detecting and Ranging) sensor for detecting and positioning these objects was evaluated. For that purpose, a commercial model was simulated using the specifications of the manufacturer along with empirical measurements to determine the scanning pattern of the device. With the point clouds generated by the sensor, the system detects the presence of intruders and estimates their motion to finally compute avoidance trajectories using a Second Order Cone Program (SOCP) in real time. The method was tested in different scenarios, offering robust results. Execution times were of the order of 50 milliseconds, allowing the implementation in real time on modern onboard computers.

Low-Frequency Trajectory Map Matching Method Based on Vehicle Heading Segmentation

Numerous Global Positioning System connected vehicles are collecting extensive data remotely in cities, enabling data-driven infrastructure planning. To truly benefit from this emerging technology, it is important to combine telematics and map data to make it easier to extract and mine useful information from the data. By performing map matching, data points that cannot be accurately located on the road network can be projected onto the correct road segment. As an important means of remote data processing, it has become an important pre-processing step in the field of data mining. However, due to the various errors of location devices and the complexity of road networks, map matching technology also faces great challenges. In order to improve the efficiency and accuracy of the map matching algorithm, this study proposes an offline method for low-frequency trajectory data map matching based on vehicle trajectory segmentation. First, the trajectory is segmented based on the vehicle’s travel direction. Then, the comprehensive probability of the corresponding road segment is calculated based on the spatial probability and the directional probability of each road segment around the location. Third, the k candidate matching paths under consideration are selected based on the comprehensive probability evaluation. Finally, the shortest path planning and the probability calculation of the different candidate paths are combined to find the optimal matching path. The experimental results on the real trajectory dataset in Shanghai and the road network environment show that the proposed algorithm has better accuracy, efficiency, and robustness than other algorithms.

Machine learning techniques in internet of UAVs for smart cities applications

Recently, there were much interest in technology which has emerged greatly to the development of smart unmanned systems. Internet of UAV (IoUAV) enables an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) to connect with public network, and cooperate with the neighboring environment. It also enables UAV to argument information and gather data about others UAV and infrastructures. Applications related to smart UAV and IoUAV systems are facing many impairments issues. The challenges are related to UAV cloud network, big data processing, energy efficiency in IoUAV, and efficient communication between a large amount of different UAV types, in addition to optimum decisions for intelligence. Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies such as Machine Learning (ML) mechanisms enable to archives intelligent behavior for unmanned systems. Moreover, it provides a smart solution to enhance IoUAV network efficiency. Decisions in data processing are considered one of the most problematic issues related to UAV especially for the operations related to cloud and fog based network levels. ML enables to resolve some of these issues and optimize the Quality of UAV network experience (QoE). The paper provides theoretical fundamentals for ML models and algorithms for IoUAV applications and recently related works, in addition to future trends.

Towards Fully Autonomous UAVs: A Survey

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles have undergone rapid developments in recent decades. This has made them very popular for various military and civilian applications allowing us to reach places that were previously hard to reach in addition to saving time and lives. A highly desirable direction when developing unmanned aerial vehicles is towards achieving fully autonomous missions and performing their dedicated tasks with minimum human interaction. Thus, this paper provides a survey of some of the recent developments in the field of unmanned aerial vehicles related to safe autonomous navigation, which is a very critical component in the whole system. A great part of this paper focus on advanced methods capable of producing three-dimensional avoidance maneuvers and safe trajectories. Research challenges related to unmanned aerial vehicle development are also highlighted.