Nano drone swarm: Advanced tiny quadrotors stabilize mid-air, fly in strict form

ation (VIDEO)
Published time: October 19, 2014 00:43 Get short URL
Screenshot from a YouTube video / user Vijay KumarScreenshot from a YouTube vide
o / user Vijay Kumar
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Drones, SciTech, Thrills&Spills, USA
New and improved tiny quadrotors can now sustain collisions in mid-air and fly i
n leader-follower formations, protecting the head of the pack, according to a ne
w research video released by University of Pennsylvania's GRASP Lab.
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es (VIDEO)
Only 0.11 meters in size and weighing just 25 grams, the robots can fly up to si
x meters per second.
New video shows robust collision resistance during flights. At one point, two ro
bots are shown crashing into each other during flight and still manage to contin
ue on with their mission.

During another test, researchers are shown playing ping-pong with two of the rob
ots. Another clip shows robots crashing into columns and other objects without s
ustaining too much damage.
Their most unique feature, however, is the strict flying formation. The leader-f
ollower formation consists of three followers and one pack leader, which fly in
a triangle formation with the leader based in the center.
The followers are able to mimic the leaders' movements precisely in real-time, k
eeping the formation intact at any point during flight.
The size of the protective perimeter around the leader can also be changed via r
emote-control.
Screenshot from a YouTube video / user Vijay Kumar
The project was started earlier this year with the design and development of the
pico quadrotor. I ve designed the robot from the ground-up, right from the circuit
boards to the software to control it, one of the researchers behind the project,
Yash Mulgaonkar, told TechCrunch.
The robots would be ideal for future work in search and rescue, first response,
and law enforcement fields due to their ability to fly through unstructured, cons
trained, 3-D environments, Mulgaonkar said, adding that they enable humans to obt
ain information about potentially dangerous or inaccessible locations.
Another cool feature is that each robot has its own set of sensors, which free i
t to fly and make direction decisions in real-time, without the need to be conne
cted to a computer. But, some help is still required while performing formation
flight and obstacle avoidance maneuvers.
The original models were shown off in 2012, when GRASP Lab showcased a network o
f 20 nano-quad rotors. Even back then they were already capable of agile flight,
and able to swarm and navigate in an environment with obstacles.
READ MORE: US military surveillance future: Drones now come in swarms?