{"id":2775,"date":"2011-02-28T20:59:29","date_gmt":"2011-03-01T03:59:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cafe.foundation\/blog\/?p=2775"},"modified":"2013-03-09T09:07:09","modified_gmt":"2013-03-09T16:07:09","slug":"aircraft-that-don%e2%80%99t-ask-for-directions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/cafe.foundation\/blog\/aircraft-that-don%e2%80%99t-ask-for-directions\/","title":{"rendered":"Aircraft That Don\u2019t Ask For Directions"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>During the last two Electric Aircraft Symposia,<a href=\"http:\/\/robots.stanford.edu\/\"> Sebastian Thrun <\/a>has shared his visions of future autonomous highways travelled by free-range cars that literally think ahead of the curve and don\u2019t allow themselves to be boxed in &#8211;\u00a0and even more daunting \u2013 autonomous helicopters that independently perform maneuvers that stretch the envelope in new directions and dimensions.<\/p>\n<p>His 2009 EAS presentation featured a Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) desert race in which his Stanford University team fielded a Volkswagen Taureg in a 132-mile race through the Mojave.\u00a0 Although not the ultimate winner, Stanford\u2019s entry completed the course in a time that would have done pride to any human Baja race driver.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"DARPA Grand Challenge: Stanford\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/2gQ3P5BpLjQ?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>More related to daily driving and eventual incorporation into a \u201csmart\u201d air traffic control system, Stanford\u2019s entry in the DARPA Urban Challenge showed what is possible in close-quarter driving.\u00a0 As Thrun noted, careful measurements from aerial and satellite photographs show huge gaps in what is considered \u201cbumper-to-bumper\u201d traffic, with 80-percent of the road not used even in high-traffic corridors.\u00a0 It will take smart cars to make up for the average driver\u2019s less efficient reflexes to close these gaps.\u00a0 Thrun\u2019s reasoning and the attendant hardware\/software packages would reduce the need for new roads, save fuel, and make commuting a pleasure while allowing individual freedom of movement.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Stanford robot car &quot;Junior&quot; in action, DARPA Urban Challenge\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/BSS0MZvoltw?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>To cap things, Thrun showed videos of the Stanford Autonomous (model) Helicopter performing incredible maneuvers that required self-learning on the part of the vehicle\u2019s software.\u00a0 The craft improves over time without human intervention.<\/p>\n<p>At the 2010 EAS, Thrun introduced his compatriot Dr. Nicholas Ray, Associate Professor of Aeronautics and Astronautics at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and head of <a href=\"http:\/\/groups.csail.mit.edu\/rrg\/\">CSAIL<\/a>, the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, or the Robust Robotics Group.<\/p>\n<p>According to their web site, \u201cOur research goals are to build unmanned vehicles that can fly without GPS through unmapped indoor environments, robots that can drive through unmapped cities, and to build social robots that can quickly learn what people want without being annoying or intrusive. Such robots must be able to perform effectively with uncertain and limited knowledge of the world, be easily deployed in new environments and immediately start autonomous operations with no prior information.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis engineering challenge will require algorithmic advances in decision-theoretic planning, statistical inference, and artificial intelligence. We specifically focus on problems of planning and control in domains with uncertain models, using optimization, statistical estimation and machine learning to learn good plans and policies from experience.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>At the Agra, India 2008 <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nal.res.in\/MAV08\/MAV%2008%20Mission%20Scenario.pdf\">Micro Air Vehicle contest<\/a>, these tiny vehicles used GPS, Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) guidance, compasses and a variety of sensors to fulfill their mission of finding hostages on a flat plain.\u00a0 \u201cFinds\u201d\u00a0had to\u00a0be performed within 12 minutes because of the micro endurance that goes with the crafts&#8217; diminutive size.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"MAV08-Fly final-MIT\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/iNAqRnZlAkg?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>The 2009 Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International Aerial Robotics Competition indoor event in Puerto Rico challenged the micro-copters to find a light emitting diode (LED) while searching\u00a0through featureless hallways and around various obstructions and distractions.\u00a0 MIT\u2019s winning entry took little more than five minutes to seal a solid victory.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"MIT Indoor Autonomous Flight Vehicle Competition - Final Attempt\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/fHDw4SFQzJM?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>As this type of autonomous aerial vehicle grows in number (Air Force numbers show far greater acquisition of UAVs than manned aircraft), we must look at integrating their more frequent flights into the overall air traffic control system, already stretching its limits.<\/p>\n<p>To pull all these threads together into a cohernt fabric, the fifth annual Electric Aircraft Symposium will feature Dr. Roy, addressing the issue of\u00a0autonomous electronic flight contols, and Richard Glassock from Queensland University of Technology, Australia, discussing\u00a0the Smart Skies project &#8211; an automated airspace control system.\u00a0 This is a culmination of the technologies that will make future flight a reality.\u00a0 Be sure to attend.<\/p>\n<div id=\"facebook_like\"><iframe src=\"http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/plugins\/like.php?href=http%3A%2F%2Fcafe.foundation%2Fblog%2Faircraft-that-don%25e2%2580%2599t-ask-for-directions%2F&amp;layout=standard&amp;show_faces=true&amp;width=500&amp;action=like&amp;font=segoe+ui&amp;colorscheme=light&amp;height=80\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"border:none; overflow:hidden; width:500px; height:80px;\" allowTransparency=\"true\"><\/iframe><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>During the last two Electric Aircraft Symposia, Sebastian Thrun has shared his visions of future autonomous highways travelled by free-range cars that literally think ahead of the curve and don\u2019t allow themselves to be boxed in &#8211;\u00a0and even more daunting \u2013 autonomous helicopters that independently perform maneuvers that stretch the envelope in new directions and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,14],"tags":[1062,1061,1059,1060,299,208,644,643,175],"class_list":["post-2775","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-electric_powerplants","category-sustainable_ga","tag-association-for-unmanned-vehicle-systems-international","tag-darpa-urban-challenge","tag-dr-nicholas-roy","tag-dr-sebastian-thrun","tag-electric-aircraft-symposium","tag-massachusetts-institute-of-technology","tag-queensland-university-of-technology","tag-richard-glassock","tag-stanford-university"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.7 - 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