One potential application of this project is enabling collaborative search and rescue operations in the event of a disaster. But alongside emergency and high-consequence applications are also day-to-day conveniences. For instance, imagine checking on your aging parents and their home in a distant state from your own home. The VR interface could even allow a user to create a flight path through a dense environment to task a drone or a drone swarm to perform a task, command the drones to change shape as they navigate through tight spaces or exchange control of these drones between different users. This research involves undergraduate and graduate students from various disciplines, including aerospace engineering and computer science, highlighting the collaborative nature of this technology and necessity for experts from numerous areas’ involvement.

While a multirotor (a quadcopter being the most common) is what comes to mind to many when “drones” are discussed, the term UAS covers fixed-wing uncrewed aircraft as well—similar to aircraft models that many people grew up flying in RC flight fields. In the future, it is reasonable to expect that larger fixed-wing UAS will be used in long-distance transport, or long endurance monitoring flights, when approved by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).

Within the AirCRAFT Lab, technologies are being developed using Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning (AI/ML) to detect damage, like from hail, on the wings of these fixed-wing UAS and enable the aircraft to continue flying. Researchers (particularly graduate students looking to de-stress) recreate these damaged conditions by launching ice pellets from a compressed air cannon at prototype wings made from insulation foam and composite materials like fiberglass. These damaged wings are then tested in the Saint Louis University wind tunnels to calculate any resulting changes in lift and drag on the wing. This way, AI/ML is being taught to first recognize this damage and then alter the flight profile of the aircraft to keep it aloft (and the individuals on the ground below safe).

In the future, it is conceivable to see drone usage being ubiquitous in everyday life—smart drones equipped with high levels of autonomy powered by AI/ML, capable of recognizing input, whether hand gestures or verbal commands, from a user with a basic skill level. Ahead, there is a world where farmers utilize a VR interface from their home office to command drones to survey their fields; where a first responder can deploy a drone to a disaster area using simple hand gestures and voice commands; or where instate commerce and delivery are executed by unmanned aircraft, aware of their environment and able to adapt in severe weather, to complete a mission.

The possibilities that these drones of the future bring are almost limitless, and at Saint Louis University’s AirCRAFT Lab researchers are exploring them with a combination of cutting-edge drone technology and Artificial Intelligence, powered by the belief that “The Future is Autonomous.”

Watch our recent member event All About Artificial Intelligence below!