Brief: First place at the outdoor competition, first place at the indoor competition, and the best paper award!🥇🥇🥇
The MAVLab and BioMorphic Lab were at the International Micro Air Vehicle (IMAV) Conference in Bristol from September 16th to 20th. IMAV is special since it is not only a conference, but also a drone competition! This year’s theme revolved around wildlife preservation, stimulating teams to use drones in support of wildlife by observing them in varying situations. The competition was divided in an indoor and an outdoor part. We participated in both competitions, with support from the TU Delft Robotics Institute.
Outdoor competition
Outdoors the drones had to show endurance, make a map of a certain area and automatically count the amount of zebras present, observe unknown animals in four different locations and deliver a camera trap to a marked location. We believe that hybrid drones, that combine vertical takeoff and landing with a wing for fast and efficient forward flight, are best suited for such a mission, because of their good endurance and ability to hover over points of interest. Hence, we participated with our ‘overactuated quadplane’, which has a double-axis tilting mechanism on all four rotors, allowing it to translate without rotating and vice versa.
During the competition, the drone demonstrated its capabilities by taking off vertically and flying the endurance parcour in its fixed wing mode. It also showed precise hovering capabilities above the waypoints where it took photographs of various animals. This did not only look amazing, but it also led to first place in the hybrid category!
Indoor competition
In the indoor competition, the goal was to demonstrate autonomous navigation through multiple gates, landing on small and narrow targets, and sampling objects by grasping. While flying through the circuit, the drone also had to stop at key locations to observe projected animals and provide enough confidence to identify the species. It was tough — the drone bumped into plants and even knocked the lion off Pride Rock. But by completing the mission autonomously multiple times, crossing the gates, and identifying the animals, the score accumulated rapidly, leading to first place in the indoor competition!
Best paper award
Of course, the IMAV is not only a competition, but also conference, and we presented four papers. The organizing committee every year selects a best paper, and three of our papers were nominated! Even more amazing, this year we were happy to receive this award for:
M. Blaha, E. J. J. Smeur, B. D. W. Remes, and C. C. de Visser, “Flying a quadrotor with unknown actuators and sensor configuration,” in 15th annual international micro air vehicle conference and competition, Bristol, United Kingdom, 2024, p. 193–199.
We’re very proud of this achievement, which was reinforced by a live demonstration by PhD candidate Till Blaha! Demonstrating something outside of the lab, in the real world, is a daring move and shows the trust we had in the robustness of the algorithm. Hearing the crowd cheer as the drone recovered after briefly brushing the ground confirmed to us that this work may have the potential for a large scientific impact!