Ing. Václav Pritzl

A novel approach for cooperative navigation and guidance of a micro-scale aerial vehicle by an accompanying Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) using 3D Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) relative localization is proposed in this paper. The use of 3D LiDARs represents a reliable way of environment perception and robust UAV self-localization in Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS)-denied environments. However, 3D LiDARs are relatively heavy and they need to be carried by large UAV platforms. On the contrary, visual cameras are cheap, light-weight, and therefore ideal for small UAVs. However, visual self-localization methods suffer from loss of precision in texture-less environments, scale unobservability during certain maneuvers, and long-term drift with respect to the global frame of reference. Nevertheless, a micro-scale camera-equipped UAV is ideal for complementing a 3D LiDAR-equipped UAV as it can reach places inaccessible to a large UAV platform. To gain the advantages of both navigation approaches, we propose a cooperative navigation and guidance architecture utilizing a large LiDAR-equipped UAV accompanied by a small secondary UAV carrying a significantly lighter monocular camera. The primary UAV is localized by a robust LiDAR Simultaneous Localization and Mapping (SLAM) algorithm, while the secondary UAV utilizes a Visual-Inertial Odometry (VIO) approach with lower precision and reliability. The LiDAR data are used for markerless relative localization between the UAVs to enable precise guidance of the secondary UAV in the frame of reference of the LiDAR SLAM. The performance of the proposed approach has been extensively verified in simulations and real-world experiments with the algorithms running onboard the UAVs with no external localization infrastructure.

This paper presents a family of autonomous Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) platforms designed for a diverse range of indoor and outdoor applications. The proposed UAV design is highly modular in terms of used actuators, sensor configurations, and even UAV frames. This allows to achieve, with minimal effort, a proper experimental setup for single, as well as, multi-robot scenarios. Presented platforms are intended to facilitate the transition from simulations, and simplified laboratory experiments, into the deployment of aerial robots into uncertain and hard-to-model real-world conditions. We present mechanical designs, electric configurations, and dynamic models of the UAVs, followed by numerous recommendations and technical details required for building such a fully autonomous UAV system for experimental verification of scientific achievements. To show strength and high variability of the proposed system, we present results of tens of completely different real-robot experiments in various environments using distinct actuator and sensory configurations.

This paper presents a novel approach to autonomous extinguishing of indoor fires inside a building by a Micro-scale Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (MAV). In particular, controlling and estimating the MAV state, detection of a building entrance, multi-modal MAV localization during the outdoor-indoor transition, interior motion planning and exploration, fire detection and position estimation, and fire extinguishing are discussed. The performance of these elements, as well as of the entire integrated system, are evaluated in simulations and field tests in various demanding real-world conditions. The system presented here is part of a complex multi-MAV solution that won the Mohamed Bin Zayed International Robotics Challenge 2020 (MBZIRC 2020) competition, and is being used as the core of a fire-fighting Unmanned Aerial System (UAS) industrial platform under development. A video attachment to this paper is available at the website http://mrs.felk.cvut.cz/2020firechallenge-insidefires.

We propose an approach enabling an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) to autonomously enter a target building through an open window. We use a fusion of depth camera and 2D Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) data for window detection and continuous estimation of its position, orientation, and size. The proposed algorithms are capable of running both with and without available a priori information. The obtained detections are utilized for planning collision-free trajectories through the target window. We use a sensor fusion algorithm for robust altitude estimation from laser rangefinder data while flying over ground with inconsistent elevation. Particular focus is given to the transition between outdoor and indoor environments and vice-versa to achieve the required reliability of UAV state estimation. The proposed approach has been verified in multiple real-world experiments, where the UAV was able to successfully enter and leave the target building both under normal conditions and under decreased visibility conditions in a smoke-filled environment.

This paper proposes a novel technique for radio frequency transmission sources (RFTS) localization in outdoor environments using a formation of autonomous Micro Aerial Vehicles (MAVs) equipped with a rotating directional antenna. The technique uses a fusion of received signal strength indication (RSSI) and angle of arrival (AoA) data gained from dependencies of RSSI on angle measured by each direc- tional antenna. An Unscented Kalman Filter (UKF) based approach is used for sensor data fusion and for estimation of RFTS positions during each localization step. The proposed method has been verified in simula- tions using noisy and inaccurate measurements and in several successful real-world outdoor deployments.

Techniques designed for using teams of small and therefore safe Micro Aerial Vehicles (MAVs) for realization of antenna-like sensing devices with flexible shape, which may be adaptively changed based on the currently sensed properties of the scanned medium, are presented in this paper. This approach enables using simple and cheap sensors carried onboard of MAVs and cooperatively deploying them in the environment to optimize overall sensitivity of the compound sensory array. Two case studies of a deployment of MAV teams in the application of real-time radio transmitters localization are discussed as an example. The first method relies on Kalman Filter-based fusion of distributed RSSI measurements used to estimate distances between the transmitter and multiple receivers, which results in precise, robust and fast transmitters location in the environment. The second method utilizes onboard rotating directional antennas to estimate angles between transmitters and receivers at different positions and a Weighted Robust Least Squares method to determine transmitters locations. Both algorithms were verified in a realistic simulation system under Gazebo simulator in ROS and in real experiments with a fleet of MAVs, with a focus on aspects of real-time information fusion and coordination of MAVs sharing the same workspace with small mutual distances.