Review of Biomimetic Approaches for Drones

Abstract

The utilization of small unmanned aerial vehicles (SUAVs), commonly known as drones, has increased drastically in various industries in the past decade. Commercial drones face challenges in terms of safety, durability, flight performance, and environmental effects such as the risk of collision and damage. Biomimetics, which is inspired by the sophisticated flying mechanisms in aerial animals, characterized by robustness and intelligence in aerodynamic performance, flight stability, and low environmental impact, may provide feasible solutions and innovativeness to drone design. In this paper, we review the recent advances in biomimetic approaches for drone development. The studies were extracted from several databases and we categorized the challenges by their purposes—namely, flight stability, flight efficiency, collision avoidance, damage mitigation, and grasping during flight. Furthermore, for each category, we summarized the achievements of current biomimetic systems and then identified their limitations. We also discuss future tasks on the research and development associated with biomimetic drones in terms of innovative design, flight control technologies, and biodiversity conservation. This paper can be used to explore new possibilities for developing biomimetic drones in industry and as a reference for necessary policy making.

Metal–air batteries for powering robots

“…These robots include industrial robots used for automation tasks in manufacturing, service robots designed to provide various services, exploration robots used for navigating complex environments, and medical robots that assist in the healthcare industry. [133][134][135][136][137] However, although robot technology has witnessed rapid advancement, research on their power sources has received relatively less attention, and inadequate battery life has become a signicant limiting factor for the widespread deployment of robots across various domains.…”

Lessons from natural flight for aviation: then, now and tomorrow

“…Nevertheless, flapping-wing drones are not yet in wide circulation because of the enduring challenges of miniaturization, power economy and flight control. We therefore address ourselves to these general themes, while recognizing that other aspects are also being tackled, such as collision damage mitigation, where concepts are being incorporated that are based on lightweight, deformable insect wing architectures ( Mintchev et al, 2017 ; Mountcastle and Combes, 2014 ; Tanaka et al, 2022 ).…”

Quadcopter Drone for Vision-Based Autonomous Target Following

“…This article Indoor, outdoor (low altitude), stairwell Identify by clothing; available for crowd, tracking, and obstacle avoidance [15] Indoor, outdoor (low altitude) QR-code identification (strict conditions), tracking but no obstacle avoidance [23] Outdoor (high altitude) Recognition and tracking functions are used for drones to park on the landing zone on the roof of the car [24] Outdoor (high altitude) UAVs identify and track targets at a high altitude [26] Indoor Use 3D vision to measure the distance between UAVs and objects (can be used for obstacle avoidance) [28] Outdoor Using deep learning and simulating multiple UAV tracking and obstacle avoidance (simulation only)…”

“…Ref. [24] discusses the issues related to the bionic control of UAVs, which can provide more ideas for the control of UAVs in this paper. In the research of tracking, [25] uses a UAV to track the landing point on the roof of a car and allows the UAV to safely land at the target point.…”