University of Nebraska

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Carrick Detweiler

Sebastian Elbaum

James Higgins

Christian Laney

Craig Allen

Dirac Twidwell

Evan Michael Beachly

Daniela Rus

David Anthony

Iuliu Vasilescu

Alexander Bahr

An unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) can be configured for fire suppression and ignition. In some examples, the UAV includes an aerial propulsion system, an ignition system, and a control system. The ignition system includes a container of delayed-ignition balls and a dropper configured, by virtue of one or more motors, to actuate and drop the delayed-ignition balls. The control system is configured to cause the UAV to fly to a site of a prescribed burn and, while flying over the site of the prescribed burn, actuate one or more of the delayed-ignition balls. After actuating the one or more delayed-ignition balls, the UAV drops the actuated one or more delayed-ignition balls from the UAV onto the site of the prescribed burn.

Fire suppression and ignition with unmanned aerial vehicles

An unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) can be configured for crop height estimation. In some examples, the UAV includes an aerial propulsion system, a laser scanner configured to face downwards while the UAV is in flight, and a control system. The laser scanner is configured to scan through a two-dimensional scan angle and is characterized by a maximum range. The control system causes the UAV to fly over an agricultural field and maintain, using the aerial propulsion system and the laser scanner, a distance between the UAV and a top of crops in the agricultural field to within a programmed range of distances based on the maximum range of the laser scanner. The control system determines, using range data from the laser scanner, a crop height from the top of the crops to the ground.

Crop height estimation with unmanned aerial vehicles

Described are a method and an apparatus for color-corrected underwater imaging. A range to an underwater object to be imaged is determined and control values are selected according to the range. Control values are predetermined for a number of ranges according to an optimization of a color quality factor for each range based on the spectra of the optical sources used for illumination and the wavelength-dependent optical transmission of the water for the range. The optical power of each optical source is controlled according to a respective one of the selected control values. Advantageously, an acquired image requires no color correction as the adaptive illumination compensates for the wavelength-dependent losses in the light propagation path from the optical sources to the object and from the object to the imaging device.

Adaptive illumination for color-corrected underwater imaging

Growing community of inventors

Lincoln, NE, United States of America

Carrick Detweiler