University System of Maryland

Steven Gerardi

Darryll John Pines

Evan R Ulrich

Joseph Park

Micro/nano mono-wing aircraft with the wing configured as a winged seed (Samara) is uniquely suited for autonomous or remotely controlled operation in confined environments for surrounding images acquisition. The aircraft is capable of effective autorotation and steady hovering. The wing is flexibly connected to a fuselage via a servo-mechanism which is controlled to change the wing's orientation to control the flight trajectory and characteristics. A propeller on the fuselage rotates about the axis oriented to oppose a torque created about the longitudinal axis of the fuselage and is controlled to contribute in the aircraft maneuvers. A controller, either ON-board or OFF-board, creates input command signals to control the operation of the aircraft based on a linear control model identified as a result of extensive experimentations with a number of models.

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Salisbury, MD, United States of America

Steven Gerardi