Setting Up a Mixed Reality Simulator for Using Teams of Autonomous UAVs in Air Pollution Monitoring

Setting Up a Mixed Reality Simulator for Using Teams of Autonomous UAVs in Air Pollution Monitoring

F. López Peña P. Caamaño  G. Varela  F. Orjales  A. Deibe 

Integrated Group for Engineering Research, Universidade da Coruña, Spain

NATO Centre for Maritime Research and Experimentation, Italy

Mytech Ingeniería Aplicada S.L., Spain

Page: 
616-626
|
DOI: 
https://doi.org/10.2495/SDP-V11-N4-616-626
Received: 
N/A
| |
Accepted: 
N/A
| | Citation

OPEN ACCESS

Abstract: 

A framework based on a mixed reality simulator for coordinating teams of autonomous Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) is been developed. This framework would serve as a tool to facilitate crossing the reality gap for different applications; particularly when using these UAVs teams for air pollution monitoring and measurement. The system is built on a co-evolutionary simulator that makes use of data transmitted from some real UAVs to integrate them within a team of simulated UAVs. The system allows the progressive increase of the number of real UAV in the team. This facilitates the setting-up of a single UAV control system and also of the UAV collaboration schemes for different scenarios. A specific implementation of this system focussed on mapping the pollutant dispersion of a plume in the atmosphere is presented. Implementing an appropriate pollution dispersion model within the simulator is a key aspect of the system. This model should require few computational resources, should be easy to adapt in real time to ambient changes, and it should have a fair accuracy.

Keywords: 

mixed reality, plume dispersion, unmanned aerial vehicles

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