Work in progress by Lionel Ndambeun, discussing Autonomous Drone Navigation

Name: Lionel Ndambeun– PhD in Computer Science

Supervisor: Dr Harin Sellahewa

Lionel’s research focuses on the use of autonomous swarm of drones to maintain line-of-sight of targets of interest. Such a swarm of drones could provide support to the police force to keep targets of interest in sight when in a pursuit. This reduces the need for police helicopters, which are costly to own, operate and maintain, and caries a degree of risks for its pilots and crew.

In his seminar, Lionel proposed a system architecture and explained the role of its main components.  The proposed system architecture would involve sensors, actuators and controllers that will effectively keep a target inside the line of sight. The drone would track the target by remaining stationary in the air, only moving to maintain sight of the target and relaying target location to the police on the ground.

Lionel went on to introduce a number of path planning algorithms and demonstrated an example implementation of one of commonly used algorithms. The next stage of his work is to test his own path planning and navigation algorithms on a simulator before testing them on a drone.

The Work in Progress seminar series gives postgraduate and undergraduate students an insight into the range of research projects undertaken in the School of Computing, an opportunity to broaden their understanding of computing and identify areas of interest for further study. All staff and students are encouraged to attend.

Check out the upcoming School of Computing events and seminars.

Find out more about our courses in computing.