The project is framed within the COINCIDENTE Programme, the Spanish Ministry of Defence’s National R&D Plan, which seeks innovative technological solutions of interest for defense. It will also benefit from the support of institutions such as AICIA (Association for Research and Industrial Cooperation of Andalusia, University of Seville) and FADA-CATEC (Advanced Aerospace Technologies Centre).
The main objective of FENIX is the design, development and validation through simulation and flight test campaigns of a technological demonstrator for an autonomous control and coordination system for heterogeneous unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) swarms.
The system will build on Alpha Unmanned Systems’ existing UAV platforms, as project lead, and on the advanced autopilot technology of UAV Navigation-Grupo Oesía. Building on this foundation, new technologies will be developed to endow the swarm with collective intelligence, in alignment with military doctrine. These technologies will analyze, assess and demonstrate how the use of such systems enhances effectiveness and efficiency in surveillance and reconnaissance tasks in complex and contested environments, while also providing increased robustness.
Key developments and objectives of the project include:
Swarm coordination and planning system: Capability for efficient, real-time replanning in response to unforeseen events.
Cooperative perception system: Integration of multisensor data collected by the different UAVs, enhancing detection accuracy and robustness against occlusions, concealment and adverse weather conditions.
Advanced capabilities for critical missions: Identification and mapping of areas of interest under GNSS signal interference (jamming) or spoofing, as well as in NRBQ (CBRN) threat scenarios, and detection of specific targets in patrol, reconnaissance, target acquisition, and search-and-rescue missions.
The use of a heterogeneous UAV swarm will enable these missions to be carried out more effectively and efficiently, directly enhancing defense operational capabilities. The FENIX system operator will only need to define the mission to be executed by the swarm through a single human–machine interface.
The system will automatically decompose the mission defined by the operator into simple tasks, optimally allocate these tasks to the UAVs within the swarm according to their capabilities and constraints, and generate and assign safe, efficient and physically feasible trajectories for each UAV, while respecting kinematic constraints, energy limitations, communication range constraints, and other operational factors.
The FENIX Project, supported by the advanced intelligence of UAV Navigation-Grupo Oesía’s GNC systems and Alpha Unmanned Systems’ rotary-wing platforms, represents a significant step forward in the use of UAV swarms for military applications. This project provides a robust and efficient tool for inspection and reconnaissance in complex and contested environments.
Researchers from Finland, Switzerland, Spain and Romania gathered at Tampere University in Finland for a workshop this month within the Robosat project focusing on localization of autonomous machines.
Workshop participants discussed and demonstrated novel technical solutions to improve localization, particularly of autonomous machines operating in challenging and unconstrained environments, such as forests and mountainous regions.
The Robosat project aims to change how autonomous robots navigate in the wild by integrating multi-sensor and multi-GIS data. During the Tampere workshop, partners from Tampere University (Finland),ETH Zürich (Switzerland), Universitat de València (Spain) and CITST (Romania) discussed strategies for sharing data, identifying relevant GIS and GNSS datasets, and leveraging AI for autonomous labeling of large-scale data.
Key topics included the integration of multi-sensor and multi-GIS data to enhance positioning accuracy, planning piloting tests with ETH’s ANYmal robot and TAU’s new I/Q GNSS grabber device, and discussing methods for AI-driven data labeling for massive datasets collected during field trials.
The Tampere University project team includes Elena Simona Lohan and Jari Nurmi as supervisors and Ph.D. students Yelyzaveta Pervysheva and Muhammad Safi.
The Robosat efforts supports applications in robotics, environmental monitoring, and industrial automation. By combining expertise across Europe, Robosat intends to pave the way for smarter, safer and more efficient autonomous systems.
It also aims to provide new open-access rich datasets to the research community. A first dataset enabling multimodal classification studies has already been published on Zenodo as a collaborative work between Tampere University and CITST teams.
The Robosat project
Autonomous robot navigation in the wild using satellite-based 3D geographical information (ROBOSAT)aims to provide a scalable MultiGIS high-quality data collection platform through the use of a quadrupedal robot that can autonomously perform long-distance missions in challenging environments, such as Alpes mountains or Finnish forests.
Consortium organizations are comprised of three universities and one SME:
Tampere University, Finland. Expertise: GNSS, wireless positioning, sensing, and communications, RF Fingerprinting and interference mitigation. Coordinator: Elena Simona Lohan
ETH, Switzerland. Expertise: automation, mapping, control theory, and legged-robot research. PI:Marco Hutter
An A330 airplane carrying Spanish Defence Minister Margarita Robles experienced GPS interference while flying over Kalingrad, Russia, reports EU Today. The news outlet cites Spanish newspaper El Mundo as its source.
Robles was flying to in an aircraft belonging to the Spanish Air and Space Force. It was is “subjected to an attempt to throw it off course using GPS” over Kaliningrad as Robles was travelling to the Šiauliai air base in Lithuania on Sept. 24.
The pilot said incidents attempting to disorient pilots have been common for both commercial and military flights over Kaliningrad. Becausee this was a military craft, the plane was receiving instructions from a military satellite and the attempt failed.
Thales Alenia Space has signed a €43 million contract for the Euro High-Altitude Platform Systems (HAPS) demonstration project. EuroHAPS was selected by the European Commission on July 20, 2022, for collaborative defense research and development projects from the European Defense Fund.
EuroHAPS aims to develop several stratospheric demonstrators for missions designed to improve intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance and communications capabilities. Project partners include companies from Italy, Spain, Germany and France.
The project will conduct flight demonstrations for three types of complementary stratospheric platforms: A reduced-scale Stratobus from Thales Alenia Space, a solar-powered airship designed for long-endurance missions and offering large payload capacity, Hybrid High Altitude Airship from the Italian Aerospace Research Centre capable of generating extra lift with a wing airfoil, and autonomous stratospheric balloon system from ESG and TAO consisting of a series of three altitude-controllable balloons.
These three types of platforms are complementary and feature different operating times, capacity and operational restrictions. They will give Europe a broad spectrum of solutions to meet a variety of different requirements.
The platforms will test a range of missions, including lidar observation to detect and classify targets at sea or on land and the ability to detect them in environments with vegetation cover. Communications intelligence and electronic intelligence missions will also be tested, as well as a meshed broadband communications network for air and land players.
HAPS offer a new opportunity to complement ground-based, satellite-based or airborne assets with unique capabilities tailored to operational requirements. These flight demonstrations of HAPS will enable demonstrations of different platforms and address the main technical risks associated with these new technologies while refining operational requirements to ultimately enable development of future HAPS systems.
EHang deployed its EH216 eVTOL for flight trials in Europe including the recent Air Mobility Urban-Large Experimental Demonstration. (Photo: EHang)
EHang will deploy its EH216 autonomous aerial vehicle in a European Union-funded project that is assessing how the European Geostationary Navigation Overlay Service (EGNOS) could be used for electric vertical-takeoff-and-landing (eVTOL) aircraft operations.
The fully autonomous, all-electric vehicle will be used for flight trials at Lleida-Alguaire Airport in Spain as part of the Satellite Based Augmentation System Adoption in Multicopter VTOL Aircraft (SAMVA) program.
As part of an initiative of the European Union Agency for the Space Programme (EUSPA), the SAMVA project is tasked with establishing how EGNOS could support planned air mobility services, including eVTOL air taxi flights. It is also intended to prepare for uncrewed vehicles to use the new U-Space concept for managing autonomous or remotely piloted aircraft.
Aeroports de Catalunya will help China-based EHang to establish an operational center at its Lleida-Alguaire facility in the Catalonian region of northeast Spain. The EH216 will use the EGNOS technology to conduct unmanned traffic management (UTM) tasks and to demonstrate how eVTOL aircraft could operate in urban environments, including to and from airports.
EHang is working to achieve Chinese certification for the two-seat EH216, which it intends to deploy with partners and customers for services such as air taxi and sightseeing flights. It also aims to get approval for its aircraft to operate in Europe and has been active in other air mobility partnerships in Europe, where it has provisional customers in places like Norway.
In October, EHang completed its participation in the European Union’s Air Mobility Urban-Large Experimental Demonstration (AMU-LED) with a series of flight tests in Spain. The company — one of 16 consortium members in the AMU-LED program — demonstrated the EH216 at the Rozas Airborne Research Center, which is part of Spain’s National Institute of Aerospace Technology.
“The SAMVA project will unleash EGNOS capabilities aboard EHang’s EH216 AAV to provide precise and integral navigation guidance and support U-Space airspace integration,” said Victoria Jing Xiang, the company’s chief operating officer for Europe and Latin America. “Our participation in this project reflects the meaningful progress we’ve made overseas with our strong technologies as our global footprint expands.”
Spain-based GMV is taking responsibility for integration of the GNSS/PRS receiver system for the European Union’s (EU’s) GEODE project.
GEODE (GalilEO for EU DEfence) is the biggest Galileo application development project ever launched and a crucial and decisive step towards the development of the Galileo Galileo PRS (PRS) military user segment. GEODE is and one of the most ambitious defense cooperation projects launched under the umbrella of the European Commission’s European Defence Industrial Development Programme (EDIDP).
Co-financed by Belgium, Germany, Italy, France and Spain, GEODE is supported by the EU with a grant of about 44 million Euros.
GMV, part of the Spanish industrial team, will develop the GNSS/PRS receiver’s signal-processing, navigation and timing functions. GMV also participated in the Feb. 8 GEODE kick-off meeting.
GEODE aims to boost the EU industry’s competitiveness in the highly strategic domain of military positioning, navigation, timing and synchronization (PNT) and to endow EU military forces with Galileo PRS capacity. The project will be implemented by a consortium of 30 undertakings from 14 EU countries.
The Spanish industrial team made up by GMV, Indra and Tecnobit, takes on first-level responsibility for the complete development of the solution for naval military platforms (GNSS/PRS receiver with security module and CRPA antenna). GMV is responsible for the integration of the GNSS/PRS receiver system and, in particular, for the development of all the receiver’s signal-processing, navigation and timing functions.
GEODE will provide the EU Industry with an even playing field in the Defense PNT market, where military GPS’s essentialness at the moment ensures U.S. industry’s supremacy. It will also reinforce EU military capability and autonomy and maximize the benefits of the Galileo program by promoting take-up of its crucial PRS service.
Following an initial specification and standardization phase, the project will then prototype, test and qualify all the elements of a complete PRS solution:
A PRS solution for spacecraft will be also designed and prototyped. Complementarily, a PRS infrastructure will be developed to ensure the availability of the security assets necessary for operational testing.
Military operational field testing will be organized on military naval and land platforms, RPAS, and a timing and synchronization system.
GEODE will boost the EU industry competitiveness in the highly strategic domain of military positioning, timing and synchronization, it will foster the equipment of EU Member States’ military forces with the Galileo PRS capability, essential to reinforce their interoperability and autonomy. It also will facilitate access to complex security certified technologies and make them affordable through means of standardization and by creating the necessary critical mass.
A crucial step toward the development of the Galileo Public Regulated Service (PRS) military user segment took place Monday, Feb. 8, with the kick-off meeting in Brussels of the GEODE (GalilEO for EU DEfence) project, according to a press release from FDC.
GEODE is the biggest Galileo application development project ever launched.
Sponsored by Belgium, Germany, Italy, France and Spain — contributions should exceed 82.7 million euros — GEODE is supported by the EU with a grant of about 44 million euros. The ambitious defence-cooperation project is under the umbrella of the European Defence Industrial Development Programme (EDIDP) of the European Commission.
GEODE will establish the framework for developing the Galileo PRS user segment for defense applications. At kick-off, the project involved 30 companies and organizations from 14 EU Member States: Belgium, Czech Republic, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and Romania.
The GEODE Roadmap
National defense organizations — in close cooperation with industry — have defined a roadmap for the Galileo PRS military user segment development, beginning with a specification and standardization phase. GEODE will prototype, test and qualify
seven PRS security modules developed from various technologies
nine PRS receivers (including two server-based variants)
four GPS/Galileo PRS-compatible anti-jamming controlled radiation pattern antennas (CRPA).
A common and standardized test environment will be developed as well as a PRS infrastructure to ensure the availability of the security assets for operational testing.
Finally, military operational field testing will be organized on military platforms (naval, land and drones) and timing and synchronization systems in (at least) Belgium, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Greece and Romania.
A PRS solution for spacecraft will also be designed and prototyped.
Beyond paving the way for the equipment of EU Member States defense forces with Galileo PRS, the military user segment that is developed, tested and certified under GEODE is planned to be available for export to other countries that have the necessary PRS security agreements with the EU.
The GEODE project will be completed in 2026.
Plans are for GEODE to
boost EU competitiveness in the highly strategic domain of military positioning, timing and synchronization.
foster the equipment of EU Member States’ military forces with Galileo PRS capability, essential to reinforce their interoperability and autonomy.
facilitate access to complex security-certified technologies and make them affordable through means of standardization and by creating the necessary critical mass.
In brief, the project will bolster EU Member States’ military capability, create business opportunities for the EU industry in the field of military application of satellite navigation, and maximize the benefits of the Galileo programme by energizing the adoption of its PRS service in all EU Member States and beyond.
Background on GEODE
This project has received funding from the European Defence Industrial Development Programme (EDIDP) under grant agreement No 039.
The GEODE industrial consortium is led by FDC and comprises the major industry players of the field: Airbus Defence and Space, Antwerp Space, Cy4gate, Diehl Defence, Elettronica, Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits IIS, GMV Aerospace and Defense, Indra Sistemas, Safran Electronics and Defense, Leonardo, Siemens Aktiengesellshaft, Orolia, Tecnobit, Telespazio, Thales Alenia Space Italia, Thales AVS France, Thales SIX GTS France, accompanied with 12 other EU companies acting as subcontractors (c.f. picture hereafter).
The GEODE project is developed in the context of the European Radio-navigation Solution (EURAS) project of the Permanent Structure Cooperation (PESCO). The EURAS project aims at promoting the development of EU military positioning, navigation and timing) capabilities and future cooperation taking advantage of Galileo and the PRS.
The Spanish Army and Navy have received the first Seeker Remotely Piloted Aircraft Systems (RPAS) from GMV and Aurea Avionics. The unmanned aircraft is designed to boost the intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities of two elite forces, the Spanish Army’s 6th Almogávares Paratroopers Brigade and the Marine Infantry Protection Force.
Seeker has a 90-minute endurance and 15-km range, and weighs 3.5 kg. The UAV’s design and manufacture in Spain proved crucial during the COVID-19 epidemic, with the manufacture, test flights and delivery of the aircraft all performed within the project deadlines.
In the final phase of the project, intensive training courses took place on the Madrid site of Aurea Avionics and the Los Alijares Firing and Maneuvering Range (CMT) of Toledo. There, future Seeker users put the RPAS through its paces with mission simulations, engaged in vehicle-tracking exercises and learned about its theoretical and practical uses.
Seeker will provide BRIPAC (Paratrooper Brigade) and BRIMAR (Marine Infantry Brigade) with real-time thermal-infrared and visible-spectrum video, augmented by metadata that can be mined by the operators and remotely by the command-and-control centers.
New digitized ground-station architecture makes Seeker compatible with NATO’s standard command centers. This means any allied force will be able to integrate the aircraft into its fleet and command centers, ensuring joint operability between all troops and systems.
The RPAS is financed by the Subdirectorate General of Planning, Technology and Innovation of the Directorate General of Armaments and Material.
The first drone of Europe’s U-space TRACE project took its maiden flight Sept. 23. It carried an EGNOS-enabled beacon that allows the identification of the aircraft while guaranteeing accurate, robust positioning.
The drone lifted off at the ATLAS experimental flight center in Jaén, Spain, an aerodrome equipped for flight tests with unmanned aircraft systems.
The Regional Minister for Economic Transformation, Industry, Knowledge and Universities, Rogelio Velasco said, “This event shows Andalusia’s commitment to hosting initiatives that promote innovation in the region.”
Using enhanced EGNOS signals, the EU’s regional satellite-based augmentation system, TRACE supports the safe and effective integration of drones into U-space by providing essential services such as e-registration, e-identification and pre-tactical geofencing.
The smart beacon allows for remote identification of drones flying at a very low altitude, enabling safer integration of drones into airspace through the use of U-Space. This makes it easier for traditional aviation pilots to know the position of drones. The smart beacon also enables better traffic separation when integrated with U-space services, thanks to EGNOS.
“TRACE is a pioneering project in Europe that will allow us to demonstrate the advantages of EGNOS, particularly in terms of greater precision in locating drones,” said Luis Gómez, CEO of Alter Technology.
The TRACE project is funded by a GSA EGNOS Adoption in Aviation grant. It designed and developed a smart beacon that leverages the robust signal corrections of EGNOS to improve positioning accuracy, and thus the safety of drone operations at very low altitudes.
Carolina Jiménez, TRACE project manager at Alter Technology added, “TRACE will demonstrate compliance with the European Drone Regulation, an important aspect within the Alter business line, since one of the fundamental requirements in this new regulatory framework is that each system has the capacity for remote identification for future secure integration within the air space for these systems (U-Space).
The TRACE project is led by Alter Technology, and is a result of collaboration among European companies such as Unifly (Belgium), Pildo Labs and FADA-CATEC (Spain).
Vodafone, together with CATEC, presented the 5G Lab of ATLAS within the 5G initiative of RED.ES. A use case of 5G with drones for urgent defibrillator delivery was demonstrated with the participation of Fundación SSG, Vodafone and the technological support of CATEC.
TRACE project partners include:
Alter Technology provides engineering and test services for electronic systems and E.E.E. components within the space and harsh environment markets.
FADA-CATEC, the Advanced Aerospace Technologies Center, promotes and develops creation of technological knowledge and its transfer to the productive aerospace industry.
Pildo Labs is an engineering company that specializes in aeronautics and aerospace technology and services.
Unifly is a software company with a platform for the safe integration of drones into the airspace.
The European GNSS Agency (GSA) manages operations, security and service provisions for Europe’s Galileo and EGNOS.
The drone market is expected to outstrip any other user base in the aviation market. According to estimations, revenues from drone-based services are expected to exceed 150 million euros by 2023. GNSS is a key enabling technology for drones and it is expected that its role will continue to grow. Solutions like TRACE that use European GNSS (EGNOS and Galileo) are differentiators that can be leveraged to safely integrate drones into non-segregated airspace and into the U-Space.
U-space
The progressive deployment of U-space is linked to the increasing availability of services and enabling technologies. Over time, U-space services will evolve as the level of automation of the drone increases, and advanced forms of interaction with the environment are enabled (including manned and unmanned aircraft).
These U-space services have been identified and gathered in four different phases, increasing the drone level of integration. Learn more in the U-space Blueprint.
GPS technology is doing far more than helping us navigate or receive accurate time. It is now being used to fight the spread of the global COVID-19 pandemic.
Global navigation satellite systems are being used to collect big data on travel and contact, but they are also being used in more unconventional ways: for example, quarantine enforcement and sanitation technology.
Read on to learn about a few recent developments in the world of GNSS/GPS that are bolstering the battle against the novel coronavirus.
Electronic monitoring enforces quarantine
There is a surge of applying ankle monitors to track sick individuals and deter them from spreading the virus further. According to BloombergBusinessweek, one business is thriving because of it: providers of electronic ankle monitors.
Kentucky courts are requiring GPS ankle monitors for people who test positive for COVID-19 and refuse to self-quarantine. Kentucky couple Elizabeth and Isaiah Linscott were two of a growing number of people placed under house arrest after Elizabeth tested positive for COVID-19 and denied signing the Self-isolation and Controlled Movement Agreed Order, a health department document promising she would stay home.
Photo: Regulus Cyber
Elizabeth told Louisville television station WAVE 3 News that she did not sign because she disagreed with the wording of the document. She said that she was concerned about having to contact the health department before traveling, even in the case of an emergency.
“My part was if I have to go to the ER, if I have to go to the hospital, I’m not going to wait to get the approval to go,” she said.
A few days after Elizabeth refused to sign the paperwork, her husband opened their door to an entourage of law enforcement officers serving them with a Health Department order to wear ankle monitors.
“I open up the door, and there’s like eight different people, five different cars, and I’m like ‘what the heck’s going on?’ This guy’s in a suit with a mask. It’s the Health Department guy, and they have three papers for us. For me, her and my daughter,” Isaiah said.
The Linville family is now confined to a 200-foot radius. If they leave their designated quarantine area, their ankle monitors will alert law enforcement.
Alternative to prison
The number of people on house arrest in the United States and across the world has surged as corrections departments struggle to slow the spread of the coronavirus within prisons. An estimated 25 to 30 percent more people are wearing ankle monitors in comparison with a few months ago, according to Bloomberg Businessweek. The U.S. Federal Bureau of Prisons reported a 160 percent increase in home confinement from late March to July. European corrections departments have similarly put thousands of inmates on house arrest in the last few months.
“Demand has spiked everywhere,” BI Inc. monitoring equipment executive Robert Murnock said to Bloomberg. “We’re getting calls from different jurisdictions and other countries we’ve never worked with.”
Efforts to reduce crowding in prisons mean that the electronic monitoring industry is one of very few industries benefiting financially from the coronavirus pandemic.
“Coronavirus gives electronic monitoring companies an opportunity like they’ve never had before to expand,” parole reform expert James Kilgore said.
On Aug. 3, Singapore announced the rollout of electronic tracking devices to enforce quarantine. Travelers will be required to wear GPS and Bluetooth-powered tracking devices that notify authorities if quarantine is broken or the device is tampered with. The rule went into effect on Aug. 11 and applies to all incoming travelers — resident or nonresident — over the age of 12.
On Aug. 20, the premier of Western Australia, Mark McGowan , said his government could soon force people in hotel quarantine to wear electronic monitoring equipment if they are deemed a risk. “If we identify people who are potential flight risks or who might have a criminal history, we are looking at applying monitoring bracelets to them,” he said.
An estimated 25 percent to 30 percent more prisoners are wearing bracelets now compared to the pre-outbreak period. In the U.S., the Federal Bureau of Prisons has placed about 4,600 inmates in home confinement, a 160 percent increase since the end of March.
“Demand has spiked everywhere,” said Robert Murnock, vice president for partnership development at BI Inc., a provider of EM technology.
The emergency shift to electronic monitoring spurred by COVID-19 may foretell a long-term shift toward use as an alternative to prison time, reducing clutter and the risk of the virus spreading among inmates.
Photo: LeoPatrizi/E+/Getty Images
Contact tracing via mobile phones
Israel is using covert mobile phone data to track the spread of COVID-19. On July 1, the Knesset approved a bill temporarily reauthorizing mass surveillance of coronavirus-infected citizens by the Shin Bet, Israel’s internal security service. The original program lasted from mid-March to June 9.
The contact-tracing program works like this. When a patient is diagnosed with COVID-19, the Israeli Health Ministry provides their personal information — including their mobile number — to the Shin Bet. The Shin Bet then consults a classified database of every person who uses Israeli telecom services to determine who came into contact with the infected individual for more than 15 minutes at a time. After the Shin Bet sends information back to the Health Ministry, the Health Ministry notifies those people via text and tells them to self-quarantine.
The Shin Bet’s newfound role in public health enforcement is quite different from its usual focus. Former Shin Bet agents say the COVID-19 mobile phone tracking technology was originally developed as a counterterrorism measure, and the tracking system being used on Israeli civilians is almost identical to that used for suspected terrorists.
“It’s the same system, the same methods,” retired Shin Bet agent Arik Brabbing said to BBC. “We know that someone was here in the park. We can get from the [mobile phone] company all the details about the hour, the place, exactly the place… and we can understand who else was around.”
Supporters of the mass surveillance program, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, argue that reduced privacy is necessary to curb the spread of the virus. However, the Israeli government has come under fire by opponents who claim that the program is intrusive and undemocratic.
Israel’s contact tracing procedures are more secretive than those of South Korea and Taiwan, other countries that mandate central mass surveillance. South Korea and Taiwan both enforce quarantines with mobile-phone tracking, and both have built publicly available COVID-19 data platforms.
The South Korean government has disseminated detailed — but anonymized — information about COVID-19 carriers, including their travel routes and treatment facilities. Citizens broadly support these measures — a testament to collectivism in Korean culture.
Civic engagement and enthusiasm for fighting the pandemic is also remarkable in Taiwan, where the public has been collaborating with the government on a town hall-style website called vTaiwan. Citizen-led initiatives, like a GPS-powered tool for tracking face mask supplies, have been applied nationwide.
Meanwhile in Europe, eight major telecom companies, including Vodafone and Orange, have been supplying anonymized metadata to the European Commission to model and predict the spread of the virus. In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is soliciting GPS data from mobile advertising companies rather than carriers themselves.
The two tech giants, Apple and Google, made it easier for health agencies to join its coronavirus exposure notification system, creating a new built-in app within iOS and Android. The app provides real-time notification to users when they are exposed to a sick person.
Virus-killing robots may roam the streets
GPS-based robots, drones and autonomous cars are being deployed to sanitize outdoor spaces, transport medical equipment, and announce safety information to the public.
Robots began rolling around the streets of Wuhan, the original epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak, as early as January. China was the first to deploy robots of this type, but India, Spain, France and other countries have followed in their footsteps. In addition to the chemical-spray approach, some companies are pioneering mobile disinfection robots armed with large ultraviolet-C germicidal lights.
Apollo, the autonomous vehicle company of multinational internet giant Baidu, has partnered with Chinese self-driving startup Neolix to transport food and supplies to Beijing Haidian Hospital. Every morning at 10:30 a.m, an unmanned car delivers meals to about 100 frontline workers. The process eliminates direct contact, protecting the safety of food service workers, hospital staff, and patients.
Zhangjiang Artificial Intelligence Island
A fleet of Apollo and Neolix’s unmanned cars is also responsible for disinfecting all roads on Zhangjiang Artificial Intelligence Island, an 100,000-square-meter industrial complex in Shanghai. The vehicles are loaded with up to 160 liters of spray disinfectant and can cover the island’s entire road system in about half an hour.
The vehicles at Zhangjiang AI double as nighttime surveillance bots. They patrol the island and make sure that guests are adhering to coronavirus protocols, alerting security personnel if they note suspicious activity.
In addition to using drones to spray disinfectant, South Korea’s government has leveraged the technology for public announcements. On July 4, 300 drones lit the sky above Seoul in a show of appreciation for frontline workers. The drones executed a 10-minute synchronized show that included images of face masks, hand washing, and social distancing.
Summary
As COVID-19 continues to ravage the globe, governments rely on GPS to track the virus, contain it, and fight against it. The battle against coronavirus is still being waged on a global scale, utilizing GPS as a weapon along with many other existing technologies.
The pandemic changed the world forever, and it also highlighted the power of tracking and monitoring location of people and machines. It is another testament to the immense reliance on GPS technology in our modern world.
The increased deployment of these technologies necessitates increased security measures, especially when public health is on the line. Regulus Cyber offers GPS Cybersecurity software. To read more about it, visit www.regulus.com.
On Feb. 3, drone company Quaternium broke its own record for long flight time with a hybrid-fuel electric drone.
The Quaternium HYBRiX UAV took off at 08:52 a.m. in Valencia, Spain, and landed at 17:02 p.m., performing a stationary flight of 490 minutes.
The new endurance record of 8 hours and 10 minutes of non-stop flight time was accomplished with an experimental version of the company’s HYBRiX 2.1 drone, which carries 25 kilograms of maximum take-off weight.
Six years ago, the startup Quaternium developed its first hybrid fuel drone, inspired by hybrid cars from the automotive industry.
In 2015 the company flew its hybrid drone, the multirotor HYBRiX, for 3 hours and 10 minutes. According to the company, Hybrid multirotors multiply flight time more than 10 times compared to electric solutions.
The company has published a flight video with the demonstration of the record.
Most multicopter drones provide flight times of 25 to 40 minutes, with the pilot needing to carry multiple batteries into the field.
The HYBRiX project is supported by the European Union through its Horizon 2020 innovation program, which fosters disruptive projects in innovation, excellent science and industrial leadership. The project has received awards from institutions such as AUVSI, CDTI and the Spanish government.
The Quaternium team was motivated to develop a long-endurance drone because it will help first responders and and firefighters to identify hot spots and search for survivors in the event of a catastrophe, the company said in a press release.
The use of drones for precision agriculture is gaining momentum because of their capability to deliver the most updated information fast and efficiently. UAVs are transforming how agriculture is done. By implementing drone technology, farms and agriculture businesses can improve crop profit, save time, and make land-management decisions that improves long-term success.
A few weeks ago Quaternium tested its innovative HYBRiX drone to spray fertilizers in the orange fields near Valencia, Spain. With its system of longer-than-average flight-duration, farmers have the opportunity to monitor and spray their fields precisely and rapidly.
“I am really glad to see that the entire spraying process in my orange fields has hardly taken six hours,” said farmer Pedro Andreu while operating the HYBRiX. “With other drones, we had to spend multiple hours waiting for batteries to charge and days to finish the work.”
The test convinced Andreu to use the technology to simplify his work. He engaged farmers in the neighborhood to join him and implement this technology in their work as well.
Alicia Fuentes, Quaternium CEO, accompanied the team for the field demonstration. She noted that farmers could benefit by using precision farming technology in a variety of ways: monitoring the health of their crops, estimating soil conditions, planting future crops, fighting infections and pests, updating the health of plants, and livestock monitoring.
Hybrid fuel system. HYBRiX UAS operates using a hybrid electric-fuel system. This makes it easy to operate the multi-rotor drone through the fields of a farm for an entire work whole day by refilling the spraying tank when needed and the fuel tank every 2-3 hours. Its built-in capacity of 5 liters of fuel enables HYBRiX to surpass the flying time from minutes to 2 to 4 hours.
The powerful propulsion system of HYBRiX allows the aircraft to carry up to 10 liters of liquid, with a maximum takeoff weight of 25 kg. The combination of hybrid power with its increased range extender capacity allows the farmer to cover large acres of land without carrying uncomfortable batteries and ensure long flight time in the field with the aircraft.
Quaternium is now focused on refining this technology to extend crop protection across the country so that farmers can benefit from the outcome to make their work more efficient.
