Researchers Built a Flying Squirrel Drone with Foldable Wings

Plenty of our favorite products are inspired by nature in some way. That applies to drones and robots too. This highly maneuverable drone is inspired by squirrels. It coordinates a propeller system with foldable wings through the Thrust-Wing Coordination Control (TWCC) framework to control the folding and unfolding timing of the wings. As the researchers explain, they collected data for their neural network by flying this robot through the wild.

These folks used a custom MATLAB simulation to test their algorithm before trying real world experiments. As they explain:

“By combining precise aerodynamic modeling with
an advanced control algorithm, the proposed system achieves
high tracking performance across diverse and unpredictable
trajectories, enabling the drone to operate effectively in
outdoor environments.”

[HT]