A Review of UAV Platforms for Autonomous Applications: Comprehensive Analysis and Future Directions

Unmanned aerial vehicles have evolved rapidly in the recent past for their widespread utilization for both commercial and military purposes. It is extremely desirable while designing unmanned aerial vehicles, to enable them to accomplish their tasks with little human intervention. To achieve full autonomy, an optimal and robust control algorithm that covers complete flight phases is needed. Being propriety in nature, very little information is available in the literature that encompasses all modalities related to UAV design and development. Literature is even more dreath when it comes to near-actual implementation of the developed strategies. This study provides a comprehensive and in-depth review of the most recent and state-of-the-art control and estimation techniques for UAVs, as well as an examination of the flight phases in which those controllers and estimators are utilized. This study also suggests UAV-related research that would improve the overall quality of UAV design and facilitate the transition from software simulations to hardware implementation. Through this paper, a comprehensive platform is established that not only examines the controller and state estimators used for the development of autonomous UAVs but also identifies and discusses the limitations of existing research. In conclusion, several practical implementation considerations and future research directions are proposed.