A Survey on Autonomous and Intelligent Swarms of Uncrewed Aerial Vehicles (UAVs)

UAV swarms have attracted much attention due to their high potential to execute complex missions more robustly and effectively. Essential technologies for swarms are the family of algorithms that allow the individual agents to undertake tasks intelligently, localize their relative positions, perceive surroundings, and plan and track collision-free and low-cost trajectories cooperatively so that the swarm’s overall objectives are efficiently achieved. There is still a lack of corresponding surveys that provide a systematic summary covering the control layer to task allocation and guide application-driven researchers in leveraging these capabilities for diverse UAV swarm applications. This survey debates the essential technologies of UAV swarms, including swarm trajectory planning, task assignment, control approaches, localization, perception, and communications. State-of-the-art algorithms and recent technical advancements have been investigated to expose the potential for developing highly autonomous and intelligent swarm systems. It further explores the use cases of UAV swarms in civil applications and critically analyzes existing technologies. The paper concludes by emphasizing the challenges for autonomous and intelligent UAV swarms and outlining potential future research directions. Overall, this paper provides a contemporary and comprehensive review of UAV swarm technologies and investigates their potential to transform civil application fields and support future technology advancement.