Impact of Unmanned Aircraft Regulations on Autonomous Navigation Approaches for Indoor Multi-Rotor Applications — Survey

Demand in unmanned aircraft (UA) technologies for real-world applications have increased over the recent years, driving national aviation authorities to implement weight dependent regulations across all UA operations. Introduction of registration for UA weighing 250g and above as well as other regulatory requirements for heavier UA systems have motivated manufacturers to consider weight as a part of design requirement. Although UA weight is not a major concern for most outdoor applications, weight requirements imposed by aviation authorities further emphasizes the importance to develop smaller and lighter UA for safer indoor or urban operations in GPS denied environments. Comparison across various sensors used for autonomous UA navigation methods suggested that benefits of using vision sensors outweighs other methods since most UA are equipped with onboard cameras and thus does not require retrofitting of additional hardware. In addition, vision sensor data can potentially be used for both navigation and non-navigation tasks resulting in a productive and lightweight UA system that is able to avoid or reduce regulatory burdens for GPS denied UA operations.