Small Racing Drone

Always been interested by the possibilities of the very small drone.  Here aimed at racing, and not meant to swarm to tasks with other drones.  But notably fast and autonomous.    Small means we do need to do motion prediction and avoidance well.

TU Delft scientists have created the world's smallest autonomous racing drone. The main challenge in creating the drone lies in the use of only a single, small camera and in the highly restricted amount of processing. The main innovation is the design of robust, yet extremely efficient algorithms for motion prediction and computer vision.

Drone racing by human pilots is becoming a major e-sport. In its wake, autonomous drone racing has become a major challenge for artificial intelligence and control. Over the years, the speed of autonomous race drones has been gradually improving, with some of the fastest drones in recent competitions now moving at 2 meters per second. Most of the autonomous racing drones are equipped with high-performance processors, with multiple, high-quality cameras, and sometimes even with laser scanners. This allows these drones to use state-of-the-art solutions to visual perception, like building maps of the environment or tracking accurately how the drone is moving over time. However, it also makes the drones relatively heavy and expensive. .... "