Crewless Aircraft State Estimation for Safe Target Interaction

Solution Overview

Problem

Existing drones face safety risks when interacting with recognition targets such as animals or people due to unpredictable states, leading to potential attacks, collisions, or missed shots.

Innovation Solution

A crewless aircraft equipped with a state estimation unit to analyze camera images and motor drive signals to determine the state of the recognition target, and an action determination unit to adjust its actions accordingly, such as ascending, landing, or hovering, to ensure safe interaction.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Reliability

If a drone interacts with a recognition target without state estimation, then the interaction can proceed without complex processing, but the drone cannot safely respond to unpredictable states such as attacks or collisions

Engineering Contradiction:

Improveinteraction safetyVSAvoidprocessing complexity

Core Design Contradiction:

ReliabilityVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The system performs preliminary state estimation of the recognition target before executing interaction actions. The state estimation unit analyzes the target's state in advance, allowing the drone to proactively determine safe interaction strategies and avoid dangerous situations before they occur.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #10Preliminary action

Solution Approach 2:

The system continuously monitors the recognition target's state and feeds this information back to the action determination unit. This closed-loop feedback mechanism enables real-time adjustment of interaction actions based on the target's current state, ensuring safe and adaptive interaction.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #23Feedback

2Measurement precision

If the drone uses instantaneous sensor information for state estimation, then the processing is simpler and faster, but the estimation results contain errors and are unstable

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvestate estimation accuracyVSAvoidprocessing time

Core Design Contradiction:

Measurement precisionVSLoss of time

Solution Approach 1:

The system performs preliminary state estimation of the recognition target before executing interaction actions. The state estimation unit analyzes the target's state in advance, allowing the drone to proactively determine safe interaction strategies and avoid dangerous situations before they occur.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #10Preliminary action

Solution Approach 2:

The system continuously monitors the recognition target's state and feeds this information back to the action determination unit. This closed-loop feedback mechanism enables real-time adjustment of interaction actions based on the target's current state, ensuring safe and adaptive interaction.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #23Feedback

Data Source

PatentUS20250285445A1Crewless aircraft and control method

Publication Date: 2025.09.11 SONY GROUP CORP

AI summary

The present disclosure relates to a crewless aircraft that enable safe interaction with a recognition target. The crewless aircraft includes a state estimation unit that estimates, based on at least one of a camera image shot of the recognition target by a camera or a drive signal of a motor for a flying operation, a state of the recognition target, and an action determination unit that determines an action of the crewless aircraft based on the estimated state of the recognition target.