Algorithm trains high-speed drones to avoid obstacles

News

Aerospace engineers at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) claim to have developed an algorithm to help drones navigate around obstacles at high speeds without crashing.

According to researchers, a drone trained with their algorithm flew through a simple obstacle course up to 20 per cent faster than a drone trained on conventional planning algorithms. The research has been published in the International Journal of Robotics Research.

The algorithm was tested in the context of autonomous drone racing, where crashes are a common occurrence due to unpredictable aerodynamics at high speeds, but the team believes the algorithm could be used to improve drones’ performance in time-critical operations and complex environments beyond the race course such as searching for survivors in a natural disaster.

Researchers said the new algorithm did not always keep drones ahead of competitors, in some cases choosing to slow a drone down to handle curves or to save energy in order to speed up and overtake its rival.

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