Autonomous Target Detection and Localization Using Cooperative Unmanned Aerial Vehicles

In this chapter we present sensor implementation issues encountered in developing a team of cooperative unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance missions. UAVs that compose the cooperative team are equipped with heterogeneous sensors and onboard processing capability. The sensor information collected by each UAV is constantly shared among the neighboring UAVs and processed locally using Out-of-Order Sigma-Point Kalman Filtering (O3SPKF) techniques. Results from flight experiments support the effectiveness of the cooperative autonomous UAV technologies.