Experiments in Integrating Autonomous Uninhabited Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) and Wireless Sensor Networks

This paper is concerned with the integration and control of UAVs and wireless sensor net-works, an approach that is useful in isolated areas where communication between ground nodes might be difficult. We present the pre-liminary design for a fixed-wing aircraft carry-ing a wireless sensor node which acts as a mo-bile gateway for information gathering. Exper-iments were conducted using a low cost UAV platform to measure the range and amount of data that can be exchanged between ground-based and airborne nodes. Field test results demonstrate the feasibility of this approach and the viability of a combined UAV air and ground wireless sensor network.