Army plans to network ground robots and unmanned aircraft.

• Author: Tiron, Roxana
• Position: Army Unmanned Air

Army researchers are working on a program that would pair autonomous unmanned aircraft with ground robots.

A demonstration of this networking capability is scheduled for October, at Fort Dix, N.J., under me oversight of the Communications-Electronics Research Development and Engineering Center.

The program itself is still in the gestation period." said Charles Shoemaker, chief of robotics at the Army Research Laboratory, "What we are doing this veer is pulling together all the relevant pieces. Some of us have already been thinking about some interaction of air-ground."

NUGAS, snort for Networked Unmanned Ground-Air Sensor, would find its use for battle damage assessment, detection of suspicious packages, urban combat, or simply to cover a wide area.

"It is a way of covering a lot of real estate without having to actually maneuver around, by pairing air and ground." Shoemaker said in an interview. "Suppose that you saw a suspicious truck by the side of the road that you picked up from the air vehicle, you might then send over a ground robot with a sniffer that works with a different phenomenology man the air vehicle."

For the demonstration. ARL is providing the aerial platform-the R-MAX helicopter, developed by the Japanese compare Yamaha.

The pilotless helicopter was initially developed for crop dusting applications in Japan. It has a 70-pound payload and Is operated By remote control.

It includes Global Positioning System and laser radar to detect objects. Carnegie Mellon developed the sensor technology.

The air vehicle will be operated from the control station of the ground robot, said Shoemaker. Using the ground vehicle in conjunction with the helicopter will give the soldiers a broader selection of sensors and payloads that the airframe does not employ. "A...