News & Stories

Award helps drone project reach new heights

Newsroom

Centre for Forest Value PhD Candidate Sean Krisanski, is one step closer to completing his innovative drone project, thanks to a Federal Government science and innovation award.

This award, from the Australian Government Department of Agriculture, Water and Environment, will help Sean to develop an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) or “drone” which will make it possible to collect forest canopy samples more safely, at a lower cost and at a much larger scale than existing canopy sample collection techniques.

Sean said the award will support the much-needed technology to enable a wide variety of studies to occur and for the first time collect a large number of canopy samples.

“There are a few existing drone-based canopy sample collection solutions in the literature, however, I am hoping to create a simpler and lower cost solution than what has previously been demonstrated,” he said.

“I would also like to make the plans available to the public at the end of the project so that it can assist other scientists who need canopy/branch samples.”

Sean said the other aspect of the award is to develop the capability to place a sensor module in the canopy of a tree as well as retrieve it using a drone.

“I am focusing on the ability to place and retrieve a sensor in this work, with the goal of providing a modular sensor package deployment system for forest research," he said.

Some example applications might involve placing a wildlife monitoring camera near a nest or placing microphones for bioacoustics research.”

The University of Tasmania student’s PhD research looks at the development of an autonomous unmanned aerial system for under-canopy mapping of forests, as well as extracting measurements from these maps using deep-learning techniques.

“So far the feedback on the project has been very positive. Workplace health and safety has been a common concern among forest workers where dense undergrowth and rough terrain can pose a trip/slip/fall hazard,” he said.

“By using under-canopy UAVs as an alternative to manual field measurement techniques, we can help avoid such issues by simply flying over them. If a forest is severely infested with blackberry undergrowth or similar, measurement may simply be avoided in that area altogether. This is where such a system might eventually serve as a useful tool in the forest researcher’s/worker’s tool kit.”