UAV application in ecology: Data collecting with quad-copter equipped with Arduino based measurement platform

In this paper, a measurement system for air monitoring is presented. For this purpose, a four rotor copter is designed and built. The central body of the quad-copter carries a payload with adequate sensors to monitor the level of O ₂ and CO ₂ . A main board, as part of the payload to operate the measurement equipment, is Arduino based. A wireless link, operating at f = 433 MHz is present to establish communication between the quad-copter and the ground station; to send mission and flight change information from the ground station to the quad-copter and to receive measurement results. An onboard GPS system allows a flight mission recalculation during flight time. Preliminary measurement results are presented. The setup as described in this paper presents an affordable, precise, fast, and accurate quad-copter based platform equipped with sensors to collect data while flying.