System Simulation for Autonomous UAV Design.

The use of drones or Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) in commercial applications has the potential to disrupt several industries. To cover effectively such a broad spectrum of applications, UAV integrators require the ability to develop drone platforms that meet the requirements specified for the missions to accomplish. Simulation-based analysis are essential to this extent, as they provide useful means to explore the design space and select the most promising concepts that comply with requirements and specifications. This paper presents the use of system simulation techniques to model the performance of an octocopter UAV following specifications shared in the frame of the European research project COMP4DRONES. Batteries, electric motors, propulsion and flight behavior are simulated in the context of a mission including seismic sensors droppings. The performance model was then integrated in a co-simulation framework to include navigation sensors, mission environment, and guidance and control algorithms to simulate the drone\u0027s behavior when faced with obstacles avoidance and cluster flight.