Posted on 02/15/2016 6:54:33 PM PST by BenLurkin
After spending the past decade studying ground-nesting wasps a team of researchers from the Australian National University believe that they've unlocked the secret to the insects' uncanny homing abilities -- one they hope can be applied to future UAV development. Modern, autonomous UAVs have to be laden with high resolution cameras, GPS radios and a slew of other high-tech gadgetry in order to know where they are and where they're going. Wasps, on the other hand, only need their compound eyes and a daily refresher flight.
(Excerpt) Read more at engadget.com ...
Just a minor point. Current day writers assume everyone knows what an acronym stands for— they don’t. The article should have simply stated this in a sentence: “unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV).” But then again most writers never learned it.
They’ve been working on this for quite some time. Back in WWII, they experimented with using wasps as navigators in B-17 Bombers.
“Pilot to navigator. Pilot to navigator. What is our current position?”
“Bzzzzz. Bzzzzz. Bzzzzz.”
“What the hell did he say? ‘Bzzzzz’? Where is that? Andy, can you understand him?”
“Well, Skipper, I think he said we’re by a tree.”
“That’s it! Try the duck.”
White Anglo-Saxon Protestants because #patriarchy! (Sorry, I had to! It’s too tense here lately!)
Flying Fish (read to the part about the bats...)
Excellent point. Until you mentioned it, I had no idea what UAV stood for.
That was hilarious. Thanks!
The Coast Guard actually piloted (no pun intended) a program to use pigeons for search and rescue operations by housing them in plexiglass cupolas on the underside of S&R helicopters with a little switch they would peck when they sighted flotsam on the water. Google, "Project Sea Hunt,"
“...failing to show the ‘can-do’ spirit you want in your night-flying combat mammal.” One of the funniest lines of all time. :-)
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