New Research Aims to Improve Drone Detection, Reducing Threats to Public Safety

Researchers from one U.S. and two European universities have been gathering extensive radar measurement data on drones, aiming to improve the ability to detect and identify these devices in real-world public safety applications. Specifically, the researchers measured various commercially available and custom-built drone models’ Radar Cross Section (RCS), which indicates how the target reflects radio signals. The RCS signature can help to identify the size, shape and the material of the drone. “We believe that our results will be a starting point for a future uniform drone database. Therefore, all results are publicly available along with our research paper,” says researcher Vasilii Semkin. The publicly accessible measurement data can be utilized in the development of radar systems, as well as machine learning algorithms for more complex identification. Researchers suggest that 5G base stations could made in the future to assist with drone surveillance. Read the article at Aalto University.