A UAV sense and avoid system design method based on software simulation

Sense and Avoid (SAA) has been identified as one of the crucial technologies for UAV safety flight. The SAA systematic design is to develop a system with sensor configuration and SAA algorithms. Normally, the SAA system integration and test can be both expensive and dangerous without carefully system and algorithms development. In this paper, we proposed a software based SAA simulation framework for SAA system configuration and algorithms design. First, the software structure and functional submodules are described. Then the SAA function is modelled and optimization based algorithms integrating environment sensing, collision evaluation and avoidance. Simulation results and analysis are provided to validate the simulation software and algorithms. By configuring the sensors and adjusting the algorithms parameters, the software based simulation framework can act as a guidance to the development of practical SAA systems.