Robotic planes flying out of new research centre

4 April 2007

Robotic planes flying out of new Canterbury University research centre

The development of an unmanned, robotic plane for farmers to collect data on animal health, crop and soil conditions, water uptake and water use is one example of the work to be done at a new multi-million dollar research centre being launched tonight by the University of Canterbury.

The new Geospatial Research Centre is a partnership between the University of Canterbury, the University of Nottingham (UK) and Canterbury Development Corporation, and is based at the New Zealand ICT Innovation Institute within UC’s College of Engineering.

Broadly speaking, geospatial research is the gathering and interpretation of geographic information through the use of new technologies such as satellite navigation devices.
Director of the Centre, Dr David Park, and four other researchers from the University of Nottingham 's Institute of Engineering Surveying and Space Geodesy (IESSG) have moved to Christchurch to establish the new centre.
“The range of actual physical environments that is available for research in the South Island within a few hours of Christchurch in terms of oceans, rain forest, glaciers, mountains, cliffs and agriculture of all types, makes it all very exciting.”

Dr Park says the centre is already trialling an unmanned aircraft fitted with a Global Positioning System (GPS), imaging systems and communications facilities.

“The idea is to develop a model which would retail for about $10,000 and which would be no more than a couple of metres in size, and packed with electronics and sensor devices.”

Dr Park says the aircraft would fly over a property and technology on board would collate and feed information to a central computer which would interpret the data and produce useful information to help manage a property more efficiently.

The new centre has received $2 million in government funding and $900,000 in regional funding. Dr Park says the centre needs to be self-supporting within two-and-a-half years.

ENDS

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