A Brief History of the Role of Inventions in the Eventual Creation of Suas

There are numerous technologies that make up today’s sUAS such as radio communication, GPS, lithium batteries, digital cameras and microcontrollers to name a few. The sUAS market would simply not exist without the development of the aforementioned components.

Evolution of those technologies goes as far back as the 1800’s when Nikola Tesla debut one of his famous inventions. In 1898, at the New York’s Madison Square Garden, Nikola Tesla showcased his remote controlled boat. He was able to demonstrate how radio communications had the ability to remotely control other devices.

Today, radio communication is now being used to remotely control sUAS at incredible distances.

Progress continued on the study of radio communication and years later in the 1960’s the Doppler Effect was discovered. This effect is best described by “the change in frequency of a wave for an observer moving relative to the source of the wave” (Dewey, 2014). This technology allowed for satellite, submarine and weather tracking capabilities and later evolved into a multi-use coordinate system we call GPS today.

sUAS today rely on GPS and other advanced tracking systems to navigate its surroundings.

Radio communication was developed even further for other applications including the ability to send digital information. In 1971, a UHF wireless data packet network connected the Hawaiian islands to the digital mainland. This wireless data transmission technology was the forerunner for the protocols that eventually created the 802.11 standard of communication. A standard that was later named Wi-Fi in 1999 by the brand-consulting firm Interbrand. This technology has become a standard in the way sUAS transmits video back to the pilot.

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Before sUAS there was Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) used for military applications. These drones, as they are referred to as, were extremely large and were primarily fixed winged aircraft used to carry large payloads for remote data collection and military strikes. They were hardly something that could be used commercially by the general public due to their size and complexity. However, in the 1980’s Lithium batteries were being developed by several physicists. Lithium batteries had many advantages; they were smaller, lighter and had a much higher energy density than any other battery on the market. Then in 1991, the first commercially available lithium battery was introduced by the company Sony. Lithium batteries made sUAS possible by allowing the aircraft to be shrunk down to a more portable and cheaper device.

Another component that shrunk in size, weight and price that made sUAS possible was the digital camera. The invention of the Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor (CMOS) sensor in 1963 by Frank Wanlass eventually went on to take the place of the Charge-Coupled Device (CCD) sensor that was widely being used at the time. CMOS sensors used up to 100x less power and could be manufactured with the same process as microprocessors making them very cost effective. The weight savings provided sUAS the ability to fly for longer periods of time and additionally it gave sUAS a market in photography.

The complexity of sUAS demanded a large amount of processing power to control its many sensors, multiple rotors, digital cameras and radio communications. On board computers would need to be much smaller and efficient to be both lightweight and powerful enough for the sUAS to be viable. Microcontrollers would end up being the answer and in 1971 engineers

working for a company called Texas Instruments (TI) created the first of its kind. Designed for embedded applications microcontrollers had a processor, ram and other components all built into a single integrated circuit. Thus, the end result was a computer that was powerful, inexpensive, mass producible, lightweight and space saving enough for small aircraft.

The culmination of the previous mentioned technologies directly lead to the creation of sUAS and their market. By the mid 2000’s, companies such as DJI and Yuneec were mass producing commercially available sUAS for worldwide consumption. Even today in 2018 sUAS are becoming more advanced and their market continues to grow exponentially.