Research and Development Projects

Hornet is a hybrid drone with quadrotor and fixed-wing flight modes combined to give vertical take-off and landing (VToL) and efficient fixed-wing cruising at the same time. Hornet doesn’t need a runway or a skilled pilot. Hornet is one of our MPhil projects funded by the National Research Council. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cu8rdGvTDYY	Smart Junction is a vision based traffic control system being developed together with the Innovation Quotient Pvt. Ltd. In the first phase, vision and off-line learning methods are used for accurate sensing of incoming traffic.
Telepresence Robot is a mobile robot with audio video connectivity with a remote user. This was built to be kept at the work place for its employees to login from outside when they have to be present at the work place. Four final year project groups involved in building this robot for the company Pulztech. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jN0u6yvkPpc&feature=youtu.be	CeyTwin is a twin-puller drone specifically designed for precession aerial surveying. CeyTwin has proven 3.8cm georeferencing accuracy in the most recent mapping assignment. It has one hour endurance to map 5km2 (500ha) area in one flight. It can be hand-launched and landed by a parachute. CeyTwin is a product of our drone startup company. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ResHjAu3XPQ
zeroMag IMU is a new inertial measurement sensor specifically developed for accurate attitude measurement in view of persistent magnetic field disturbances. zeroMag IMU is essential for aerial vehicles operating indoor or near buildings with iron structures. A few sensor fusion algorithms have been developed in this MPhil project. After the development, the sensor will be commercialized.	AC Energy Saver is a centralized control system for single floor supermarkets to reduce electricity consumed for cooling/heating. Temperatuer and humidity sensors are located at strategic placed for the central unit to measire the status, and then it issues control commands to all of the AC units in order to maintain desired temperature profile. (to be patented)
CeyBee is an ultralight multipurpose drone, which is able to fly nearly two hours. It can be fitted with mapping camera, multispectral camera, or a gimballed camera. CeyBee is hand launched and landed by a parachute. CeyBee is a product of our drone startup company. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uzepb07XlA8	AMDC (Autonomous Mine Detector and Classifier) is an automated mine detecting algorithm designed to detect and classify the type of mine and the depth below ground. It has been trained to distinguish between a number of anti-personal mines such as Rangan 99 and PK Mark1. Minelab F3 detector is used in this work, which is one of our final year projects.
Quad² is a modular hierarchical quadrotor assembly to produce a higher lift by way of using many smaller propellers. Quad² is fault-tolerant, and redundant. It gives lower I²R loss and EMI (electromagnetic interference). It also has a very low crash probability. Quad² is a 2018 MPhil project funded by the Senate Research Committee.	AUR (Autonomous Underwater Robot) is a small underwater robot designed for underwater research on localization, control, and navigation. AURobot is one of our final year projects. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PhFk7-63TV8
Hawk is a 12kg 3hr long range unmanned aerial vehicle designed and built for large scale aerial mapping and surveillance operations. Hawk was developed at the University and handed over to our UAV startup company for commercialization, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ytjax9W7oG8	RC power-tiller is a remotely operable farming vehicle developed for elderly, disabled and women to operate from a convenient place away from hot Sun. This work, which is one of our MSc projects was supported by the NSF, Sri Lanka https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sx9LSpMVNIk
RAVAN (Robotic Aerial Vehicle with Autonomous Navigation) is a twin-boom H-tail fixed wing. RAVAN was used quite extensively for research in UAV path planning, and it was one of our final year projects. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w7NFnefj1xk	APM Robot is a tracked robot with a metal sensing capability. The sensor is swung sideways as the robot moves forward. This work, which is one of our final year projects was supported by the National Research and Development Center of Sri Lanka. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7LiIJNQuFa4
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HexPack is a hexacopter for small package delivery. Propellers have been inverted to improve safety. A unique combination of guard ring and landing gear further improves safety. This drone can lift 3kg payload and fly about 20minutes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2KcI8Fed78	Elephant Fence is an electric fence designed to protect villages from elephants. The fence is remotely monitored for voltage and faults, and also operated through GSM network. Autonomous control is used using a real-time clock. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xow_iZ1opQY
DMD (Disaster management Drone) is a delta-wing drone developed for real-time aerial observation of disaster sites such as floods. Electric version was first developed, which is being converted to engine version to get 2hr endurance. It can easily lift 1kg payload. DMD takes off from a launcher fully autonomously, and landed using a parachute. DMD was funded by the UNDP https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eFOs-GWwh7M	Low-Jerk Arm is a trajectory planning algorithm for industrial robot manipulators to perform 3D motions with least amount of jerk. It has been verified that 5-3-5 spline gives the lowest jerk. This work was carried out in one of our MSc projects.