DOD successfully tests terrifying swarm of 104 micro-drones
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Sean Gallagher
The Department of Defense has released video
of a test of swarming drones conducted in the skies over the US Navy's
test range at Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake in California. In the
October test, conducted by the Department of Defense Strategic Capabilities Office
in collaboration with the Naval Air Systems Command, three FA-18 Hornet
aircraft dispersed 104 Perdix micro-drones from onboard flare
dispensers. The drones then communicated with each other, swarmed, and
performed a series of designated "missions"—including finally swarming
in a circle around a designated point on the ground.
The sound of the drone swarm, audible from the
ground at the designated rendezvous point (at about 2 minutes into the
video below), might be described as terrifying. But we'll leave that
judgment to the reader. In the course of the test, the drones
demonstrated advanced swarm behaviors, including self-healing
communications, self-adapting formation flying, and collective
decision-making.
The battery-powered Perdix drones were developed at MIT's Lincoln Labs and
can be largely produced with a 3-D printer. "Due to the complex nature
of combat, Perdix are not pre-programmed synchronized individuals, they
are a collective organism, sharing one distributed brain for
decision-making and adapting to each other like swarms in nature,”
Strategic Capabilities Office Director William Roper explained in a
statement about the test. “Because every Perdix communicates and
collaborates with every other Perdix, the swarm has no leader and can
gracefully adapt to drones entering or exiting the team.”
Perdix began as an MIT student project and
was pulled into Lincoln Labs for defense modification, science
modification, and testing back in 2013. Based entirely on commercial
components used in smart phones and 3D-printable parts, Perdix is
currently in its sixth generation of modifications. The October
air-launch test confirmed that the current design could withstand the
shock of being launched from the aircraft, buffeting at speeds of Mach
0.6, and the cold temperature of high altitude (-10 degrees Celsius).
The sort of autonomy demonstrated by Perdix
has all sorts of implications going forward for military use of drones.
Since no one operator can control all of the drones individually, drone
swarms have to act on general instructions and determine how to carry
them out collectively. While the prototype drones' orders were simply to
"patrol" an area, they could conceivably be used for surveillance,
battlefield communications networks, or even attacks—imagine a swarm of
self-guiding flying hand grenades.
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