The SkyTote is an

unmanned aerial vehicle An unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) or unmanned aircraft system (UAS), commonly known as a drone, is an aircraft with no human pilot, crew, or passengers onboard, but rather is controlled remotely or is autonomous.De Gruyter Handbook of Dron ...

(UAV),

tail-sitter A tail-sitter, or tailsitter, is a type of VTOL aircraft that takes off and lands on its empennage, tail, then tilts horizontally for forward flight. Originating in the 1920s with the inventor Nikola Tesla, the first aircraft to adopt a tail-sit ...

Vertical Take-Off and Landing (

VTOL A vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) aircraft is one that can takeoff and landing, take off and land vertically without relying on a runway. This classification can include a variety of types of aircraft including helicopters as well as thrust- ...

)-fixed wing hybrid plane, which attains the advantages of both airplane designs (respectively VTOL takeoff capability and decreased energy usage). In order to control the vehicle when transitioning between vertical take-off to forward flight, an adaptive

neural network A neural network is a group of interconnected units called neurons that send signals to one another. Neurons can be either biological cells or signal pathways. While individual neurons are simple, many of them together in a network can perfor ...

controller was designed by Guided Systems Technologies and used on the vehicle. The vehicle was developed by

AeroVironment AeroVironment, Inc. is an American Arms industry, defense contractor headquartered in Arlington, Virginia, that designs and manufactures unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). Paul MacCready, Paul B. MacCready Jr., a designer of human-powered aircraft, ...

, under a contract given by the

Air Force Research Laboratory The Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) is a scientific research and development detachment of the United States Air Force Air Force Materiel Command, Materiel Command dedicated to leading the discovery, development, and integration of direct- ...

, and its primary purpose is

cargo In transportation, cargo refers to goods transported by land, water or air, while freight refers to its conveyance. In economics, freight refers to goods transported at a freight rate for commercial gain. The term cargo is also used in cas ...

-delivery. The SkyTote is special as it features a

fly-by-wire Fly-by-wire (FBW) is a system that replaces the conventional aircraft flight control system#Hydro-mechanical, manual flight controls of an aircraft with an electronic interface. The movements of flight controls are converted to electronic sig ...

system with remote control. As of August 2010, the SkyTote appears as a past product on the company websites, not as a current. Turn Key VTOL UAV Systems

References

External links

Aerovironment SkyTote

SkyTote to demonstrate high-speed flight with vertical takeoff

Guided Systems Technologies
{{AeroVironment aircraft SkyTote Mid-wing aircraft 2000s United States experimental aircraft Unmanned aerial vehicles of the United States Tailsitter aircraft X-tail aircraft Single-engined tractor aircraft Single-engined piston aircraft Aircraft with contra-rotating propellers Aircraft with fixed quad landing gear

See also

References

External links