Flying robot echolocates like a bat to avoid banging into walls

A simple buzzer and some microphones can help drones navigate and map their surroundings, much like bats use sound to see in the dark.

To Alex Wilkins

Drones can use a simple buzzer and microphone setup to guide themselves and map their environment via echolocation, much like bats use sound to see things in the dark. .

For a robot to be able to move autonomously, it must determine where it is in space and whether there are obstacles in its path. This is usually done using GPS sensors, cameras, or devices that use radio waves or lasers, but these can be too heavy for small robots…