Bart Remes

When drones were not yet known by the general public, PINC.5 attendees witnessed the first public presentation of the DelFly, a Micro Air Vehicle that flapped its wings like a dragonfly. The 50 cm wide DelFly was designed and presented by a team from TU Delft.

Among them was Bart Remes, who since 2003 is project manager for the micro aerial vehicle lab at the Aerospace Faculty of the TU Delft. "When it began, 11 years ago, nobody believed in the future of these small devices," he says. "Now the micro aerial vehicle lab of the TU Delft has a central spot in the activities of the Aerospace Faculty. The research done at the lab is unique in the world. It ranges from flapping wing vehicles to hybrid aerial vehicles, as well as the smallest open source autopilot in the world, a 2 by 2 cm device."

DelFly was followed by DelFly II, half as wide, and more recently by DelFly Micro, which measures no more than 10 cm. Remes is convinced in five years time many people will carry one in their pocket that will be controlled from a mobile phone.

Remes and his team now are working on unmanned aerial systems that will work together with ground robots and pocket-sized satellites. This new research track just started at TU Delft's cyber zoo, where all kinds of autonomous systems are integrated in multidisciplinary swarms. These swarms need to solve advanced missions where information is gathered at different levels.