Autonomous UAV Landing and Collision Avoidance System for Unknown Terrain Utilizing Depth Camera with Actively Actuated Gimbal

Autonomous landing capability is crucial for fully autonomous UAV flight. Currently, most solutions use either color imaging from a camera pointed down, lidar sensors, dedicated landing spots, beacons, or a combination of these approaches. Classical strategies can be limited by either no color data when lidar is used, limited obstacle perception when only color imaging is used, a low field of view from a single RGB-D sensor, or the requirement for the landing spot to be prepared in advance. In this paper, a new approach is proposed where an RGB-D camera mounted on a gimbal is used. The gimbal is actively actuated to counteract the limited field of view while color images and depth information are provided by the RGB-D camera. Furthermore, a combined UAV-and-gimbal-motion strategy is proposed to counteract the low maximum range of depth perception to provide static obstacle detection and avoidance, while preserving safe operating conditions for low-altitude flight, near potential obstacles. The system is developed using a PX4 flight stack, CubeOrange flight controller, and Jetson nano onboard computer. The system was flight-tested in simulation conditions and statically tested on a real vehicle. Results show the correctness of the system architecture and possibility of deployment in real conditions.