Research Fellow in Bio-Inspired Enhancement of UAV Technology for Agricultural Applications

We are looking for a professional and proactive individual to undertake a short-term proof-of-concept investigation in the area of agricultural robotics, with an emphasis on (UAVs).

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles UAVs are already seeing limited use in agriculture, where fixed-wing and multi-rotor systems are used to provide valuable information on crop and soil properties. We want to go a step further by using UAVs to perform manipulation tasks in an agricultural context, such as pollination and pest removal.  This introduces significant additional challenges in areas such as flight stability, landing / perching / launching, and in the need for extremely light-weight manipulators and special-purpose end-effectors.

In order to help overcome these difficulties, we want to take inspiration from the natural world, in which very similar challenges have been solved. But rather than starting from scratch, the aim of this research is to assess the potential of augmenting existing UAV technology with biologically-inspired design features.

To explore the post further or for any queries you may have, please contact:

Dr Jordan Boyle in the School of Mechanical Engineering. 

Tel: +44 (0) 113 3432140

Email: J.H.Boyle@leeds.ac.uk