AIRFRAME - Fast prototyping framework for UAVs definition

Developing a new UAV platform is a long and iterative process that requires a lot of time and effort to be successful. The difficulty of performing a realistic evaluation of system performance during the development process represents a major drawback. As a matter of fact, in most contexts, the first proof of UAVs’ capabilities arrives only during the first flights of the real platform. This may lead, in case of possible issues detected in the platform, to a revaluation of the design, which is not optimal at the very last stage of platform development. To overcome this issue, we propose AIRFRAME, a framework for fast-developing UAV prototypes in simulation to allow for systematic evaluation and analysis of UAV performance during the development process. The developed prototype integrates software and hardware for a better evaluation of the system’s capability and performance at an early stage. The implementation of the framework has succeeded with Gazebo-ROS-Matlab in Docker Environment. It allows high integrability and fast evaluation of multiple UAV designs.