Drone and Controller
HD CAMERA
An HD camera will be used on our drone to examine hives affected by Coloney Collapse Disorder. The ability to look closely at a hive to examine it for differences from other hives will play a vital role in the future of our project. Our project may require examining the hive from greater distances, thus, it will be necessary to obtain clear picture streaming to our computers for examination.
TELEMETRY SENSORS
We know that our drone uses sensors to calculate wind speeds so adjustments can be made to maintain stable hovering and prevent the drone from drifting away. A special monitor may be required to pull such wind data for analysis, as another possible dimension for our project involves measuring wind speeds. This will help us understand the effects of weather conditions on the flight patterns of the bees. Equipment such as this would provides important information regardless of the focus of the project.
Payload Compartments
An idea still under consideration is to drop bees from the drone down onto a specific location. This would require a complicated piece of equipment added on because it would need to be large enough to hold a significant amount of bees comfortably, be light enough to not adversely affect the drones flight time, and be compatible with the controller used for the drone to be precisely operated by hand from the ground.
Drone in flight
Update 11/30:
Our group decided against using the HD camera and the payload compartment as a part of the Bee Team drone. The payload compartment would be unnecessary because the sensors we are using are not bulky enough to need a special compartment, and the HD camera is not relevant due to the direction that we took.
Adafruit Si7021 Temperature and Humidity Sensor Breakout Board
A temperature and humidity sensor would be necessary for observing microclimates. The Si7021 gives print temperature and humidity readings near the drone to provide us with accurate readings of the climate and to help us determine if disease or fungus is more easily transmittable near a hive.
Adafruit FLORA 9-DOF Accelerometer/Gyroscope-LSM9DSo-v1.0
The FLORA 9-DOF sensor is the other sensor our group added to our drone, which gives us readings on the drone’s yaw and orientation in combination with the telemetry sensors. The combination of these both should give us an accurate reading of wind currents high in the air, helping us to see if the wind currents contribute to the spread of disease near a hive.
Our Sponsors
