drones

In a COVID-19-ravaged business environment that's seen China's auto industry experience record drops, Geely Auto has launched an online purchase program that now includes drone delivery in select areas.

Obstacle avoidance is crucial for drones, but most systems aren’t fast enough for some situations. Now engineers at the University of Zurich have developed a new system that gives drones such fast reflexes that they can play – and win at – dodgeball.

In the past couple of years, both bomb-carrying balloons and brush fire-causing flaming kites have been launched from Gaza into neighboring Israel. A new system uses lasers to shoot them down, and it could even be used to neutralize drones.

It's that time when Brabus reveals one of the weirdest, most extreme new Mercedes-based builds of the year. This year, it's the 800 Adventure XLP truck, an AMG G63 with custom pickup bed, more power and torque, portal axles and a companion drone.

This racy-looking 12-rotor coaxial multicopter has been filmed in Croatia pulling extreme rolls and loops, and carrying a human on board. Not at the same time, mind you, but still, to see a drone of this size pulling stunts like this is astonishing.

Leonardo's Falco Xplorer drone has completed its maiden flight. The largest Remotely-Piloted Air System (RPAS) built by the company, the Falco Xplorer S/N0001 spent 60 minutes flying over the Gulf of Trapani in a dedicated fly zone.

Although drones or other robotic devices could certainly help astronauts to explore other planets, controlling the things while wearing spacesuit gloves would be a challenge. It was with this in mind that the Astronaut Smart Glove was created.

Flash Forest combines the use of drones with specially-designed pods and an accelerated seed germination process. The technology is said to plant trees 10 times faster than a single worker and at a cost that's 80 percent cheaper than traditional tree planting methods.

Having introduced a massive heavy-lift drone at the end of October, Volocopter is now looking to show what the aircraft can do through a new partnership with John Deere, with the two developing a version customized for spraying crops.

We've watched with interest as subsequent developments have allowed RoboBee to fly, swim, hover, perch and lose its tether. Now it's become the first microrobot to achieve controlled flight using soft artificial muscles.

Scientists have used a drone to calculate the weight of live whales as they're swimming.

It looks like it was designed for the zombie-apocalypse, but the TF-19 Wasp from Ohio-based Throwflame is a serious piece of kit with potentially life-saving applications. From clearing critical infrastructure to pest management and forest fire back-burns, this modern-day dragon is nobody's toy.