Terminal Guidance for Autonomous Aerial Refueling Navy SBIR FY2010.1 Sol No.: Navy SBIR FY2010.1 Topic No.: N101-073 Topic Title: Terminal Guidance for Autonomous Aerial Refueling Proposal No.: N101-073-1825 Firm: Cybernet Systems Corporation 727 Airport Boulevard Ann Arbor, Michigan 48108-1639 Contact: Glenn Beach Phone: (734) 668-2567 Web Site: www.cybernet.com Abstract: Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) are serving an ever increasing role in U.S. military operations. There are many reasons why UAVs are becoming the platform of choice over manned air assets for many missions. UAVs can be used to perform dangerous missions that would be too risky with a human pilot and can operate for long durations without concern about pilot fatigue. However, overall mission length is affected by both pilot issues and the need for fuel, the UAV can only carry a certain amount before needing to be refueled. The probe and drogue method has been used successfully to refuel both manned and unmanned aerial vehicles in flight, effectively extending the maximum mission length for these platforms. Typically, refueling of UAVs is done with a human pilot teleoperating the aircraft. However, the long-term goal for UAVs (and the focus of much current research) is to make them operate autonomously. Therefore, there is a need for a system that allows a UAV to autonomously rendezvous with a refueling tanker and then correctly insert the refueling probe into the drogue. Cybernet proposes to build such a system by leveraging our exiting tracking visual tracking technologies Benefits: The proposed technology will be directly applied to performing terminal guidance during the docking phase of aerial refueling for UAVs. The technology can also track the tanker after docking to insure that the UAV moves in proper coordination with a tanker during refueling. Additionally, the technology can be applied to commercial applications for docking vehicles with trailers and parking large vehicles such as semi-trucks and airplanes. Return