Check out this batteryless drone prototype that relies entirely on wireless charging

By Ed Oswald Published September 23, 2016

To get drones to fly longer and farther, manufacturers have been building ever bigger batteries. But at least one researcher is working on a drone that requires no battery at all.

Imperial College of London research associate Dr. Samer Aldhaher has found a way to power a small drone through wireless charging. The drone itself gets all the power it needs from a wireless charging unit directly beneath it. While it certainly won’t be able to fly anywhere, it at least works.

Recommended Videos

Right now Aldhaher only has been able to get the drone to fly about five inches above the wireless charging base. It also can’t move very much, mainly due to the lack of an onboard battery. If it flies too far away from the charging power, it shuts off.

Here’s the technical explanation on how this works. Aldhaher told Hackaday that the transmitter is etched into a PCB coil, which sends power wirelessly to a copper foil tape at a frequency of 13.56 MHz. This is much higher than the frequency used for most power transfer projects of this type, mainly because it allows the parts to be smaller and lighter, a necessity here.

Don’t try this at home though: these high frequencies are pushing some of the onboard transistors to the limit. The ones used in Aldhaher’s drone were created specifically for this project, and are capable of withstanding the stresses placed on them.

If you’re curious, Dr. Aldhaher has made his research paper on his work publicly available by clicking here. It’s a complicated read, but worth it if you’re interested. As a general matter, however, even though this is quite rough around the edges and limited in capabilities at present, it’s an exciting look into what could be in our future thanks to wireless charging.

Former Contributor

For fifteen years, Ed has written about the latest and greatest in gadgets and technology trends. At Digital Trends, he's…

Topics

Emerging Tech

Pangram, the gold standard for AI text checks, releases Image 1.0 tool to sniff fake pics and videos

It can identify AI-generated pictures with an astounding 99.96% accuracy on its own evaluation set.

AI image detector tool pangram

Pangram, one of the most widely used and trusted AI text detectors out there, is finally releasing its multimedia detection tools to the masses. Pangram Image 1.0, which was previously available as a research preview, is now widely available on the web, through the company’s API, and via its eponymous Chrome extension.

The company claims its image detector can identify AI-generated pictures with an astounding 99.96% accuracy on its own evaluation set. Pangram also notes that it has improved the model’s accuracy over the past few months, especially against edited images, low-resolution pictures, and pictures made by the most advanced AI models out there. As far as the competition goes, TruthScan achieves an accuracy of 96.33%, followed by AI or Not at 91.38% and Sightengine at 88.33%.

Emerging Tech

Scammers are using AI to fake missing pet photos, and what happens next is horrifying

Criminals are using AI-generated pet photos to convince desperate owners their missing animals have been found, before demanding money and making disturbing threats.

Brown and white cat meowing in Inzoi.

Losing a pet can be heartbreaking, and anyone who's experienced it knows how quickly you'd drop everything if someone called to say they'd found your missing dog or cat. Unfortunately, scammers have learned to exploit that desperation, and AI is making their tricks even more convincing.

A disturbing new scam is targeting pet owners across the UK, with criminals using AI-generated images to pretend they've found missing animals. They then demand money for their return, sometimes going as far as threatening to kill the pets if the owners refuse to pay. According to a BBC report, several pet owners have already experienced these attacks, with scammers using convincing photographs, emotional stories, and increasingly aggressive messages to pressure them into paying.

Emerging Tech

AI can turn your Instagram posts into scam that know a little too much about you

Your public social media posts could be helping scammers create emails that feel personal, and existing AI safeguards aren't doing enough to stop them.

Electronics, Mobile Phone, Phone

We've all received those suspicious emails claiming we've won something, missed a delivery, or need to urgently update our bank details. Most are easy enough to ignore, especially when they're full of strange wording or have absolutely nothing to do with us. But what happens when a scam email actually knows what you've been up to lately? That's where things get a little worrying.

Researchers at the University of Texas at Arlington have found that AI can use information people share publicly on social media to create phishing emails that feel personal. And we're not just talking about knowing your name or where you work. These emails can reference things you've recently done, places you've visited, or even something you've been looking forward to. The researchers showed how widely available AI models could gather these details and turn them into targeted messages, potentially letting scammers reach large numbers of people without spending hours researching each person individually.