Drones have long been the eyes of the sky, but a team of researchers from the University of Hong Kong wants to take them to new heights, literally. Introducing the Aerial Elephant Trunk (AET), which is essentially a drone with a flexible arm that looks just like an elephant’s trunk.
Aerial robots have historically taken a hands-off approach when inspecting bridges, mapping terrain, or monitoring crops. Yet the University of Hong Kong team saw a gap: what if a drone could not only observe but act? “The motivation was to create a drone that could perform complex manipulation tasks in cluttered or constrained environments,” says Fu Zhang, assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at HKU.
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The AET’s arm is made from soft materials that allow it to bend and stretch without losing strength. Power is derived from a series of actuators that give it precise control, which means it can url around objects or extend into narrow gaps. “Our design draws inspiration from nature. An elephant’s trunk can be both strong and delicate, capable of lifting heavy loads or picking up a single peanut,” said Zhang.
To tackle balance issues, the researchers cooked up a control system to keep it rock-steady while the arm swings around—it’s called an Extended Kalman Filter. This thing tracks the drone’s position in real time, making sure it knows its exact spot in 3D space. For the arm’s moves, they went with a minimum-jerk planning method, focusing on smooth, predictable motions to dodge any nasty surprises. “The control algorithms are critical,” says Zhang. “They allow the drone to compensate for the arm’s dynamics, maintaining stability even when the manipulator is fully extended.”
In infrastructure maintenance, the AET could inspect a rusted bolt on a wind turbine and then tighten it, all in one flight. In agriculture, it might sample soil or pluck fruit from a tree. Search-and-rescue missions could benefit too, with the drone navigating collapsed structures to deliver supplies or retrieve objects. “We envision the AET enabling operations in environments that are too dangerous or inaccessible for humans,” says Zhang.
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