Analyzing UAV-based remote sensing and WSN support for data fusion

Abstract

Recent developments in remote sensing are significantly contributing to exploration and data acquisition through improved efficiency and risk reduction. Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) are involved in a wide range of remote sensing applications, as they are rapid, efficient and flexible acquisition systems. They represent a valid alternative or a complementary solution to satellite or airborne sensors. Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN), on the other hand, have proliferated significantly in recent years thanks to their timely, cheap and extremely rich data acquisition capacity with respect to other acquisition systems. This paper analyzes current state of the art in UAV-based remote sensing and WSN support for the generation of integrated data. An architecture is proposed for the combination of these technologies and the data acquisition, communication, fusion, and presentation processes are analyzed along with the proposal of future challenges.