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Design and Field Evaluation of a Mission Specialist Interface for Small Unmanned Aerial Systems

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Abstract

This article describes a small unmanned aerial system (sUAS) interface that allows untrained responders acting in a Mission Specialist role to effectively coordinate with a Pilot and directly control the UAS payload. Currently, responders view the same interface as the Pilot and give verbal directions for navigation and payload control. Field experiments with 26 experts in chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear response evaluated two interfaces for a chemical train derailment incident staged at Disaster City®. Responder participants had their own role-specific tablet display: one interface passively filtered Pilot-only artifacts from the payload camera video feed; the second interface added responder-specific indicators and information and allowed the participants to actively control the payload pan, tilt, and zoom and to take pictures. A majority of responders reported greater role empowerment for similar tasks using the responder-specific interface. This article demonstrates that a responder-specific interface is preferred by untrained responders instead of viewing the same interface as the Pilot in sUAS.

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Data Availibility

The data sets generated during and/or analysed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grants: IIS-1143713, EAGER: Shared Visual Common Ground in Human-Robot Interaction for Small Unmanned Aerial Systems and 1925262, NRI: INT: COLLAB: Leveraging Environmental Monitoring UAS in Rainforests.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering, Iowa State University, 605 Bissell Road, Ames, IA, 50011, USA

    Joshua M. Peschel

  2. Computer Science and Engineering, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 291 Schorr Center, Lincoln, NE, 68588, USA

    Brittany A. Duncan

  3. Computer Science and Engineering, Texas A &M University, 333 H.R. Bright Building, 77843, College Station, USA

    Robin R. Murphy

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  1. Joshua M. Peschel
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  2. Brittany A. Duncan
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  3. Robin R. Murphy
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Correspondence to Joshua M. Peschel.

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Peschel, J.M., Duncan, B.A. & Murphy, R.R. Design and Field Evaluation of a Mission Specialist Interface for Small Unmanned Aerial Systems. Int J of Soc Robotics 14, 1423–1434 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12369-022-00872-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12369-022-00872-3

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