The Smart Skies Project is a leading edge research program exploring the research and development of future technologies that support the efficient utilisation of airspace by both manned and unmanned aircraft.
The Smart Skies Project brings together specialist researchers from Boeing Research & Technology (BR&T), Boeing Research & Technology Australia (BR&TA), Insitu Pacific Ltd and ARCAA to explore the development of three key enabling aviation technologies:
- An Automated Separation Management System capable of providing separation assurance in complex airspace environments
- Sense and Act systems for manned and unmanned aircraft capable of collision avoidance of dynamic and static obstacles
- A Mobile Aircraft Tracking System (MATS) utilising a cost-effective radar and dependent surveillance systems
Smart Skies Poster
Central to the Smart Skies Project are a series of integrated flight trials to be conducted near the township of Kingaroy, Queensland, Australia. The objective of these flight trials is to characterise the performance of the developed technologies under realistic operating conditions.
The three-year, $AUD 10M dollar Smart Skies Project commenced in March 2008 and is supported by a successful bid for funding under the Queensland Government National and International Research Alliances Program.
An overview of the Smart Skies Project was published in IEEE A&ES Magazine, Vol.26(6), pp.14-23, 2011. The Authors’ pre-print version can be viewed on QUT ePrints. More articles summarising the achievements of the project will be published in the coming months.
Smart Skies Video
The Smart Skies Project was completed in February 2011. The achievements of the project are recognised through a number of awards, including:
- 2010 Engineers Australia Queensland Division Excellence Award
- 2010 Business & Higher Education Round Table Award for best research and development collaboration
- 2011 Queensland iAward
- 2011 QUT Vice Chancellors Excellence Award
For more information on the awards, see the News page.
