I've written a few times recently about a number of projects that are using drone technology to monitor vast environments. As you can perhaps imagine, with such endeavors, there is a huge amount of data generated, and while it presents rich pickings from a scientific perspective, nonetheless raises challenges about how that data can be managed. A recent study tested the role automation could play in both easing the burden on research teams and making data analysis more effective. The paper revealed that when teams are looking for optimal speed and accuracy that an approach that combines both machine and human can be the best. The researchers used the analysis of aerial images taken by camera drones in the Kuzikus wildlife reserve as their testing ground. The drones were used to count the wildlife in the park, and generated a huge amount of images over the course of the study.

After being stranded in the Mediterranean for three days, fear had overcome Alou Sango. "I thought that we would all die, because there was nothing left, the petrol had finished," he says of his journey from Libya. Like thousands before him, Sango boarded an overcrowded boat to escape the country's turmoil after being unable to return to his native Mali. But after days at sea the captain lost his way and, without a GPS position to give to the Italian authorities, the 100 or so passengers were losing hope. Their rubber dinghy was finally spotted by a Chinese vessel, which picked up the migrants and took them to Italy, where Sango, now 24, is studying through a Rome-based charity, Sant'Egidio Community.

Adding neural deep learning to a system doesn't have to be a complicated endeavor. AI firm Movidius has just announced a USB stick that can be plugged into existing systems to add deep learning functionality that can allow them to understand the world around them or recognize objects. It's called Fathom, and it'll cost less than 100. At the heart of Fathom is the Myriad 2 visual processing unit. This hardware is designed from the ground up to run a miniature version of a neural network. DJI uses this same chip in its drone aircraft to help them avoid obstacles in flight.

Robots are going to take all the boring jobs first. This extends even to the military, where the Navy wants to keep humans flying fighter jets in attack missions, but switch over the less exciting scouting and refueling missions to drones. Looking toward that future, the U.S. Navy has outfitted the supercarrier USS Carl Vinson with a drone control room. "We are carving out precious real estate on board the carrier, knowing that the carrier of the future will have manned and unmanned systems on it," said Capt. "This suite is an incremental step necessary to extend performance, efficiency and enhance safety of aerial refueling and reconnaissance missions that are expending valuable flight hours on our strike-fighter aircraft, the F/A-18 Echoes and Foxtrots." Here's what that means: the F/A-18 fighters the Navy uses are versatile planes, which are tasked with several jobs.

It's an approach that Portuguese start-up Pro-Drone are applying to the maintenance of wind turbines. Rather than have inspections carried out by dangling highly-qualified engineers many meters in the air, they offer an automated solution to do the job without putting anyone in harms way.

Storm damage repairs and preventative maintenance on power lines and trees are two of the most important tasks utility companies take on, requiring a large amount of time and budget. Currently, ground crews inspect assets manually or via helicopter, and then based on their observations, they'll identify areas that need attention. New technology on the horizon will help protect the grid from potentially dangerous storms and trees that pose a risk of falling. Affordable drone technology, coupled with big data software, is paving the way for a more detailed, holistic approach to storm damage assessment and utility maintenance. Through the collaboration of Edison Electric Institute and Palo Alto-based drone service company Sharper Shape, the EEI Sharper Utility partnership was formed to fast-track long-distance commercial drone inspections of power lines in the U.S. Drone flights have already found their footing in Europe with help from Sharper Shape's European affiliate and are looking to make an impact on the utility industries in the U.S. and the rest of the world.

Irish chip maker Movidius has created the world's first deep learning USB stick that can add artificial intelligence (AI) to future products from self-driving cars to robots, and drones that will learn to think for themselves. Entitled the Fathom Neural Compute Stick, the device will sell for less than 100 and will allow powerful neural networks to be moved out of the cloud and deployed on new products like robots and drones. It is the latest breakthrough for the Dublin company, which has been winning major multi-million dollar deals with Google and drone maker DJI. 'With Fathom, every robot, big and small, can now have state-of-the-art vision capabilities' – DR YANN LECUN, NEW YORK UNIVERSITY "Any organisation can now add deep learning or machine intelligence to devices using the USB stick and create products that will be accessible to broader markets," Movidius co-founder David Moloney told Siliconrepublic.com. "We've already seen how the auto industry has been outflanked by Tesla ...

A new USB stick computer uses Google's machine-learning software to give drones and robots the equivalent of a human eye, and add new smarts to cameras. It is instead designed to analyze pixels and provide the right context for images. Fathom provides the much-needed horsepower for devices like drones, robots and cameras to run computer vision applications like image recognition. These devices alone typically don't have the ability to run computer vision applications. Fathom uses an embedded version of Google's TensorFlow machine learning software for vision processing.

Last month we heard about DRU, the Domino's delivery robot that's getting a trial run in Australia. The idea may seem silly, but some new restaurant industry numbers highlight the growing importance of food delivery in an age when consumers expect online ordering and rapid to-their-door service. As consumers get more comfortable with autonomous delivery (which is on the way, despite lots of skepticism), a restaurant industry that already uses state of the art logistics services could begin adding delivery robots to their operations in the next decade. According to information provided by 1010data, our hunger for the pies is growing. Domino's, Pizza Hut, and Papa John's combined to account for 45.1% of total food delivery sales, up from 40.3% in 2014.

A brood of sidewalk drones could be rolling around the nation's capital within a year, if a District of Columbia Council member has her way. Executives from Starship Technologies, with roots in Estonia and London, say their goal is to unleash a platoon of "smart, friendly robots" that will ply sidewalks along with pedestrians to make local deliveries of groceries or small packages "almost free." The company is led by Skype co-founders Ahti Heinla and Janus Friis, and launched the effort in November. Councilwoman Mary Cheh and company officials sought to make a splash by promising one of the squat vehicles on Wednesday would deliver legislation to the council authorizing self-driving delivery robots. The little white device, which looks like an ice chest rolling on six wagon wheels, did indeed scoot its way into Council Secretary Nyasha Smith's office with the three-page bill in its compartment and reporters on its tail.