DJI on Wednesday unveiled the Spark drone, the smallest model the popular Chinese dronemaker has released to date. A first for DJI, the Spark can be controlled entirely through hand gestures for quick airborne selfies. Piloting it with an accompanying app allows for a broader array of maneuvers, including flight patterns like "Helix," which mimics Hollywood-style action movie helicopter shots. An optional remote control adds further control options and dramatically increases the range. Like other recent DJI drones, the Spark is capable of detecting and avoiding objects in its flight path.

LOS ANGELES - Flying a drone can be hard, with lots to learn. Drone manufacturer DJI showed a new way to do it Wednesday, with a new mini-drone that can be flown via hand gestures. Wave your hands to land it, or use other gestures to go higher or soar. The DJI Spark, available in June for $499, was debuted at a media event in New York, where everything DJI said it could do worked flawlessly. In one taped demo, a woman moved her hand from left to right to push the drone in those directions, and in another we saw hands go upward to inch the drone into the skies.

The new DJI Spark is much smaller than other quadcopters on the market; the body is about the size and weight of a can of La Croix. It arrives in mid-June for $500. It shoots HD video, has a 2-axis gimbal stabilizer on the camera, and comes with on-board software that mitigates shake and shutter roll. It tops out at 31 mph and stays aloft for 16 minutes. Not crazy-bonkers specs, but it is just so, so tiny.

DJI made a name for itself with its chunky flying Phantom drones, but within the last year we've seen the company really embrace the value of smallness. Despite numerous delays, the Mavic Pro was greeted very positively, and now the company has another small drone -- the Spark -- made for first-time pilots and drone dabblers alike. DJI likes to call the Spark the "perfect lifestyle accessory," which sounds like a stretch if we've ever heard one, but the company might not be totally off-base. After all, the Spark weighs less than a can of pop, comes in five colors, and can be controlled (at least a little) with simple hand gestures. While the Mavic Pro relied on a smartphone for most of its controls, the Spark is designed to take off from the palm of your hand and interpret your hand motions as commands.

The European Space Agency (ESA) has developed a'crash-proof' drone to fly on missions to Mars and beyond. The new drones could one day help Martian settlers explore lava tubes on the planet by mapping out tight spots that humans cannot reach. The drone, surrounded by a protective spherical cage and equipped with thermal cameras, deliberately bumps into its surroundings in order to build a 3D-map. The European Space Agency (ESA) has developed a'crash-proof' drone (pictured) to fly on missions to Mars and beyond. The ESA has been testing equipment, techniques and working methods in caves for space missions for many years.

Is it just a new version of the model aircraft that decades of schoolchildren have flown in their backyards and parks with little harm to people or property? Or is it a far more dangerous, often much more substantial, piece of machinery that can fly thousands of feet in the air, requires little or no training to get off the ground and can cause serious damage? And that's a problem because, as a federal appeals court noted last week, the Federal Aviation Administration doesn't have the authority to regulate model aircraft. This means the FAA must drop its 18-month-old requirement that owners of large recreational drones (defined as between 0.55 pound and 55 pounds) register with a federal database before they take to the air and possibly blunder into the path of a commercial jet. Congress must fix this, and quickly.

In what is likely a warning to nuclear-armed North Korea, the U.S. military on Wednesday showed off to media its Global Hawk surveillance drone, which is temporarily deployed to its Yokota Air Base in western Tokyo. The massive drone, with a wingspan of about 40 meters and a length of about 15 meters, can fly for long durations at altitudes higher than manned aircraft. The main focus of the deployment is believed to be to collect surveillance data on the North's nuclear- and missile-related facilities as well Chinese military activity in the Western Pacific. The aircraft is one of five Global Hawks sent to Yokota from their home base in Guam to avoid the harsh summer typhoon season that annually hits the Pacific island. The drones are scheduled to operate out of Yokota until the end of October.

Teen scientists use machine learning and neural networks to detect and diagnose diseases, track space debris, design drones and justify conclusions at Intel ISEF 2017. While sentient computer beings like HAL from the classic 2001: A Space Odyssey or Samantha from the 2013 film Her may still be on the distant horizon, some forms of artificial intelligence (AI) are already improving lives. At the 2017 Intel International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) – where nearly 1,800 high school students gathered to present original research and compete for more than $4 million in prizes – the next generation of scientists used machine learning and artificial neural networks to find solutions to some of today's most vexing problems. "AI is critical to our future," said Christopher Kang, a budding computer scientist from Richland, Washington, who won an ISEF award in the robotics and intelligent machines category. "Humans have a limit as to how much data we can analyze," he said.

Drone owners may not have to register their machines with the Federal Aviation Administration, but users of a DJI model will experience restrictions if they do not verify their craft with the manufacturer. The China-based firm has announced it will introduce a new application activation process for users that provides the necessary information to power the drone. For those who do not comply, their unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) will experience camera malfunctions and flight will be limited to a 164-foot (50m) radius up to 98 feet (30m) high. Anyone who owns or purchased a DJI drone'will have to log in once when you update the new version of DJI GO or GO 4 App,' DJI said. 'If this activation process is not performed, the aircraft will not have access to the correct geospatial information and flight functions for that region, and its operations will be restricted if you update the upcoming firmware,' the firm continued.

Drones have the potential to play a big role in protecting endangered species, with a number of trials being conducted to investigate how small aerial surveillance aircraft can be used to combat poaching. The latest effort involves the use of artificial intelligence software to quickly identify poachers and animals in drone footage, in an attempt to better protect elephants and rhinos. Developed by Neurala, the software will be used by the Lindbergh Foundation in its efforts to combat poaching. It's designed to keep an eye on video as it's streamed back to researchers from drones in the field and identify animals, vehicles and poachers in real time without any human input. The software can analyze regular or infrared footage, so works with video taken day or night.