Drones can do some incredible acrobatics. If you were somehow a passenger on that drone and weren't a trained fighter pilot (and maybe even if you were), you'd pass out and very likely die. Drones don't do a lot of passenger carrying at the moment, which is probably for the best, but we've seen enough crazy ideas to suggest that using autonomous drones instead of autonomous cars to transport humans is probably going to be a reality within a handful of decades.* At the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), in Switzerland, a group of researchers led by Dario Floreano is already worrying about how we're going to handle personal drone flights, especially in situations where a lot of drones are trying to go in a lot of different directions at the same time. They've come up with an algorithm that allows drones to avoid collisions with each other while also not turning humans into mounds of quivering goo.

A U.S.-led coalition drone strike in Raqqa, Syria, killed three Islamic State fighters, two of whom helped facilitate the November 2015 terror attacks in Paris, the Pentagon announced on Tuesday. The third fighter killed on December 4 was involved in a foiled suicide attack plot targeting Europe in 2015, U.S. officials said. A Belgian court had convicted him in absentia. "The three were working together to plot and facilitate attacks against Western targets at the time of the strike," Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook told reporters. He said the fighters were involved in a terror network led by Boubaker Al-Hakim, who was killed in a coalition airstrike last month.

Drones will start getting digital identification certificates under a new service being launched on Tuesday that hopes to bring trust and verification to the skies. The Drone IDs will be SSL/TLS certificates from DigiCert issued through AirMap, a provider of drone flight information data, and will first be available to users of Intel's Aero drone platform. Under the system, drone owners receive the digital ID in the form of an SSL/TLS certificate when they register for AirMap services. The ID is different from the identification number issued to drone owners by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration and isn't part of any government scheme. Initially, the IDs will be used to authenticate drones into AirMap's system, which provides data about local weather and obstacles that could impede a drone's flight.

Spotted by Conflict News contributor Derek Bisaccio, this anti-drone rifle comes to us from Tasnim News, an Iranian media service. The anti-drone rifle was unveiled during a military exercise by Iran's army. Tasnim describes it as "a drone jammer, a portable electronic device used for deflecting the hostile flying objects." According to the brief description provided by Tasnim, the drone jammer can lock onto an enemy drone, and then "disrupt its operation or even hack the aircraft and force it to land safely." More pictures of the weapon are available at a Tasnim gallery.

I'll confess I was slightly confused when a GDU drone showed up at my door last month. I had never heard of this company, and it's rare that a new drone maker slips past my radar. A quick trip to the internet set me straight: GDU is the new name of ProDrone, which unveiled the Byrd to much fanfare at the last CES. Compact and relatively lightweight; the Byrd can fit in your backpack with room to spare. Interchangeable gimbals work with a few different common cameras, which means the camera is upgradeable.

There was a time when Parrot was the name in consumer drones. That's partly because, way back in 2010 when it launched the AR Drone, the DJI Phantom was still some years away. Today, the landscape is a little different: DJI now dominates the skies, while its competitors can't seem to catch a break. The French company remains unfazed by the large industry that has grown around it, and continues to do what it's always done: make fun, accessible products. That's not to say the company isn't looking forward, though.

A barely visible fog hangs in the air in a California laboratory, illuminated by a laser. And through it flies a parrot, outfitted with a pair of tiny, red-tinted goggles to protect its eyes. As the bird flaps its way through the water particles, its wings generate disruptive waves, tracing patterns that help scientists understand how animals fly. In a new study, a team of scientists measured and analyzed the particle trails that were produced by the goggle-wearing parrot's test flights, and showed that previous computer models of wing movement aren't as accurate as they once thought. This new perspective on flight dynamics could inform future wing designs in autonomous flying robots, according to the study authors.

Regarding Fear and Artificial Intelligence (AI), one question often comes up:'Will we be killed by a Terminator Doppelganger?' I don't know if this will happen eventually, but I do know that we already have robots fighting our wars. This century is therefore, the first time in human history that we engage in Unmanned Warfare. What is the current status of this'Unmanned Warfare'? What do people think about drone strikes and will terminators be the next step?

In a bid to promote the safe use of drones, the transport ministry will set up a pilot certification system involving private organizations, sources said Friday. The envisioned system will allow the ministry to evaluate the skills of pilots objectively when they seek government permission to fly small unmanned aerial vehicles over densely populated areas and other places where drone flights are restricted, the sources said. The ministry will establish certification criteria by the end of March, which will include the content of the training programs that private organizations provide to drone pilot candidates, as well as criteria for trainers and qualification examinations, the sources said. It will begin accepting applications for certification from private organizations in fiscal 2017, which begins in April. The names of certified organizations will be posted on the ministry's website.

Koichiro Otaki started taking aerial pictures of photovoltaic power stations in April 2015. At first, it was an innocent desire to capture their sheer scale and aesthetic value that motivated him, he says. Solar parks, mostly in rural, desolate areas, were also among the few places where he could practice flying a drone without having to worry about hitting people or tall structures, he says. Weather permitting, the 38-year-old freelance photographer would toss a compact drone into his backpack and venture out to the suburbs of Tokyo or up north to the Tohoku region by motorcycle, snapping away at solar panels neatly lined up along river banks, mountain slopes and even abandoned golf courses. "I was simply captivated by their geometric beauty," Otaki said of the panels.