Renowned experts Stjepan Bogdan  from the University of Zagreb Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing and Tomislav Radišić  from the University of Zagreb Faculty of Transport and Traffic Sciences have been appointed to the Technical Committee on Unmanned Aircraft Systems at the Croatian Standards Institute . The committee's main focus is to establish and coordinate Croatian norms and standards for unmanned aircraft systems, ensuring safe and efficient integration into the country's airspace. Bogdan and Radišić bring their extensive knowledge and experience in UAS operations, safety, and airspace integration, positioning Croatia as a leader in responsible unmanned aviation.  

The recent MUZZA Science Week, held from May 19th to 21st at the Zagreb Trade Fair, successfully captivated the general public with its mission to showcase the captivating world of science. With a special focus on engaging children, the event aimed to spark curiosity and demonstrate the beauty of scientific exploration, and inspiring children to learn about science and technology.

Marko Križmančić was visiting Spain from 8th to 11th May 2023 , where he participated in setting up air quality sampling experiments for the WatchPlant project . The project partners from CSIC-IRNAS and CSIC-IDAEA placed tomato and ivy plants in three different air quality measuring stations located in Barcelona and Vic . These locations were selected specifically to monitor background pollution in suburban, urban, and high-traffic density areas. In a couple of months, the responses collected from plants in the experiment will be matched with data from air quality stations to create more precise models for future bio-hybrid sensors.

Trieste, Italy - From May 15th to May 19th, robotics enthusiasts gathered for an inspiring training event. Professor Stjepan Bogdan from the University of Zagreb Faculty of Electrical Engineering delivered a captivating lecture on the MARBLE project, while Filip Zorić conducted a tutorial on starting robots in Docker Terminal. Attendees left with valuable knowledge and newfound inspiration.

The Bounding Box Conference in Osijek was an incredible success, thanks to the outstanding organization by Protostar and the strong support of the Aerostream project. With captivating lectures, including one by Professor Bogdan titled Multi agent active perception based on Reinforcement Learning, the event surpassed all expectations. Held at the newly opened Business Centre, attendees engaged in fruitful networking and explored cutting-edge solutions. Relive the excitement at https://bounding-box.ai/ and stay tuned for future innovations!

The HEKTOR project recently reached an important milestone with the completion of the final experiments. The project focused on developing algorithms for autonomous robotic tasks in agriculture and mariculture, and the focus of the latest experiments was on the autonomous suckering and spraying in vineyards located on meliorated karst terrain. Meliorated karst, characterized by distinctive limestone and dolomite rocks, presents a major challenge for agricultural activities. The in situ testing phase of the project included a series of rigorous trials to evaluate the effectiveness and efficiency of the developed algorithms. These tests provided valuable insights into the real-world performance of the autonomous robotic systems and allowed the team to identify potential areas for improvement and optimization.

The two days of great talks, interesting panels, excellent presentation at the company booths, combined with a casual afternoon in Boogaloo flight zone, are behind us. On a small closing ceremony held at the Alumni club at FER, professor Bogdan thanked all involved for being a part and contributing to DroneDays. Until next edition, feel free to check out the photo gallery at the DroneDays website to relive these two awesome days. Thank you all and until next time!

Like last year, we are organizing the UAV Competition at the International Conference on Unmanned Aircraft Systems (ICUAS) . The competition is organized through two phases, with the final phase being held alongside the Conference in Warsaw, Poland in June. This year, the competition is organized by FER, LARICS and CATEC through AeroSTREAM and METRICS projects. Almost 40 teams registered for the first phase of the competition, with 15 teams submitting their solutions. 5 teams qualified for the finals in Warsaw: UMIC from Indian Institute of Technology in Bombay, AIRo Lab (PAIR lab) from the Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Carrot from Chung-Ang University, SDCN lab from York University and CVAR from Polytechnic University of Madrid.    We congratulate all teams on their performance and especially to the top five teams for qualifying to the finals in Poland. See you at ICUAS'23!