A more cost-effective unattended ground sensor using commercial off-the-shelf products

The military is increasingly using sensors as part of its battlefield strategy. Sensors can be used as an alternative to placing soldiers in dangerous situations and the information that sensors collect helps leaders make better decisions. However, the cost of integrating these sensors into existing tactical networks has been a limiting factor in their adoption. Thus, the research team sought to use Android smartphones and Arduino microcontrollers, two commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) technologies, to create an inexpensive, "plug-and-play" interface to help relieve this issue. This interface was then demonstrated through the creation of a series of unattended ground vehicles (UGVs) that can be networked together in an ad-hoc wireless mesh network to collect sensor data from across an operational area. This project was broken down into two phases and the Agile development methodology was used throughout. During the first phase an interface between the Android phone and Arduino microcontroller was created and then integrated with sensors. During the second phase a robotics platform, path setting algorithm, and the ad-hoc wireless mesh network were developed. Collectively, this project demonstrated the feasibility of using open-source, commercially available parts to create unattended ground sensor (UGS) networks, thereby providing an alternative to current market offerings which are custom and proprietary in nature and therefore expensive and difficult to upgrade.