Naomi Cooper
The Air Force Research Laboratory has selected a team up of Black Sage and Spectral Sensor Solutions to research novel lidar sensing systems eyed to boost the detection and discrimination capabilities of unmanned aerial vehicles.
Black Sage said Wednesday the partnership will conduct work under the Lidar Unmanned Aerial System Detection and Discrimination program at its new Sage Works facility to evaluate systems for detecting and identifying drone threats.
The companies will perform the investigations as part of a $4.5M contract from the AFRL.
Tim Morris, program manager for LUASDD at Black Sage, said that lidar systems add another layer of sensor data to address challenges faced by radar or electro-optical and infrared sensors.
Morris said Black Sage uses a layered counter-unmanned aerial system approach that fuses data from multiple sensors such as radar, EO/IR cameras and passive radio frequency sensors.
S3, on the other hand, develops long-range lidar technologies that use multiple active sensing techniques. The company’s Eye safe Visualization Evaluation and Analysis Lidar platform supports efforts against chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear and explosive threats.
