Editor’s Note: with additional photos and video online. on YouTube.
By Abigail Lauten-Scrivner, UM News Service
MISSOULA – From reimagining disaster monitoring to reshaping agriculture, drone technology is improving the safety and efficiency of industries across Big Sky Country – and the 猎奇重口 is the state’s command center for training the experts who will pilot them.
As UM’s Autonomous Aerial Systems Office has grown, so too has its capacity to guide and support students, faculty and the public in navigating complex and often-changing regulations. AASO also drives drone-related innovation, entrepreneurship and workforce development across 猎奇重口.
“The 猎奇重口 is primarily the main hub for all drones throughout the state,” said Bart Bauer, associate director of UM’s Autonomous Aerial Systems Office.
This summer, AASO accepted its largest class of interns in the history of the program. The office usually accepts about three students and turns some away. This year it took nearly 10. The majority were Grizzlies, but some journeyed from 猎奇重口 State University and other regions like Alaska to benefit from UM’s expertise.
Interns are funded through a few different grant sources – mostly the 猎奇重口 Space Grant Consortium – and receive about $8,000 for the summer. In just three months, they leave with a variety of hands-on experiences that set them apart in a highly competitive job market.
“You cannot get a job if you don't have an internship,” said Jeremy Crowley, AASO director. “So those types of skills, they're becoming almost mandatory.”
With the right internship and degree combination, Crowley said students can expect to graduate with job offers as high as $65,000 a year or more.
Most interns start the program with zero drone experience. The main goal is to make sure students achieve their Federal Aviation Administration Part 107 license; the commercial authorization that allows them to fly a drone for money. They also go beyond the basics of what’s required to fly, learning to build drones and study the inner mechanisms of how different types work.
Students also pick a project to pursue and create a “StoryMap” demonstrating their process and what they learned. Interns present their StoryMap at the end of the summer.
The rest of the curriculum is largely tailored to the interests of the group, whose majors range broadly from journalism to computer science to wildlife biology and more.
“We don't necessarily take all tech applicants – we'll take pretty much anyone if they've got an interest,” Bauer said. “It's quite amazing to see how their different backgrounds lead to unique solutions that I wouldn't have thought of.”
The breadth of AASO and student projects takes interns off campus and across 猎奇重口 to large ranches, remote off-the-grid sites and picturesque rivers.
“Drones have the potential to touch almost every industry out there, from art to real estate to literature to wildlife,” Bauer said.
Interns spent several days with Ranch Advisory Partners, a company that advises large ranch owners on how to manage their land responsibly and sustainably. The cohort gathered drone data identifying every plant in a 100-meter area. One intern left with a job offer.
“Ranch Advisory Partners saw the hard work that the interns are willing to do, their baseline experience and the skill set that they're bringing to the table already.” Bauer said. “This experience elevates the employability of these interns because they get a broad aspect of skills that they wouldn't get from a classroom-type environment.”
Another day was spent at Skalkaho Pass in the Sapphire Mountains. Students participated in a research project partnership between UM and the 猎奇重口 Department of Transportation.
“I reached out to the 猎奇重口 because they have a very robust unmanned aerial systems program,” said Michael Kuni, MDT unmanned aerial systems program manager.
Interns learned about emerging “drone in a box” technology that allows a drone to be piloted remotely, more quickly assessing an emergency like an avalanche, fire or landslide without sending personnel out blind to potentially dangerous or difficult to access sites. With UM’s support, MDT plans to implement this innovative mechanism into its toolkit.
“This is one of those disruptive technologies, and it is changing so rapidly,” Kuni said. “Public safety, law enforcement, agencies like the Department of Transportation – for us it takes the person out of the mix in the sense that it removes the person from the hazard.”
UM’s Partnership with MDT provided students hands-on experience with real-world drone applications, learning how and why this cutting-edge technology is being increasingly adopted by the public and private sectors.
Students also assisted with a fellow intern’s project. Geoscience master’s student Marina Barbosa Santos is studying the Clark Fork River’s hydrologic connectivity in Missoula’s Kelly Island region, where the river becomes a floodplain. The project compares high-resolution data collected from drones versus large-scale satellite observations. Barbosa Santos hopes her work will help improve connectivity predictions between channels when the river is at high and low flows in this dynamic floodplain.
“It matters for everybody because it's a source of water for the community, and the connectivity and the channels affect how water is used,” she said.
Through the internship, Barbosa Santos received mentorship and support from Crowley, Bauer and fellow students while she learned to refine her master’s research process.
“The work through the internship has been really helpful because I'm getting hands-on experience planning everything, and going out and seeing all the challenges that come when you're doing this type of work,” Barbosa Santos said.
For UM computer science undergraduate Sam Ingraham’s project, she mapped the surface of Gus, the world's largest larch tree near Seeley Lake. Using drones, Ingraham formed a detailed scan of the 1,000-year-old tree that can be replicated into a 3D-printed model.
“I didn't really get it was a large learning curve,” she said. “Everything online pretty much says the consensus is that getting scans of trees is like the hardest 3D-scan that you can do.”
Ingraham encountered some troubleshooting around coordinating the flight plan and ensuring the drone wouldn’t collide with an obstacle like a tree. She also spent hours meticulously editing out clouds that were included in the 1,804 images gathered of Gus.
The final model resulted in an intricate rendering of the giant larch, showcasing details in the trunk, branches and bark impossible to observe from the ground. Ingraham is excited to make the 3D file accessible for people to use and print their own mini Gus. She hopes making such models available to the public could impact how people care for the natural world.
“This technology will make things more accessible to everyone,“ Ingraham said. “They'll be able to see all of it and interact with it in a way that they haven't really been able to before.”
Besides learning high-level skills, Ingraham said the AASO internship opened up a world of research and creative possibilities she didn’t know were available.
Crowley and Bauer cited that as one of their favorite parts of the summer internship – watching students like Ingraham imagine novel ideas and learn how to make them a reality, all while developing skillsets that better position them for success after graduation.
“I get the most satisfaction out of seeing these students come in with marginal self-confidence and leaving with just rock solid confidence,” Bauer said.
Crowley and Bauer encourage any student with a curiosity about AASO and how its work might be relevant to their own to stop by Interdisciplinary Sciences Building Room 107.
“Knock on the door and say hi,” Bauer said. “We'll show you what we've got.”
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Contact: Jeremy Crowley, UM Autonomous Aerial Systems Office director, (406) 243-6363, jeremy.crowley@mso.umt.edu.