SMALL UNMANNED AERIAL SYSTEMS DETECTION AND CLASSIFICATION USING MULTI-MODAL DEEP NEURAL NETWORKS

Provided is a detection and classification system and method for small unmanned aircraft systems (sUAS). The system and method detect and classify multiple simultaneous heterogeneous RC transmitters/sUAS downlinks from the RF signature using Object Detection Deep Convolutional Neural Networks (DCNNs). The method further utilizes not only passive RF, but may also utilize Electro Optic/Infrared (EO/IR), radar and acoustic sensors as well, with a fusion of the individual sensor classifications. Detection and classification with Identification Friend or Foe (IFF) of individual sUAS in a swarm, multi-modal approach for high confidence classification, decision, and implementation on a low C-SWaP (cost, size, weight and power) NVIDIA Jetson TX2 embedded AI platform is achieved.