Objective-based control of an autonomous unmanned aerial vehicle

An unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) configured for autonomous flight through a physical environment, the UAV comprising:

• an image capture device;
• and
• a navigation system including an application programming interface (API), the navigation system configured to:
• expose information indicative of a behavioral objective;
• receive information indicative of a behavioral objective;
• parameterize the behavioral objective by receiving, from a third-party application, a call that sets or modifies one or more parameters of the behavioral objective, the parameters including at least one of:
• a target, a dead-zone region about the target, or a weighting factor;
• input sensor data and the one or more parameters into a multi-objective trajectory generation process to generate a proposed trajectory that most closely satisfies the behavioral objective in view of another behavioral objective or constraint;
• enforce one or more built-in safety objectives including obstacle avoidance and airframe dynamic limits as immutable constraints that are not alterable via the API;
• and
• generate control commands configured to cause the UAV to autonomously maneuver through the physical environment based on the proposed trajectory.

An apparatus comprising:

• one or more non-transitory storage media;
• and
• instructions stored on the one or more non-transitory storage media that, when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to:
• receive sensor data from a sensor onboard an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV);
• receive information indicative of a behavioral objective;
• expose parameterizations of a behavioral objective to a third-party application;
• receive a call that sets or modifies one or more parameters of the behavioral objective, the parameters including at least one of:
• a target, a dead-zone region about the target, or a weighting factor;
• input the sensor data and the one or more parameters into a multi-objective trajectory generation process to generate a proposed trajectory that most closely satisfies the behavioral objective in view of another behavioral objective or constraint;
• enforce one or more built-in safety objectives including obstacle avoidance and airframe dynamic limits as immutable constraints that are not alterable via the third-party application;
• and
• generate control commands configured to cause the UAV to autonomously maneuver through the physical environment based on the proposed trajectory.