High-Altitude Balloon-Based Sensor System Design and Implementation

• Main Authors: Zhanchao Wang, Min Huang, Lulu Qian, Baowei Zhao, Guangming Wang
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2020-04-01
• Series: Sensors
• Subjects: high-altitude balloon; sensor system; Honghu Project; near space
• Online Access: https://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/20/7/2080

As a kind of large-scale unmanned aerial vehicle, a high-altitude balloon can carry a large load up to tens of kilometers in the near space for a long time, which brings a new way for the stratosphere atmospheric detection. In order to provide a suitable working environment for the near-space detection load, it is necessary to design a sensor system based on a high-altitude balloon, which is used to provide environmental temperature, height position, and attitude information, current working, and video surveillance. The high-altitude balloon-based sensor system designed in this paper had participated in the near-space flight experiment, whose total flight time was 30 h and 53 min, and the horizontal flight time was 28 h and 58 min crossing the day and night. The high-altitude balloon-based sensor system had withstood the severe environment of the near-space during the day and night, providing accurate temperature measurement, real-time altitude position and attitude data acquisition, reliable current monitoring, and comprehensive video surveillance. In the next three years, the high-altitude balloon-based sensor system developed in this paper will continue to participate in the experiment and provide support for more detection loads.