Engineers’ autonomous micro-drone scores first kill in plan to eradicate mosquitoes

Engineers at Tornyol say their autonomous micro-drone has completed its first mid-air kill, taking down a moth in a test that could bring the company closer to deploying machines designed to hunt mosquitoes.

Por qué esta historia importa ahora

Tornyol, founded by engineers Alex Toussaint and Clovis Piedallu, is developing 40-gram drones that combine smartphone microphones, ultrasonic sensors commonly found in parking-assist systems, and custom signal-processing and control software.

El contexto que mueve la conversación

“Extremely excited to announce our first air-to-air kill of a flying moth by an autonomous micro-drone,” he wrote. “This is a big step towards completely eradicating mosquitoes.”

Qué puede pasar después

A motion-capture system tracked infrared lights attached to the drone and a ping-pong ball representing the target. Sonar rendering, digital signal processing, and control algorithms were run on a computer, which then sent movement commands to the drone.

Lectura rápida para la comunidad

Toussaint said deployment of the system on embedded hardware should happen within the coming weeks.

The World Health Organization estimates that vector-borne diseases cause more than 700,000 deaths annually. Malaria alone caused an estimated 610,000 deaths worldwide in 2024, giving Tornyol’s unusual extermination project a potentially serious public-health application if it can operate effectively outside controlled testing environments.45:T12a0, Eng