DETAILED ACTION
Claims 1-30 are considered in this office action. Claims 1-30 are pending examination.
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102 of this title, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
The factual inquiries set forth in Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1, 148 USPQ 459 (1966), that are applied for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
Claims 1- 4, 6 , 8-9, 11-13, 19-20, 22, and 25 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Callou et al. (US8983684) in view of Zheng et al. (US 11327477) and herein after will be referred as Callou and Zheng respectively.
Regarding Claim 1, Callou teaches a method for controlling an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) (Col.3 Line 17-23 : “To do this, the invention provides a method of dynamically controlling the attitude of a rotary-wing drone having multiple rotors driven by respective individually-controlled motors, for automatically executing a roll or loop type pre-programmed maneuver in which the drone performs a complete turn about an axis of rotation constituted by the roll axis or the pitching axis respectively of the drone.”), comprising:
obtaining an instruction for controlling the UAV; detecting that the instruction is a preset instruction for a flight action (Col.3 Line 25: “the method of the invention comprises executing a sequence of steps of: a) simultaneously controlling the motors in such a manner as to impart a prior upward vertical thrust impulse to the drone; and b) controlling the motors in such a manner as to cause the drone to rotate about the axis of rotation from an initial angular position to a final angular position with zero angular velocity, this step including a stage of subjecting the motors to open-loop control.”);
controlling the UAV to move in the flight action according to the preset instruction (Col.3 Line 27-29: “As disclosed in the above-mentioned article by Lupashin et al., and on receiving an instruction to trigger the preprogrammed maneuver, the method of the invention comprises executing a sequence of steps”)
wherein the instruction includes a first instruction configured to control the UAV to perform a dive action in a diving attitude autonomously (Col.6 Line 51-64 “the execution of a roll comprises three successive stages, namely: stage 1: prior vertical thrust impulse imparted to the drone so as to compensate for the loss of lift and for the thrust reversal that occurs while turning over, so that its altitude at the end of the roll (cp=360°) is substantially equal to its initial altitude (cp=0); stage 2: rotation imparted by sending open-loop commands directly to the motors; and stage 3: finishing off the turn by planned, servo-controlled control of the motors in such a manner as to terminate the maneuver with the same final roll angle (cp=360°) as the initial, Zero roll angle (cp=0).”).
Callou does not expressly teaches a second instruction configured to control the UAV to perform the dive action according to a received direction control instruction.
Zheng teaches a second instruction configured to control the UAV to perform the dive action according to a received direction control instruction (Fig. 8: “As shown in FIG. 7 and FIG. 8, on the basis of the above described embodiments, further, the step 335 of obtaining the flight instruction using the Euler angles specifically comprises the following steps: step 3351: rotating the movement direction cosine matrix by 90 degrees around a y axis of an aircraft-body coordinate system corresponding to the initial direction cosine matrix so as to obtain a final direction cosine matrix DCMfinal and step 3352: obtaining a control variable for controlling the attitude of the UAV using the final direction cosine matrix DCMfinal.”).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Callou to incorporate the teachings of Zheng to include a second instruction configured to control the UAV to perform the dive action according to a received direction control instruction. Doing so would optimize controlling the UAV in various operating conditions.
Regarding Claim 2, Callou in view of Zheng teaches the method according to claim 1.
Zheng teaches the detecting that the instruction is the preset instruction for the flight action , and controlling the UAV to move in the flight action according to the preset instruction comprises: detecting that a pitch angle and a throttle amount indicated by the instruction exceed a pitch angle threshold and a throttle amount threshold respectively (Col.10 Line 41-54 : “Specifically, the final direction cosine matrix DCMfinal may be converted into Euler angles, and the control variable for controlling the attitude of the UAV can be obtained through conversion of the Euler angles. There are singularities of the Euler angles in a case that the pitching angle is in a range from 90 degrees to −90 degrees. In order to avoid the positions of the singularities of the Euler angles, the vicinity of the center of the somatosensory remote controller needs to be turned into the positions of the singularities of the Euler angles so that the control is more sensitive. Therefore, the final direction cosine matrix DCMfinal is obtained by rotating the pitching angle corresponding to the movement direction cosine matrix DCMrelative by 90 degrees.”);
controlling an attitude of the UAV according to a heading angle and the throttle amount indicated by the instruction (Col.3 Line 10-12);
determining an acceleration rate of the UAV according to the throttle amount and the attitude; determining a target direction based on the pitch angle and the heading angle (Col.14 L55-67: “”);
adjusting a speed of the UAV according to the acceleration rate and the target direction to obtain an adjusted speed of the UAV (fig.8 #Step 3352); and
controlling the UAV to perform the flight action according to the attitude and the adjusted speed (fig.8 #400).
Regarding Claim 3, Callou in view of Zheng teaches the method according to claim 2.
Zheng teaches the controlling the attitude of the UAV according to the heading angle and the throttle amount indicated by the instruction comprises: determining a power direction of the UAV according to the heading angle indicated by the instruction; the power direction configured to determine a direction of the acceleration rate; determining an attitude tilt angle of the UAV according to the throttle amount; and control the attitude of the UAV according to the power direction and the attitude tilt angle (Fig.8 and 9).
Regarding Claim 4, Callou in view of Zheng teaches the method according to claim 3.
Zheng teaches the determining the attitude tilt angle of the UAV according to the throttle amount comprises: determining a mapping relationship based on a preset throttle amount and a preset attitude tilt angle; and map the throttle amount to generate the attitude tilt angle of the UAV according to the preset attitude tilt angle and the mapping relationship (Col.3 Line 5-19: “A head-less control method is further provided according to an embodiment of the disclosure, the head-less control method comprising the following steps: S1: receiving a head-less control instruction by a remote controller; S2: calculating a heading angle theta of the remote controller pointing to an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) by the remote controller in real time; S3: obtaining a rotation matrix DCM according to the heading angle theta; S4: combining an initial control variable V input by the user and received by the remote controller with the rotation matrix DCM to obtain a head-less attitude control variable C of the UAV; and S5: sending the head-less attitude control variable C to the unmanned aerial vehicle by the remote controller so that the unmanned aerial vehicle can adjust a flight attitude according to the head-less attitude control variable C.”).
Regarding Claim 6, Callou in view of Zheng teaches the method according to claim 1.
Zheng teaches the obtaining the instruction for controlling the UAV and detecting that the instruction is the preset instruction for the flight action comprises: receiving the instruction transmitted from a somatosensory controller, the instruction including a pitch angle instruction and/or a throttle amount instruction; determining the pitch angle according to the pitch angle instruction received by the UAV; determining the throttle amount according to the throttle amount instruction received by the UAV;2 detecting that the pitch angle exceeds a somatosensory tilt judgement threshold, and that the throttle amount exceeds a throttle amount judgement threshold (Fig. 1,2 and 8).
Regarding Claim 8, Callou in view of Zheng teaches the method according to claim 2.
Callou teaches before controlling the UAV to move in the flight action according to the preset instruction, the method further comprises: determining that the UAV passes a safety inspection based on environmental data of the UAV (Fig.4 #46),
Zheng teaches wherein the environmental data includes one or more of altitude, brightness, positioning data or environmental obstacles (Fig.3 #26 and 25).
Regarding Claim 9, Callou in view of Zheng teaches the method according to claim 2.
Callou teaches the instruction comprises the second instruction configured to control the UAV to perform the dive action according to the received direction control instruction (Col.7 Line 44-52), and wherein the controlling the UAV to move in the flight action according to the preset instruction comprises: controlling the UAV to enter an jumping action (fig.4 #50).
Regarding Claim 11, Callou in view of Zheng teaches the method according to claim 9.
Callou teaches the first trigger instruction represents an interaction device is touched, dropped, or toggle (Col.7 Line 44-51); and/or
Zheng teaches the second trigger instruction represents the pitch angle at which the somatosensory controller is dropped is greater than the first threshold (Fig.8).
Regarding Claim 12, Callou in view of Zheng teaches the method according to claim 9.
Zheng teaches the method further comprises: control the UAV to exit the jumping action when receiving a third trigger instruction; wherein the third trigger instruction represents the pitch angle at which the somatosensory controller is raised is greater than the second threshold (Col. 3 Line 24-35).
Regarding Claim 13, Callou in view of Zheng teaches the method according to claim 1.
Zheng teaches the instruction comprises the second instruction configured to control the UAV to perform the dive action according to the received direction control instruction, and wherein the controlling the UAV to move in the flight action according to the preset instruction comprises: controlling an attitude of the UAV to flip along a first axis so that the UAV enters the diving attitude; and controlling the attitude and/or flight direction of the UAV to move in the dive action according to the received direction control instruction, wherein a magnitude of a descending acceleration of the UAV along a direction of gravity is related to the attitude and the flight direction of the UAV (Col.9 Line 5-29: “In order to execute flip maneuvers of the roll or loop type, specific commands are provided that are represented by the block 100 operated either on command from the user 74 or on the basis of external commands (Switch 102), e.g. commands generated by the scenario of a video game being executed by the user's remote control appliance. Under Such circumstances, the command as generated automatically is transmit ted to the drone together with the piloting signals. The block 100 serves to control the three above-mentioned is stages that describe the execution of the maneuver: stage 1 (vertical impulse): via a link 104 to the block 94 for calculating climb speed setpoints; stage 2 (rotation with open-loop control): via a direct link 106 to the motors 62, the motors being decoupled from 20 the various servo-control loops by the switch represented diagrammatically at 108; and stage 3 (planned rotation under servo-control): by a link 110 to the block 72 for calculating angle setpoints, which setpoints are calculated in the manner explained 25 below as a function of a predetermined model that describes the behavior of the drone during the planned rotation stage.”).
Regarding Claim 19, Callou teaches a UAV (Fig.1 #10), comprising:
a power assembly (Fig.5 #62);
and one or more processors, operating individually or in coordination, configured to control an operation of the power assembly to: control an attitude of the UAV to flip along a first axis so that the UAV enters a diving attitude (Col.3 Line 20-23: “”);
Callou does not expressly teaches control the attitude and/or flight direction of the UAV to move in a dive action according to a received direction control instruction wherein a magnitude of a descending acceleration of the UAV along a direction of gravity is related to the attitude and the flight direction of the UAV, and during moving in the dive action, the UAV is shielded from the throttle instruction.
Zheng teaches control the attitude and/or flight direction of the UAV to move in a dive action according to a received direction control instruction wherein a magnitude of a descending acceleration of the UAV along a direction of gravity is related to the attitude and the flight direction of the UAV, and during moving in the dive action, the UAV is shielded from the throttle instruction (Col.9 Line 5-29: “In order to execute flip maneuvers of the roll or loop type, specific commands are provided that are represented by the block 100 operated either on command from the user 74 or on the basis of external commands (Switch 102), e.g. commands generated by the scenario of a video game being executed by the user's remote control appliance. Under Such circumstances, the command as generated automatically is transmit ted to the drone together with the piloting signals. The block 100 serves to control the three above-mentioned is stages that describe the execution of the maneuver: stage 1 (vertical impulse): via a link 104 to the block 94 for calculating climb speed setpoints; stage 2 (rotation with open-loop control): via a direct link 106 to the motors 62, the motors being decoupled from 20 the various servo-control loops by the switch represented diagrammatically at 108; and stage 3 (planned rotation under servo-control): by a link 110 to the block 72 for calculating angle setpoints, which setpoints are calculated in the manner explained 25 below as a function of a predetermined model that describes the behavior of the drone during the planned rotation stage.”).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Callou to incorporate the teachings of Zheng to include control the attitude and/or flight direction of the UAV to move in a dive action according to a received direction control instruction wherein a magnitude of a descending acceleration of the UAV along a direction of gravity is related to the attitude and the flight direction of the UAV, and during moving in the dive action, the UAV is shielded from the throttle instruction.
Doing so would optimize the UAV operation.
Regarding Claim 20, Callou in view of Zheng teaches the method according to claim 19.
Zheng teaches the instruction comprises the second instruction configured to control the UAV to perform the dive action according to the received direction control instruction, and wherein the controlling the UAV to move in the flight action according to the preset instruction comprises: controlling the UAV to enter an jumping action (Fig.8 #400).
Regarding Claim 22, Callou in view of Zheng teaches the method according to claim 20.
Zheng teaches the method further comprises: control the UAV to exit the jumping action when receiving a third trigger instruction; wherein the third trigger instruction represents the pitch angle at which the somatosensory controller is raised is greater than the second threshold (Col.10 L 41-54).
Regarding Claim 25, Callou in view of Zheng teaches the method according to claim 19.
However, as velocity increase so does the aerodynamic drag on the UAV while going down and hence would have been obvious to an ordinary person skilled in the art to include the obvious feature of the descending acceleration of the UAV along the direction of gravity is negatively correlated to a speed of the UAV along the direction of gravity.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Callou and Zheng to incorporate the teachings of obviousness rational to include the descending acceleration of the UAV along the direction of gravity is negatively correlated to a speed of the UAV along the direction of gravity. Doing so would optimize the UAV operation.
Claim 7 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Callou in view of Zheng in further view of Callou et al. (US20130173088) and herein after will be referred as Callou’088 respectively.
Regarding Claim 7, Callou in view of Zheng teaches the method according to claim 2.
Callou’088 teaches the adjusting the speed of the UAV according to the acceleration rate and the target direction comprises: determining whether the target direction corresponds to a direction of a current speed of the UAV (Para [0088]); if yes, maintaining the direction of the current speed according to the acceleration rate (Para [0083]); and if no, adjusting the current speed according to the acceleration rate until the direction of the current speed corresponds to the target direction (Para [0082]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Callou and Zheng to incorporate the teachings of Callou’088 to include the adjusting the speed of the UAV according to the acceleration rate and the target direction comprises: determining whether the target direction corresponds to a direction of a current speed of the UAV (Para [0088]); if yes, maintaining the direction of the current speed according to the acceleration rate (Para [0083]); and if no, adjusting the current speed according to the acceleration rate until the direction of the current speed corresponds to the target direction. Doing so would optimize the operation of UAV.
Claims 10, 21, 23, and 24 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Callou in view of Zheng in further view of Martin (US8214088) and herein after will be referred as Martin respectively.
Regarding Claim 10, Callou in view of Zheng teaches the method according to claim 9.
Martin teaches wherein the preset instruction comprises the first trigger instruction and/or a second trigger instruction, wherein trigger devices or trigger types of the first trigger instruction and the second trigger instruction are different (col.2 Line 58-67).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Callou and Zheng to incorporate the teachings of Martin to include the preset instruction comprises the first trigger instruction and/or a second trigger instruction, wherein trigger devices or trigger types of the first trigger instruction and the second trigger instruction are different. Doing so would optimize the operation of UAV.
Regarding Claim 21, Callou in view of Zheng teaches the method according to claim 20.
Callou does not expressly teaches the preset instruction comprises a first trigger instruction and/or a second trigger instruction, wherein the first trigger instruction represents that the interaction device is touched, dropped, or toggle; and/or the second trigger instruction represents the pitch angle at which the somatosensory controller is dropped is greater than the first threshold.
Martin teaches the preset instruction comprises a first trigger instruction and/or a second trigger instruction, wherein the first trigger instruction represents that the interaction device is touched, dropped, or toggle; and/or the second trigger instruction represents the pitch angle at which the somatosensory controller is dropped is greater than the first threshold (Col.2 Line 58-67).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Callou and Zheng to incorporate the teachings of Martin to include the preset instruction comprises a first trigger instruction and/or a second trigger instruction, wherein the first trigger instruction represents that the interaction device is touched, dropped, or toggle; and/or the second trigger instruction represents the pitch angle at which the somatosensory controller is dropped is greater than the first threshold. Doing so would optimize the UAV operation.
Regarding Claim 23, Callou in view of Zheng teaches the method according to claim 19.
Zheng teaches the controlling the attitude and/or flight direction of the UAV to move in the dive action according to the received direction control instruction comprises: determining a target direction according to a pitch angle information of a somatosensory controller (Col.14 Line 55-67).; and
Martin teaches controlling a nose of the UAV to face the target direction according to the target direction and the current flight direction of the UAV (Col.5 L40-52).
Regarding Claim 24, Callou in view of Zheng teaches the method according to claim 19.
Martin teaches during moving in the dive action, a thrust generated by the UAV offsets at least a part of an air disturbance torque to maintain the attitude or orientation of the UAV (Col.5 Line 40-52).
Claims 26-27 and 29-30 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zheng in view of Callou.
Regarding Claim 26, Zheng teaches a somatosensory controller (Fig.3), comprising
an attitude sensor configured to obtain an attitude of the somatosensory controller (fig.3 #24); and one or more processors (#23 Fig.3), operating individually or in coordination, configured to control an UAV to:
Callou teaches control an attitude of the UAV to flip along a first axis so that the UAV enters a diving attitude; and control the attitude and/or flight direction of the UAV to move in a dive action according to a received direction control instruction, wherein a magnitude of a descending acceleration of the UAV along a direction of gravity is related to the attitude and the flight direction of the UAV, and during moving in the dive action, the UAV is shielded from the throttle instruction (Col.12 Line 1-20).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Zheng to incorporate the teachings of obviousness rational to include control an attitude of the UAV to flip along a first axis so that the UAV enters a diving attitude; and control the attitude and/or flight direction of the UAV to move in a dive action according to a received direction control instruction, wherein a magnitude of a descending acceleration of the UAV along a direction of gravity is related to the attitude and the flight direction of the UAV, and during moving in the dive action, the UAV is shielded from the throttle instruction. Doing so would optimize the UAV operation.
Regarding Claim 27, Zheng in view of Callou teaches the somatosensory controller according to claim 26.
Callou teaches the instruction comprises the second instruction configured to control the UAV to perform the dive action according to the received direction control instruction, and wherein the controlling the UAV to move in the flight action according to the preset instruction comprises: controlling the UAV to enter an jumping action (Col. 7 Line 44-52 Fig.4 #50).
Regarding Claim 29, Zheng in view of Callou teaches the somatosensory controller according to claim 26.
Zheng teaches pitch angle detection and hence adding threshold value to the pitch angle would have been obvious to ordinary person skilled in the art.
Hence, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Zheng and Callou to incorporate the teachings of obviousness rational to include the processors configured to: control the UAV to exit the jumping action when receiving a third trigger instruction; wherein the third trigger instruction represents the pitch angle at which the somatosensory controller is raised is greater than the second threshold. Doing so would optimize the UAV operation.
Regarding Claim 30, Callou in view of Zheng teaches the somatosensory controller according to claim 19.
Callou teaches the instruction comprises the second instruction configured to control the UAV to perform the dive action according to the received direction control instruction, and wherein the controlling the UAV to move in the flight action according to the preset instruction comprises: controlling an attitude of the UAV to flip along a first axis so that the UAV enters the diving attitude; and controlling the attitude and/or flight direction of the UAV to move in the dive action according to the received direction control instruction, wherein a magnitude of a descending acceleration of the UAV along a direction of gravity is related to the attitude and the flight direction of the UAV (Col. 12 Line 1-20).
Claim 28 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zheng in view of Callou and in further view of Martin.
Regarding Claim 28, Zheng in view of Callou teaches the somatosensory controller according to claim 26.
Martin teaches the somatosensory controller further comprises: an interaction device, connected to the processors; wherein the processors configured to sent the instruction to control the UAV to enter an jumping action when the interaction device is touched, dropped or toggle, and the attitude sensor represent the pitch angle at which the somatosensory controller is dropped is greater than the first threshold (Col.6 Line 3-9).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 5, 14-18 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Hu (US10564651) teaches a control system includes an airborne flight control system and a smart terminal; the airborne flight control system is configured to acquire a first position information, and send the first position information to the smart terminal; the smart terminal is configured to acquire a second position information, and obtain a yaw angle and at least one of a horizontal flight speed and a vertical flight speed according to the second position information and the first position information sent by the airborne flight control system, and send the yaw angle and at least one of the horizontal flight speed and the vertical flight speed to the airborne flight control system, wherein the first position information is the position information of an aircraft where the airborne flight control system is located, and the second position information is the position information of the smart terminal.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ABDHESH K JHA whose telephone number is (571)272-6218. The examiner can normally be reached M-F:0800-1700.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, James J Lee can be reached at 571-270-5965. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/ABDHESH K JHA/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3668
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