Sean D Reynolds

Sean D. Reynolds
From , the free encyclopedia
Sean D. Reynolds was the first person to use an Arduino micro processor to get a helicopter to fly itself autonomously.
Titled the Wash UAV, this helicopter used a Honeywell HMC6352 Compasss, Maxbotics LV-EZ0 proximity sensors and an Arduino processor.
The WashUAV flew for 6 seconds when it debuted in late 2008. Since then the official platform has been switched from the Blade CX2, to a Blade CP Pro2 and is set to continue this summer.
The new platform will be implementing an artificial Neural network which will be tuned using the expert controls of a skilled pilot.
He is a professional software and electrical engineer. He currently lives in Saint Louis, MO. He works as a Consultant while studying to get a masters degree from Washington University in Saint Louis.
Contents
* 1 Background
* 2 Publications
* 3 References
* 4 Personal life
* 5 External links
Background
Sean Reynolds is currently working towards a Masters of Science in Artificial Intelligence at Washington University in St. Louis. His goal is to design machines to do tasks which humans are either too lazy or inept to handle themselves. An example is Recycling. In America, he believes, we have strong foundational beliefs that the Government should not tell us what to do. However, he thinks, we are not too motivated to recycle on our own, even though he thinks everyone would agree that we should all recycle. He wants to make machines that can go through junkyards and sort trash into paper, plastic, glass, metal and garbage. He thinks this could change the worlds perspective on how much America cares about the environment.
Before moving to Saint Louis, Sean Reynolds lived in India for 6 months and London for 2 years. While overseas Reynolds worked for an automotive company called BBA-reman. While there he was responsible for the entire operations of software engineering and several research projects. His work saved the company hundreds of thousands of dollars. He created an ABS test rig to test breaking ecu's before the company shipped them. His work there reduced the level of warranties on ABS to near 5%.
Before moving overseas Sean Reynolds studied at Concordia University, Nebraska. There he received a Bachelors degree in Computer Science with minors in Physics and Mathematics. He was in the choir and on the speech and debate team; while still making time after class for pickup games of Ultimate frisbee. He moved to Nebraska from Tulsa Oklahoma, and was born in Miami Florida.
Publications
For his work on the Wash UAV he was published on: Engadget , Sparkfun , and Make .
The first publication to pick up the WashUAV was Sparkfun. They are a supplier of consumer electronics. They sell everything from sensors to wires.
After Sparkfun published its article in 2008, MAKE quickly ran with the story. While sparkfun highlighted the fact that all of the parts were purchased from their store, Make loved the fact that the project was accomplished using the Arduino processor. Arduino processors are extremely popular among MAKE's target audience, and the news spread fast.
Engadget quickly picked up the story. They were generally impressed that if flew itself for "6 glorious seconds".
Due to the publication of the this project the YouTube videos for the project received over 10,000 hits in a single day!
Upon completion of the Next Phase of his project, we would expect to see him back in the news for his work on Neural Networks.

Main Menu

See Also

Main Menu