On 20 June 2025 CCTV aired footage from the National University of Defence Technology showing student Liang Hexiang balancing a micro-robot the size of a mosquito between his fingers. The insect-sized drone uses flapping leaf-shaped wings and hair-thin legs to hover, perch and crawl inside buildings for information reconnaissance on the battlefield. Analysts describe the…
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On 17 June 2025, Prof. Wu Jian of Peking University and Dr. Liu Chao of the Chinese Academy of Sciences down-linked 1 Gbps from an unnamed GEO satellite 36,705 km above Earth using a 2-watt laser. The AO‑MDR method combines 357 micro-mirrors on a 1.8 m telescope to reshape the wavefront and eight spatial modes,…
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From 2006 to 2023, violent non-state actors carried out 1,122 drone attacks, with a peak of 265 in 2023. The 2018 Gatwick airport incident highlighted the public-safety risks posed by off-the-shelf quadcopters. The Ukraine war has been described as the first “drone war,” with both sides deploying swarms of small drones for surveillance and strikes,…
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The 2017 U.S. Department of Defense project Maven was launched to apply AI-based computer vision to analyze drone surveillance footage in the Middle East, with fielding by year’s end. In 2019, China released its National Defense White Paper announcing the goal of “intelligentized warfare” and a plan to become the world AI leader by 2030.…
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