Concept of Magnetic Microwires Based Magnetometer for UAV Geophysical Survey

This article deals with a concept of the microwire magnetometer for mapping of magnetic fields using Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) that have been developed at the Faculty of Aeronautics at the Technical University of Košice. A UAV equipped with this type of sensor will be used to map mineral deposits, archaeological sites, locate pipelines and survey in specific areas of interest where conventional systems cannot be used or are impractical. The system in development uses a magnetic microwire sensor based on the Residence Times Difference (RTD) principle of magnetic field measurement. With this type of a fluxgate magnetometer several nT sensitivity was achieved - by the prototype, however the sensitivity below nT is expected to be achieved based on the results of the initial tests.