I'm not really an aficionado, but I've done some basic feasibility research as part of school work in university (I'm studying Automation and Control Engineerin

I'm not really an aficionado, but I've done some basic feasibility research as part of school work in university (I'm studying Automation and Control Engineering, and we are tasked at presenting a possible quadrotor/quatrocopter solution for scrutiny). So you will need to know a lot of stuff, but it depends on what you want to do. What you need to know: - Electric drives. (Or internal combustion engines, but I think they are way more complex, while undeniably more powerful, also more control problems) - Control Theory, mostly state-space. - basic electronics - Microcontroller programming. - you will probably need to know at least some digital signal processing. - AI - Radio communications (you have to communicate with the robot, even if its autonomous)