Path-optimization method for UAV-aided relay broadcast communication system

As the common means of field emergency communication, the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) relay plays an important role in both civil and military fields. With the diversification of requirements and the limitations of single operation, multi-UAV cooperative work has attracted extensive attention. However, due to the UAV signal’s universality of broadcast and the limitation of power, information transmission is more likely to be interrupted. Therefore, in the presence of interference, this paper adopts forward amplification protocol under UAV relay transmission model. And two beamforming methods are proposed based on minimizing transmission power and maximizing communication rate of UAV relays. Then, we establish the power-constrained maximum security rate optimization problem with UAV relays, and deduce the corresponding beamforming weight vector and the optimal rate of safety. Finally, the simulation results show the effectiveness and accuracy of the proposed beamforming method.

The use of multiple heterogeneous, low-cost, small Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) as a tool in several application domains is becoming increasingly important. One critical aspect to enable the use of such vehicles is the coordination/planning system, whose task complexity increases with the number of vehicles and the communications constraints that arise due to their small size and large distances. In this work, we propose a control architecture for a platoon of relay UAVs that are independent of the coordination system. The platoon task consists in interconnecting the communication link between the possibly mobile command station and a UAV in a mission. The relays are actively driven to deploy, create a network and maintain a desired Quality-of-Service (QoS) level, defined in this paper. We present an architecture that is composed by a waypoint generator based on the network QoS and a Time Coordinated Path Following (TCPF) controller with a method to reduce the frequency of information exchange between the relay UAVs, through the use of a self-triggered control strategy. Exploiting this architecture, it is possible to plan a mission operation for a UAV without the need of considering vehicle-to-command-station communication constraints that will be satisfied by the introduction of the relay-UAVs platoon. Simulation results are provided to illustrate the efficacy of the developed strategy. The self-triggered approach results in significant reduction of information exchange between the relay UAVs, while maintaining the user desired network QoS.

In this work we address the problem of autonomously tracking a group of ground static targets in an urban area using fixed wing unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). In this scenario, UAVs are equipped with sensors that are subject to the constraints of urban area occlusions. Information regarding the line of sight (LOS) occlusions in the urban area is assumed available. Each UAV, considering the dynamic constrains arising from the fixed wing, is modeled as a Dubins car. The motion planning of searching the shortest path for UAVs, namely Dubins path, is a NP hard problem. We propose an algorithm, which can provide sub-optimal Dubins path, hence can bring a closed-loop path for UAVs to continuously track the group of static targets and minimize the time of loss track. The proposed algorithm is validated through simulations on a visual database that is based on the CBD in Singapore.

The use of small and miniature unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) for remote sensing and surveillance applications has become increasingly popular in the last two decades. The intermittent connectivity in a sparse UAV network makes it challenging to efficiently gather sensed image data. This paper investigates the communication of sensed images from a set of mobile survey UAVs to a static base station through the assistance of a relay UAV. Given the planned routes of survey UAVs, a set of relay waypoints are found for the relay UAV to meet the survey UAVs and receive the sensed images. An Online Message Relaying technique (OMR) is proposed to schedule the relay UAV to collect images. Without any global collaboration between the relay UAV and the survey UAVs, OMR utilizes a markov decision process (MDP) that determines the best schedules for the relay UAV such that the image acquisition rate could be maximized. Evaluation results show that the proposed relaying technique outperforms traditional relaying techniques, such as the traveling salesman problem (TSP) and the random walk, in terms of end-to-end delay and frame delivery ratio.

This paper investigated the multiple unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) relays' assisted network in the Internet of Things (IoT) systems enhanced with energy harvesting in order to overcome the large-scale fading between source and sink as well as achieve the green cooperative communications, where time switch (TS) and power splitting (PS) strategies were typically applied for UAV relays to implement energy harvesting transmission, which was also selected via signal to noise ratio (SNR) maximization criterion so that the terminal node can obtain the optimal signal. Meanwhile, it was worth noting that the terminal node may be disturbed by aggregated interference caused by dense network signaling interaction in the future 5G/B5G systems. Therefore, after TS and PS protocols designing and utilizing, the closed-form expressions of outage probability and bit error rate (BER) for UAV relay assisted IoT systems suffered from aggregated interference were derived in detail. In addition, the throughput and delay limited state of UAV relay assisted transmission were also analyzed thoroughly. The derivations and analysis results showed that the proposed multi-parameter joint optimization of transmitting power, scaling factor, and UAV relay selection could effectively improve the system throughput and reduce the system outage probability and BER. The simulation experiments verified the effectiveness of the proposed schemes and the correctness of theoretical analysis.

In this paper, we consider a hybrid satellite-terrestrial network (HSTN) where a multiantenna satellite communicates with a ground user equipment (UE) with the help of multiple cache-enabled amplify-and-forward (AF) three-dimensional ($3$D) mobile unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) relays. Herein, we employ the two fundamental most popular content (MPC) and uniform content (UC) caching schemes for two types of mobile UAV relays, namely fully $3$D and fixed height. Taking into account the multiantenna satellite links and the random $3$D distances between UAV relays and UE, we analyze the outage probability (OP) of considered system with MPC and UC caching schemes. We further carry out the corresponding asymptotic OP analysis to present the insights on achievable performance gains of two schemes for both types of $3$D mobile UAV relaying. Specifically, we show the following: (a) MPC caching dominates the UC and no caching schemes; (b) fully $3$D mobile UAV relaying outperforms its fixed height counterpart. We finally corroborate the theoretic analysis by simulations.

Due to the high mobility of on-board units (OBUs) and the large-scale network topology frequency hopping-based anti-jamming techniques are not applicable in vehicular ad hoc networks (VANETs). In this paper, to improve the communication performance of VANETs against smart jamming, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are used. These unmanned aerial vehicles observe the ongoing OBU and UAV communication status and induce the UAV to use a specific relay strategy. The UAV relays the OBU message to another roadside unit (RSU) with a better radio transmission condition if the serving RSU is heavily jammed or interfered. The interactions between a UAV and a smart jammer are formulated using an anti-jamming UAV relay game. The UAV decides whether or not to relay the OBU message to another RSU based on the relay game, the jammer observes the UAV and the VANET strategy it chooses the jamming power accordingly. The proposed relay strategy can reduce the bit-error rate of the OBU message efficiently and increasing the benefit of the VANET Using Q-learning analysis.

<div>In this dissertation, methods for real-time trajectory generation and autonomous obstacle avoidance for fixed-wing and quad-rotor unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) are studied. A key challenge for such trajectory generation is the high computation time required to plan a new path to safely maneuver around obstacles instantaneously. Therefore, methods for rapid generation of obstacle avoidance trajectory are explored. The high computation time is a result of the computationally intensive algorithms used to generate trajectories for real-time object avoidance. Recent studies have shown that custom solvers have been developed that are able to solve the problem with a lower computation time however these designs are limited to small sized problems or are proprietary. Additionally, for a swarm problem, which is an area of high interest, as the number of agents increases the problem size increases and in turn creates further computational challenges. A solution to these challenges will allow for UAVs to be used in autonomous missions robust to environmental uncertainties.</div><div><br></div><div>In this study, a trajectory generation problem posed as an optimal control problem is solved using a sequential convex programming approach; a nonlinear programming algorithm, for which custom solver is used. First, a method for feasible trajectory generation for fast-paced obstacle-rich environments is presented for the case of fixed-wing UAVs. Next, a problem of trajectory generation for fixed-wing and quad-rotor UAVs is defined such that starting from an initial state a UAV moves forward along the direction of flight while avoiding obstacles and remaining close to a reference path. The problem is solved within the framework of finite-horizon model predictive control. Finally, the problem of trajectory generation is extended to a swarm of quad-rotors where each UAV in a swarm has a reference path to fly along. Utilizing a centralized approach, a swarm scenario with moving targets is studied in two different cases in an attempt to lower the solution time; the first, solve the entire swarm problem at once, and the second, solve iteratively for a UAV in the swarm while considering trajectories of other UAVs as fixed.</div><div><br></div><div>Results show that a feasible trajectory for a fixed-wing UAV can be obtained within tens of milliseconds. Moreover, the obtained feasible trajectories can be used as initial guesses to the optimal solvers to speed up the solution of optimal trajectories. The methods explored demonstrated the ability for rapid feasible trajectory generation allowing for safe obstacle avoidance, which may be used in the case an optimal trajectory solution is not available. A comparative study between a dynamic and a kinematic model shows that the dynamic model provides better trajectories including aggressive trajectories around obstacles compared to the kinematic counterpart for fixed-wing UAVs, despite having approximately the same computational demands. Whereas, for the case of quad-rotor UAVs, the kinematic model takes almost half the solution time than with a reduced dynamic model, despite having approximately the similar range of values for the cost function. When extended to a swarm, solving the problem for each UAV is four to seven times computationally cheaper than solving the swarm as a whole. With the improved computation time for trajectory generation for a swarm of quad-rotors using centralized approach, the problem is now reasonably scalable, which opens up the possibility to increase the number of agents in a swarm using high-end computing machines for real-time applications. Overall, a custom solver jointly with a sequential convex programming approach solves an optimization problem in a low computation time.</div>

Methods to implement communication in natural and humanmade disasters have been widely discussed in the scientific community. Scientists believe that unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) relays will play a critical role in 5G public safety communications (PSC) due to their technical superiority. They have several significant advantages: a high degree of mobility, flexibility, exceptional line of sight, and real-time adaptative planning. For instance, cell edge coverage could be extended using relay UAVs. This paper summarizes the sidelink evolution in the 3GPP standardization associated with the usage of the device to device (D2D) techniques that use long term evolution (LTE) communication systems, potential extensions for 5G, and a study on the impact of circular mobility on relay UAVs using the software network simulator 3 (NS3). In this simulation, the transmitted packet percentage was evaluated where the speed of the UAV for users was changed. This paper also examines the multi-input multi-output (MIMO) communication applied to drones and proposes a new trajectory to assist users experiencing unfortunate circumstances. The overall communication is highly dependent on the drone speed and the use of MIMO and suitable antennas may influence overall transmission between users and the UAVs relay. When the UAVs relaying speed was configured at 108 km/h the total transmission rate was reduced to 55% in the group with 6 users allocated to each drone.

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) play an essential role in emergency cases and adverse environments for applications like disaster detection and mine exploration. To process the massive volume of sensing data generated by various sensory payloads in these applications, existing works either compress deep learning (DL) models to conduct onboard computing, or offload raw data back to the resourceful ground station with the help of relay UAVs due to base station damage. However, the former sacrifices the inference accuracy of DL models (up to 10% accuracy loss), while the latter achieves high accuracy at the cost of significant latency, due to limited wireless communication resources in the multi-hop transmission. To address the problem, exploiting the resources of the UAV swarm including both task UAVs and relay UAVs, we build up an <underline xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">a</u>ll-<underline xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">s</u>ky <underline xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">a</u>utonomous com<underline xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">p</u>uting (ASAP) system to autonomously conduct collaborative computing in the swarm, to achieve both high accuracy and low latency of sensing data processing. In detail, we first propose a novel UAV swarm-native collaborative computing architecture, considering the general hierarchy and clustering structure of UAV swarms, as well as the characteristic of DL model execution. We then design an elastic efficient task scheduler to allocate computing tasks for UAVs, and update the scheduling scheme online when some UAVs are unavailable, with the aid of a lightweight and accurate DL inference performance predictor. Finally, we design an adaptive inter-UAV data compressor, to adapt to the limited and dynamic communication resources between UAVs. Experiment results on 24 airborne computers and five real-world UAVs show that, the proposed system can perform collaborative computing in a timely manner and effectively deal with situations when some UAVs become unavailable.

Due to the great potential of the combination of machine learning technology and unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) enabled wireless communications, various optimization algorithms on resource allocation have been proposed for the Internet of Things. UAVs not only can perform the missions under the extreme conditions but also enhance the overall performance of the system as an aerial relay assisting transmission in the public and civil domains, which have been received extensive attentions. However, with the limited capacity and power constraints, they are difficult to support the transmission for the big data information users. In addition, the lack of spectrum resource poses challenges to satisfy the quality of service (QoS) of mobile users in wireless networks. To contribute to these urgent problems, this article first studies the potential and effective applications of UAVs, by introducing the Chinese remainder theorem (CRT) and nonorthogonal multiple access (NOMA) technologies into UAV relay networks. Two scenarios with/without direct transmissions between the source and destination nodes are investigated, following the decomposition and reconstruction mechanisms to satisfy the big data information transmission. Considering the user fairness, we further discuss the effect of the UAV numbers to the overall system capacity. To maximize the system capacity, the designs of transmission protocol and receiver are also discussed, in various channel conditions. Finally, a low complexity and efficient two‐stage power allocation scheme is established for the perspective of users and UAV relays.

A cost-efficient elastic UAV relay network construction method with guaranteed QoS

Recently, unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)-assisted maritime communication systems have drawn considerable attention due to their potential for broadband maritime communication applications. However, their limited energy resources remains a critical issue in providing long-term data transmission support for maritime applications. In this study, an integrated sea–air–terrestrial communication system was constructed for marine data collection, where several unmanned surface vessels (USVs) are deployed to collect marine data from underwater sensors (UWSs), and a UAV hovers above these USVs as a relay node, transmitting marine data from USVs to an onshore base station (BS). To prolong the lifetime of the UAV relay, mobile edge computing technology is applied in USVs for partial data computing, which reduces the to-be-relayed data volume from UAVs to USVs to onshore BS as well as the relay energy consumption of UAV. A parallel data computing and transmission scheme was developed for simultaneous local data computing and relaying in the proposed system. Accordingly, a UAV energy consumption minimization problem was formulated with constraints on the USV’s computational ability, the USV’s transmission power budget, the UAV transmission power budget, and the maximum system latency. To effectively solve this nonconvex optimal problem, an energy optimal partial data computing and relaying strategy was constructed by successively optimizing the data partial computational offloading ratio, USV transmit power allocation, and UAV transmit power. Numerical simulations were used to verify the effectiveness of the proposed strategy.

Wireless communication is an essential technology to unlock the full potential of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in numerous applications and has thus received unprecedented attention recently. Although technologies such as direct link, WiFi, and satellite communications are still useful in some remote scenarios where cellular services are unavailable, it is believed that exploiting the thriving 5G and beyond cellular networks to support UAV communications is the most promising and cost-effective approach, especially when the number of UAVs grows dramatically. On the one hand, to guarantee safe and efficient flight operations of multiple UAVs, it is of paramount importance to provide secure and ultra-reliable communication links between the UAVs and their ground pilots or control stations for conveying command and control signals, especially in beyond-visual-line-of-sight (BVLOS) scenarios. On the other hand, because of advances in communication equipment miniaturization as well as UAV manufacturing, mounting compact and lightweight base stations (BSs) or relays on UAVs becomes increasingly feasible. This has led to two promising research paradigms for UAV communications, namely, UAV-assisted cellular communications and cellular-connected UAVs, where UAVs are integrated into cellular networks as aerial communication platforms and aerial users, respectively. As such, integrating UAVs into cellular networks is believed to be a win-win technology for both UAV-related industries and cellular network operators, which not only creates plenty of new business opportunities but also benefits the communication performance of 3-D wireless networks. In addition, UAV related sensing and computing are also helpful for achieving efficient and reliable communication (e.g., in avoiding coverage holes) as well as smart UAV coordination, positioning, and trajectory design. However, 5G and beyond wireless networks with UAVs significantly differs from traditional communication systems, because of the high altitude and high maneuverability of UAVs, the unique UAV-ground channels, the diversified quality of service (QoS) requirements for downlink command and control (C&C) and uplink mission-related data transmission, the stringent constraints imposed by the size, weight, and power (SWAP) limitations of UAVs, as well as the new design degrees of freedom enabled by joint UAV mobility control and communication resource allocation.

The use of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) is increasing today. UAVs can be divided into two parts, which are remote controlled and can travel automatically due to a certain battery problem. Recent research has also focused on the development and application of new algorithms to autonomously control these vehicles and determine the shortest flight paths. Together with these researches, UAVs are used in many civil activities such as weather forecasts, environmental studies and traffic control. Three-dimensional (3D) path planning is an important issue for autonomously moving UAVs. The shortest path for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) is determined by using two-dimensional (2D) path planning algorithms using the obstacles in the environment, and allows UAVs to perform their environmental tasks as soon as possible. The purpose of this study is to determine the shortest path to the target point and avoiding obstacles for UAVs using the Dijkstra algorithm. It was developed to evaluate the arrival time of the UAVs in the path planning algorithm with the simulation performed in the MATLAB program. In this study, the obstacles were defined for the purpose of the building with different heights and different widths and 2D and 3D models were carried out, assuming that the UAV flies at certain heights. In addition, the flight of the UAVs in the route planning determined in the real applications was carried out and the data such as battery consumption, amount of battery spent, speed, amount of travel were examined.