This paper investigates a symbiotic unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)-assisted intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) radio system, where the UAV is leveraged to help the IRS reflect its own signals to the base station, and meanwhile enhance the UAV transmission by passive beamforming at the IRS. First, we consider the weighted sum bit error rate (BER) minimization problem among all IRSs by jointly optimizing the UAV trajectory, IRS phase shift matrix, and IRS scheduling, subject to the minimum primary rate requirements. To tackle this complicated problem, a relaxation-based algorithm is proposed. We prove that the converged relaxation scheduling variables are binary, which means that no reconstruct strategy is needed, and thus the UAV rate constraints are automatically satisfied. Second, we consider the fairness BER optimization problem. We find that the relaxation-based method cannot solve this fairness BER problem since the minimum primary rate requirements may not be satisfied by the binary reconstruction operation. To address this issue, we first transform the binary constraints into a series of equivalent equality constraints. Then, a penalty-based algorithm is proposed to obtain a suboptimal solution. Numerical results are provided to evaluate the performance of the proposed designs under different setups, as compared with benchmarks.
This paper investigates multiuser multi-input single-output downlink symbiotic radio communication systems assisted by an intelligent reflecting surface (IRS). Different from existing methods ideally assuming the secondary user (SU) can jointly decode information symbols from both the access point (AP) and the IRS via multiuser detection, we consider a more practical SU that only non-coherent detection is available. To characterize the non-coherent decoding performance, a practical upper bound of the average symbol error rate (SER) is derived. Subsequently, we jointly optimize the beamformer a…
This paper investigates a novel intelligent reflecting surface (IRS)-based symbiotic radio (SR) system architecture consisting of a transmitter, an IRS, and an information receiver (IR). The primary transmitter communicates with the IR and at the same time assists the IRS in forwarding information to the IR. Based on the IRS's symbol period, we distinguish two scenarios, namely, commensal SR (CSR) and parasitic SR (PSR), where two different techniques for decoding the IRS signals at the IR are employed. We formulate bit error rate (BER) minimization problems for both scenarios by jointly optim…
Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV)-enabled communication is a promising solution for secure air-to-ground (A2G) networks due to the additional secure degrees of freedom afforded by mobility. However, the jittering characteristics caused by the random airflow and the body vibration of the UAV itself have a non-negligible impact on the performance of UAV communication. Considering the impact of UAV jittering, this paper propose a robust and secure transmission design assisted by an novel active intelligent reflecting surface (IRS),where the reflecting elements in IRS not only adjust the phase shift …
Symbiotic FAS Strategies for 6G UAVs Assisted Backscatter Networks
University of Benghazi（班加西大学）；Libyan Authority for Scientific Research（利比亚科学研究局）；University College London（伦敦大学学院）；King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals (KFUPM)（法赫德国王石油与矿物大学）
Intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) enhanced multi-unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) networks are investigated. A new transmission framework is proposed, where multiple UAV-mounted base stations employ NOMA to serve multiple groups of ground users with the aid of an IRS. The three-dimensional (3D) placement and transmit power of UAVs, the reflection matrix of the IRS, and the NOMA decoding orders among users are jointly optimized for maximization of the sum rate of considered networks. To tackle the formulated mixed-integer non-convex optimization problem wit…
In this paper, the intelligent reflecting surface (IRS)-aided unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) communication system is studied, where the UAV is deployed to serve the user equipment (UE) with the assistance of multiple IRSs mounted on several buildings to enhance the communication quality between UAV and UE. We aim to maximize the energy efficiency of the system, including the data rate of UE and the energy consumption of UAV via jointly optimizing the UAV's trajectory and the phase shifts of reflecting elements of IRS, when the UE moves and the selection of IRSs is considered for the energy savi…
In this paper, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and intelligent reflective surface (IRS) are utilized to support terahertz (THz) communications. To this end, the joint optimization of UAV's trajectory, the phase shift of IRS, the allocation of THz sub-bands, and the power control is investigated to maximize the minimum average achievable rate of all the users. An iteration algorithm based on successive Convex Approximation with the Rate constraint penalty (CAR) is developed to obtain UAV's trajectory, and the IRS phase shift is formulated as a closed-form expression with introduced pricing fact…
Hybrid Reconfigurable Intelligent Surfaces (HRISs), which are capable of simultaneous programmable reflections and sensing, are expected to play a significant role in future wireless networks, enabling various Integrated Sensing and Communication (ISAC) applications. In this paper, we focus on HRIS-enabled Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) networks and design the HRIS parameters (phase profile, reception combining, and the power splitting between the two functionalities) for jointly estimating the individual UAV-HRIS and HRIS-base-station channels as well as the Angle of Arrival (AoA) of the Line-…
Aiming at the limited battery capacity of widely deployed low-power smart devices in the Internet-of-things (IoT), this paper proposes a novel intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) empowered unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) simultaneous wireless information and power transfer (SWIPT) network framework, in which IRS is used to reconstruct the wireless channel to enhance the wireless energy transmission efficiency and coverage area of the UAV SWIPT networks. In this paper, we formulate an achievable sum-rate maximization problem by jointly optimizing UAV trajectory, successive interference cancellat…
This paper presents a theoretical framework to analyze the performance of integrated unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)-intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) relaying system in which IRS provides an additional degree of freedom combined with the flexible deployment of full-duplex UAV to enhance communication between ground nodes. Our framework considers three different transmission modes: {\bf (i)} UAV-only mode, {\bf (ii)} IRS-only mode, and {\bf (iii)} integrated UAV-IRS mode to achieve spectral and energy-efficient relaying. For the proposed modes, we provide exact and approximate expressions for…
Intelligent reflecting surfaces (IRSs) with the ability to reconfigure inherent electromagnetic reflection and absorption characteristics in real-time provide unparalleled prospects to improve wireless connectivity in adverse circumstances. Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV)-assisted wireless networks are evolved as a reliable solution to combat non-line of sight (NLoS) scenarios. Thereby, the IRS-empowered UAV-assisted cellular networks will be a significant role-player to improve the coverage and user experiences. The paper aimed to minimize the path loss and maximize the achievable data rate in…
Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are envisioned to be extensively employed for assisting wireless communications in Internet of Things (IoT) applications. On the other hand, terahertz (THz) enabled intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) is expected to be one of the core enabling technologies for forthcoming beyond-5G wireless communications that promise a broad range of data-demand applications. In this paper, we propose a UAV-mounted IRS (UIRS) communication system over THz bands for confidential data dissemination from an access point (AP) towards multiple ground user equipments (UEs) in IoT ne…
In this paper, a novel reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS)-assisted multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) symbiotic radio (SR) system is proposed, in which an RIS, operating as a secondary transmitter (STx), sends messages to a multi-antenna secondary receiver (SRx) by using cognitive backscattering communication, and simultaneously, it enhances the primary transmission from a multi-antenna primary transmitter (PTx) to a multi-antenna primary receiver (PRx) by intelligently reconfiguring the wireless environment. We are interested in the joint design of active transmit beamformer at the P…
In this letter, we study the simultaneously transmitting and reflecting reconfigurable intelligent surface (STAR-RIS) assisted unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) communications. Our goal is to maximize the sum rate of all users by jointly optimizing the STAR-RIS's beamforming vectors, the UAV's trajectory and power allocation. We decompose the formulated non-convex problem into three subproblems and solve them alternately to obtain the solution. Simulations show that: 1) the STAR-RIS achieves a higher sum rate than traditional RIS; 2) to exploit the benefits of STAR-RIS, the UAV's trajectory is clo…
Joint User Association, Interference Cancellation and Power Control for Multi-IRS Assisted UAV Communications
Chongqing University of Posts and Telecommunications（重庆邮电大学）；Shanghai Jiao Tong University（上海交通大学）；Nanyang Technological University（南洋理工大学）；Carleton University（卡尔顿大学）；University of Oslo（奥斯陆大学）
Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) have steadily gained attention to overcome the harsh propagation loss and blockage issue of millimeter-wave communication. However, UAV communication systems suffer from energy consumption, which limits the flying time of UAVs. In this paper, we propose several UAV energy consumption minimization techniques through the aid of multiple intelligent reflecting surfaces (IRSs). In specific, we introduce a tractable model to effectively capture the characteristics of multiple IRSs and multiple user equipments (UEs). Then, we derive a closed form expression for the UE…
In this letter, we investigate an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) communication system, where an intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) is deployed to assist in the transmission from a ground node (GN) to the UAV in the presence of a jammer. We aim to maximize the average rate of the UAV communication by jointly optimizing the GN's transmit power, the IRS's passive beamforming and the UAV's trajectory. However, the formulated problem is difficult to solve due to the non-convex objective function and the coupled optimization variables. Thus, to tackle it, we propose an alternating optimization (AO)…
Reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) offers tremendous spectrum and energy efficiency in wireless networks by adjusting the amplitudes and/or phases of passive reflecting elements to optimize signal reflection. With the agility and mobility of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), RIS can be mounted on UAVs to enable three-dimensional signal reflection. Compared to the conventional terrestrial RIS (TRIS), the aerial RIS (ARIS) enjoys higher deployment flexibility, reliable air-to-ground links, and panoramic full-angle reflection. However, due to UAV's limited payload and battery capacity, it is…
In this paper, we study an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) communication system, where a ground node (GN) communicate with a UAV assisted by intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) in the presence of a jammer with imperfect location information. We aim to improve the achievable average rate via the joint robust design of UAV trajectory, IRS passive beamforming and GN's power allocation. However, the formulated optimization problem is challenging to solve due to its non-convexity and coupled variables. To overcome the difficulty, we propose an alternating optimization (AO) based algorithm to solve i…
Intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) and unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) have emerged as two promising technologies to boost the performance of wireless communication networks, by proactively altering the wireless communication channels via smart signal reflection and maneuver control, respectively. However, they face different limitations in practice, which restrain their future applications. In this article, we propose new methods to jointly apply IRS and UAV in integrated air-ground wireless networks by exploiting their complementary advantages. Specifically, terrestrial IRS is used to enhanc…
In this paper, an intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) is introduced to assist an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) communication system based on non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) for serving multiple ground users. We aim to minimize the average total system energy consumption by jointly designing the resource allocation strategy, the three dimensional (3D) trajectory of the UAV, as well as the phase control at the IRS. The design is formulated as a non-convex optimization problem taking into account the maximum tolerable outage probability constraint and the individual minimum data rate requi…
In this paper, we study an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) enabled data collection system, where an intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) is deployed to assist in the communication from a cluster of Internet-of-Things (IoT) devices to a UAV in the presence of a jammer. We aim to improve the energy efficiency (EE) via the joint design of UAV trajectory, IRS passive beamforming, device power allocation, and communication scheduling. However, the formulated non-linear fractional programming problem is challenging to solve due to its non-convexity and coupled variables. To overcome the difficulty, we…
This paper investigates user scheduling and trajectory optimization for a network supported by an intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) mounted on an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). The IRS is powered via the simultaneous wireless information and power transfer (SWIPT) technique. The IRS boosts users' uplink signals to improve the network's longevity and energy efficiency. It simultaneously harvests energy with a non-linear energy harvesting circuit and reflects the incident signals by controlling its reflection coefficients and phase shifts. The trajectory of the UAV impacts the efficiency of t…
QoS Improvement in Multi User Cellular-Symbiotic Radio Network Assisted by Active-STAR-RIS
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Isfahan University of Technology（伊斯法罕理工大学电气与计算机工程系）；Department of Electronics and Communication Engineering, Kuwait College of Science and Technology（科威特科学与技术学院电子与通信工程系）；The Pasargad Institute for Advanced Innovative Solutions (PIAIS)（帕萨尔加德先进创新解决方案研究所）；Electrical and Electronic Engineering Department, London South Bank University（伦敦南岸大学电子与电气工程系）
Both unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and intelligent reflecting surfaces (IRS) are gaining traction as transformative technologies for upcoming wireless networks. The IRS-aided UAV communication, which introduces IRSs into UAV communications, has emerged in an effort to improve the system performance while also overcoming UAV communication constraints and issues. The purpose of this paper is to provide a comprehensive overview of IRSassisted UAV communications. First, we provide five examples of how IRSs and UAVs can be combined to achieve unrivaled potential in difficult situations. The techn…
Communication with unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in current terrestrial networks suffers from poor signal strength due to the down-tilt of the access points (APs) that are optimized to serve ground users ends (GUEs). To solve this, one could tilt the AP antenna upwards or allocate more power to serve the UAV. However, this negatively affects GUE downlink (DL) rates. In this paper, we propose to solve this challenge using a reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) to enhance the UAV communication while preserving the 3GPP- prescribed downwards antenna tilt and potentially improving the DL per…
Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) are an important component of next-generation wireless networks that can assist in high data rate communications and provide enhanced coverage.Their high mobility and aerial nature offer deployment flexibility and low-cost infrastructure support to existing cellular networks and provide many applications that rely on mobile wireless communications. However, security is a major challenge in UAV communications, and Physical Layer Security (PLS) is an important technique to improve the reliability and security of data shared with the assistance of UAVs. Recently, I…
In this paper, we propose a novel wireless architecture, mounted on a high-altitude aerial platform, which is enabled by reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS). By installing RIS on the aerial platform, rich line-of-sight and full-area coverage can be achieved, thereby, overcoming the limitations of the conventional terrestrial RIS. We consider a scenario where a sudden increase in traffic in an urban area triggers authorities to rapidly deploy unmanned-aerial vehicle base stations (UAV-BSs) to serve the ground users. In this scenario, since the direct backhaul link from the ground source ca…
In this paper, we consider that the unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) with attached intelligent reflecting surfaces (IRSs) play the role of flying reflectors that reflect the signal of users to the destination, and utilize the power-domain non-orthogonal multiple access (PD-NOMA) scheme in the uplink. We investigate the benefits of the UAV-IRS on the internet of things (IoT) networks that improve the freshness of collected data of the IoT devices via optimizing power, sub-carrier, and trajectory variables, as well as, the phase shift matrix elements. We consider minimizing the average age-of-inf…
Research, Technology and Innovation Network (RTIN), Alba, The American College of Greece（美国希腊学院阿尔巴研究、技术与创新网络（RTIN））；Aalborg University（奥尔堡大学）；Lyra Electronics（莱拉电子公司）；The University of Manchester（曼彻斯特大学）；University College London（伦敦大学学院）
In this work, we propose a framework for energy-efficient trajectory design of an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)-based portable access point (PAP) deployed to serve a set of ground nodes (GNs). In addition to the PAP and GNs, the system consists of a set of intelligent reflecting surfaces (IRSs) mounted on man-made structures to increase the number of bits transmitted per Joule of energy consumed measured as the global energy efficiency (GEE). The GEE trajectory for the PAP is designed by considering the UAV propulsion energy consumption and the Peukert effect of the PAP battery, which represen…
Multi-stream Transmission for Directional Modulation Network via Distributed Multi-UAV-aided Multi-active-IRS
School of Information and Communication Engineering, Hainan University（海南大学信息与通信工程学院）；School of Electronic and Optical Engineering, Nanjing University of Science and Technology（南京理工大学电子工程与光电技术学院）；School of Network and Communication, Nanjing Vocational College of Information Technology（南京信息职业技术学院网络与通信学院）
