Fifth Generation (5G) wireless networks are designed to meet various end-user Quality of Service (QoS) requirements through high data rates (typically of Gbps order) and low latencies. Coupled with Fog and Mobile Edge Computing (MEC), 5G can achieve high data rates, enabling complex autonomous smart city services such as the large deployment of self-driving vehicles and large-scale Artificial Intelligence (AI)-enabled industrial manufacturing. However, to meet the exponentially growing number of connected IoT devices and irregular data and service requests in both low and highly dense locations, the process of enacting traditional cells supported through fixed and costly base stations requires rethought to enable on-demand mobile access points in the form of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) for diversified smart city scenarios. This article envisions a 5G network environment that is supported by blockchain-enabled UAVs to meet dynamic user demands with network access supply. The solution enables decentralized service delivery (Drones as a Service) and routing to and from end-users in a reliable and secure manner. Both public and private blockchains are deployed within the UAVs, supported by fog and cloud computing devices and data centers to provide wide range of complex authenticated service and data availability. Particular attention is paid tocomparing data delivery success rates and message exchange in the proposed solution against traditional UAV-supported cellular networks. Challenges and future research are also discussed with highlights on emerging technologies such as Federated Learning.
SDN-Blockchain Based Security Routing for UAV Communication via Reinforcement Learning
The Key Laboratory of Dynamic Cognitive System of Electromagnetic Spectrum Space, Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics（南京航空航天大学）；School of Electronics and Information Engineering, Beihang University（北京航空航天大学）；The State Key Laboratory of CNS/ATM（民航数据通信关键实验室）；School of Information and Control Engineering, China University of Mining and Technology（中国矿业大学）
The Internet of Things (IoT) can be conveniently deployed while empowering various applications, where the IoT nodes can form clusters to finish certain missions collectively. In this paper, we propose to employ unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) to assist the clustered IoT data collection with blockchain-based security provisioning. In particular, the UAVs generate candidate blocks based on the collected data, which are then audited through a lightweight proof-of-stake consensus mechanism within the UAV-based blockchain network. To motivate efficient blockchain while reducing the operational cos…
Several types of networks that comprise unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV or drone) are being utilized in important applications such as emergency response, environment and infrastructure monitoring, defense and security, and commerce. In such networks, swarms of UAVs cooperate in executing one or more missions to achieve the application's objectives. The UAVs communicate with terrestrial networks by connecting to fixed or mobile ground control stations (GCS). The ability of drones to connect to online applications and offer services to Internet users has led to the proliferation of the Internet o…
Waterford Institute of Technology（沃特福德理工学院）；Walton Institute（沃尔顿研究所）；Northumbria University Newcastle（纽卡斯尔诺森比亚大学）；National University of Sciences and Technology（国立科技大学）
6G envisions artificial intelligence (AI) powered solutions for enhancing the quality-of-service (QoS) in the network and to ensure optimal utilization of resources. In this work, we propose an architecture based on the combination of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), AI and blockchain for agricultural supply-chain management with the purpose of ensuring traceability, transparency, tracking inventories and contracts. We propose a solution to facilitate on-device AI by generating a roadmap of models with various resource-accuracy trade-offs. A fully convolutional neural network (FCN) model is us…
The growing use of aerial user equipments (UEs) in various applications requires ubiquitous and reliable connectivity for safe control and data exchange between these devices and ground stations. Key questions that need to be addressed when planning the deployment of aerial UEs are whether the cellular network is a suitable candidate for enabling such connectivity, and how the inclusion of aerial UEs might impact the overall network efficiency. This paper provides an in-depth analysis of user and network level performance of a cellular network that serves both unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) a…
Blockchain-Enabled Routing for Zero-Trust Low-Altitude Intelligent Networks
College of Electronic and Information Engineering, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics（南京航空航天大学电子与信息学院）；College of Civil Aviation, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics（南京航空航天大学民航学院）；College of Artificial Intelligence, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics（南京航空航天大学人工智能学院）；College of Computing and Data Science, Nanyang Technological University（南洋理工大学计算机与数据科学学院）
CNN+Transformer Based Anomaly Traffic Detection in UAV Networks for Emergency Rescue
The Key Laboratory of Dynamic Cognitive System of Electromagnetic Spectrum Space, Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics（南京航空航天大学电磁频谱空间动态认知系统重点实验室（工业和信息化部））；Department of Electronic and Electrical Engineering, University College London（伦敦大学学院电子与电气工程系）
Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) has extreme potential to change the future wireless sensor network (WSN). The UAV-based WSN performances is influenced by different system parameters. To investigate this issue, it is necessary to analyses the effects of system parameters on the UAV-based WSN performance. In this paper, we design a NS-3 script for UAV-based WSN according to the hierarchical manner of TCP/IP model. We configure all layers by using NS-3 model objects and set and modify the values used by objects to investigate the effects of system parameters (access mechanism, UAV trajectory patter…
In this paper, we propose a framework design for wireless sensor networks based on multiple unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). Specifically, we aim to minimize deployment and operational costs, with respect to budget and power constraints. To this end, we first optimize the number and locations of cluster heads (CHs) guaranteeing data collection from all sensors. Then, to minimize the data collection flight time, we optimize the number and trajectories of UAVs. Accordingly, we distinguish two trajectory approaches: 1) where a UAV hovers exactly above the visited CH; and 2) where a UAV hovers wit…
The emerging blockchain protocols provide a decentralized architecture that is suitable of supporting Internet of Things (IoT) interactions. However, keeping a local copy of the blockchain ledger is infeasible for low-power and memory-constrained devices. For this reason, they are equipped with lightweight software implementations that only download the useful data structures, e.g. state of accounts, from the blockchain network, when they are updated. In this paper, we consider and analyze a novel scheme, implemented by the nodes of the blockchain network, which aggregates the blockchain data …
The challenge of wildfire management and detection is recently gaining increased attention due to the increased severity and frequency of wildfires worldwide. Popular fire detection techniques such as satellite imaging and remote camera-based sensing suffer from late detection and low reliability while early wildfire detection is a key to prevent massive fires. In this paper, we propose a novel wildfire detection solution based on unmanned aerial vehicles assisted Internet of things (UAV-IoT) networks. The main objective is to (1) study the performance and reliability of the UAV-IoT networks f…
The millimeter-wave (mm-wave) bands enable very large antenna arrays that can generate narrow beams for beamforming and spatial multiplexing. However, directionality introduces beam misalignment and leads to reduced energy efficiency. Thus, employing the narrowest possible beam in a cell may not necessarily imply maximum coverage. The objective of this work is to determine the optimal sector beamwidth for a cellular architecture served by an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) acting as a base station (BS). The users in a cell are assumed to be distributed according to a Poisson Point Process (PPP) …
The fifth generation (5G) wireless networks are on the way to be deployed around the world. The 5G technologies target to support diverse vertical applications by connecting heterogeneous devices and machines with drastic improvements in terms of high quality of service, increased network capacity and enhanced system throughput. Despite all these advantages that 5G will bring about, there are still major challenges to be addressed, including decentralization, transparency, risks of data interoperability, network privacy and security vulnerabilities. Blockchain can offer innovative solutions to…
