ML-based Secure Low-Power Communication in Adversarial Contexts

As wireless network technology becomes more and more popular, mutual interference between various signals has become more and more severe and common. Therefore, there is often a situation in which the transmission of its own signal is interfered with by occupying the channel. Especially in a confrontational environment, Jamming has caused great harm to the security of information transmission. So I propose ML-based secure ultra-low power communication, which is an approach to use machine learning to predict future wireless traffic by capturing patterns of past wireless traffic to ensure ultra-low-power transmission of signals via backscatters. In order to be more suitable for the adversarial environment, we use backscatter to achieve ultra-low power signal transmission, and use frequency-hopping technology to achieve successful confrontation with Jamming information. In the end, we achieved a prediction success rate of 96.19%

Recent Advances in Wearable Sensing Technologies

Wearable sensing technologies are having a worldwide impact on the creation of novel business opportunities and application services that are benefiting the common citizen. By using these technologies, people have transformed the way they live, interact with each other and their surroundings, their daily routines, and how they monitor their health conditions. We review recent advances in the area of wearable sensing technologies, focusing on aspects such as sensor technologies, communication infrastructures, service infrastructures, security, and privacy. We also review the use of consumer wearables during the coronavirus disease 19 (COVID-19) pandemic caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), and we discuss open challenges that must be addressed to further improve the efficacy of wearable sensing systems in the future

Accurate Landing of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles Using Ground Pattern Recognition

[EN] Over the last few years, several researchers have been developing protocols and applications in order to autonomously land unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). However, most of the proposed protocols rely on expensive equipment or do not satisfy the high precision needs of some UAV applications such as package retrieval and delivery or the compact landing of UAV swarms. Therefore, in this work, a solution for high precision landing based on the use of ArUco markers is presented. In the proposed solution, a UAV equipped with a low-cost camera is able to detect ArUco markers sized 56×56 cm from an altitude of up to 30 m. Once the marker is detected, the UAV changes its flight behavior in order to land on the exact position where the marker is located. The proposal was evaluated and validated using both the ArduSim simulation platform and real UAV flights. The results show an average offset of only 11 cm from the target position, which vastly improves the landing accuracy compared to the traditional GPS-based landing, which typically deviates from the intended target by 1 to 3 m.This work was funded by the Ministerio de Ciencia, Innovación y Universidades, Programa Estatal de Investigación, Desarrollo e Innovación Orientada a los Retos de la Sociedad, Proyectos I+D+I 2018 , Spain, under Grant RTI2018-096384-B-I00.Wubben, J.; Fabra Collado, FJ.; Tavares De Araujo Cesariny Calafate, CM.; Krzeszowski, T.; Márquez Barja, JM.; Cano, J.; Manzoni, P. (2019). Accurate Landing of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles Using Ground Pattern Recognition. Electronics. 8(12):1-16. https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics8121532S116812Pan, X., Ma, D., Jin, L., & Jiang, Z. (2008). Vision-Based Approach Angle and Height Estimation for UAV Landing. 2008 Congress on Image and Signal Processing. doi:10.1109/cisp.2008.78Tang, D., Li, F., Shen, N., & Guo, S. (2011). UAV attitude and position estimation for vision-based landing. Proceedings of 2011 International Conference on Electronic & Mechanical Engineering and Information Technology. doi:10.1109/emeit.2011.6023131Gautam, A., Sujit, P. B., & Saripalli, S. (2014). A survey of autonomous landing techniques for UAVs. 2014 International Conference on Unmanned Aircraft Systems (ICUAS). doi:10.1109/icuas.2014.6842377Holybro Pixhawk 4 · PX4 v1.9.0 User Guidehttps://docs.px4.io/v1.9.0/en/flight_controller/pixhawk4.htmlGarrido-Jurado, S., Muñoz-Salinas, R., Madrid-Cuevas, F. J., & Medina-Carnicer, R. (2016). Generation of fiducial marker dictionaries using Mixed Integer Linear Programming. Pattern Recognition, 51, 481-491. doi:10.1016/j.patcog.2015.09.023Romero-Ramirez, F. J., Muñoz-Salinas, R., & Medina-Carnicer, R. (2018). Speeded up detection of squared fiducial markers. Image and Vision Computing, 76, 38-47. doi:10.1016/j.imavis.2018.05.004ArUco: Augmented reality library based on OpenCVhttps://sourceforge.net/projects/aruco/Jin, S., Zhang, J., Shen, L., & Li, T. (2016). On-board vision autonomous landing techniques for quadrotor: A survey. 2016 35th Chinese Control Conference (CCC). doi:10.1109/chicc.2016.7554984Chen, X., Phang, S. K., Shan, M., & Chen, B. M. (2016). System integration of a vision-guided UAV for autonomous landing on moving platform. 2016 12th IEEE International Conference on Control and Automation (ICCA). doi:10.1109/icca.2016.7505370Nowak, E., Gupta, K., & Najjaran, H. (2017). Development of a Plug-and-Play Infrared Landing System for Multirotor Unmanned Aerial Vehicles. 2017 14th Conference on Computer and Robot Vision (CRV). doi:10.1109/crv.2017.23Shaker, M., Smith, M. N. R., Yue, S., & Duckett, T. (2010). Vision-Based Landing of a Simulated Unmanned Aerial Vehicle with Fast Reinforcement Learning. 2010 International Conference on Emerging Security Technologies. doi:10.1109/est.2010.14Araar, O., Aouf, N., & Vitanov, I. (2016). Vision Based Autonomous Landing of Multirotor UAV on Moving Platform. Journal of Intelligent & Robotic Systems, 85(2), 369-384. doi:10.1007/s10846-016-0399-zPatruno, C., Nitti, M., Petitti, A., Stella, E., & D’Orazio, T. (2018). A Vision-Based Approach for Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Landing. Journal of Intelligent & Robotic Systems, 95(2), 645-664. doi:10.1007/s10846-018-0933-2Baca, T., Stepan, P., Spurny, V., Hert, D., Penicka, R., Saska, M., … Kumar, V. (2019). Autonomous landing on a moving vehicle with an unmanned aerial vehicle. Journal of Field Robotics, 36(5), 874-891. doi:10.1002/rob.21858De Souza, J. P. C., Marcato, A. L. M., de Aguiar, E. P., Jucá, M. A., & Teixeira, A. M. (2019). Autonomous Landing of UAV Based on Artificial Neural Network Supervised by Fuzzy Logic. Journal of Control, Automation and Electrical Systems, 30(4), 522-531. doi:10.1007/s40313-019-00465-ySITL Simulator (Software in the Loop)http://ardupilot.org/dev/docs/sitl-simulator-software-in-the-loop.htmlFabra, F., Calafate, C. T., Cano, J.-C., & Manzoni, P. (2017). On the impact of inter-UAV communications interference in the 2.4 GHz band. 2017 13th International Wireless Communications and Mobile Computing Conference (IWCMC). doi:10.1109/iwcmc.2017.7986413MAVLink Micro Air Vehicle Communication Protocolhttp://qgroundcontrol.org/mavlink/startFabra, F., Calafate, C. T., Cano, J. C., & Manzoni, P. (2018). ArduSim: Accurate and real-time multicopter simulation. Simulation Modelling Practice and Theory, 87, 170-190. doi:10.1016/j.simpat.2018.06.009Careem, M. A. A., Gomez, J., Saha, D., & Dutta, A. (2019). HiPER-V: A High Precision Radio Frequency Vehicle for Aerial Measurements. 2019 16th Annual IEEE International Conference on Sensing, Communication, and Networking (SECON). doi:10.1109/sahcn.2019.882490

Intra-network interference robustness : an empirical evaluation of IEEE 802.15.4-2015 SUN-OFDM

While IEEE 802.15.4 and its Time Slotted Channel Hopping (TSCH) medium access mode were developed as a wireless substitute for reliable process monitoring in industrial environments, most deployments use a single/static physical layer (PHY) configuration. Instead of limiting all links to the throughput and reliability of a single Modulation and Coding Scheme (MCS), you can dynamically re-configure the PHY of link endpoints according to the context. However, such modulation diversity causes links to coincide in time/frequency space, resulting in poor reliability if left unchecked. Nonetheless, to some level, intentional spatial overlap improves resource efficiency while partially preserving the benefits of modulation diversity. Hence, we measured the mutual interference robustness of certain Smart Utility Network (SUN) Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) configurations, as a first step towards combining spatial re-use and modulation diversity. This paper discusses the packet reception performance of those PHY configurations in terms of Signal to Interference Ratio (SIR) and time-overlap percentage between interference and targeted parts of useful transmissions. In summary, we found SUN-OFDM O3 MCS1 and O4 MCS2 performed best. Consequently, one should consider them when developing TSCH scheduling mechanisms in the search for resource efficient ubiquitous connectivity through modulation diversity and spatial re-use

A Systematic Literature Review on Distributed Machine Learning in Edge Computing

Distributed edge intelligence is a disruptive research area that enables the execution of machine learning and deep learning (ML/DL) algorithms close to where data are generated. Since edge devices are more limited and heterogeneous than typical cloud devices, many hindrances have to be overcome to fully extract the potential benefits of such an approach (such as data-in-motion analytics). In this paper, we investigate the challenges of running ML/DL on edge devices in a distributed way, paying special attention to how techniques are adapted or designed to execute on these restricted devices. The techniques under discussion pervade the processes of caching, training, inference, and offloading on edge devices. We also explore the benefits and drawbacks of these strategies

Seven Defining Features of Terahertz (THz) Wireless Systems: A Fellowship of Communication and Sensing

Wireless communication at the terahertz (THz) frequency bands (0.1-10THz) is viewed as one of the cornerstones of tomorrow's 6G wireless systems. Owing to the large amount of available bandwidth, THz frequencies can potentially provide wireless capacity performance gains and enable high-resolution sensing. However, operating a wireless system at the THz-band is limited by a highly uncertain channel. Effectively, these channel limitations lead to unreliable intermittent links as a result of a short communication range, and a high susceptibility to blockage and molecular absorption. Consequently, such impediments could disrupt the THz band's promise of high-rate communications and high-resolution sensing capabilities. In this context, this paper panoramically examines the steps needed to efficiently deploy and operate next-generation THz wireless systems that will synergistically support a fellowship of communication and sensing services. For this purpose, we first set the stage by describing the fundamentals of the THz frequency band. Based on these fundamentals, we characterize seven unique defining features of THz wireless systems: 1) Quasi-opticality of the band, 2) THz-tailored wireless architectures, 3) Synergy with lower frequency bands, 4) Joint sensing and communication systems, 5) PHY-layer procedures, 6) Spectrum access techniques, and 7) Real-time network optimization. These seven defining features allow us to shed light on how to re-engineer wireless systems as we know them today so as to make them ready to support THz bands. Furthermore, these features highlight how THz systems turn every communication challenge into a sensing opportunity. Ultimately, the goal of this article is to chart a forward-looking roadmap that exposes the necessary solutions and milestones for enabling THz frequencies to realize their potential as a game changer for next-generation wireless systems.Comment: 26 pages, 6 figure

A blockchain protocol for authenticating space communications between satellites constellations

Blockchain has found many applications, apart from Bitcoin, in different fields and it has the potential to be very useful in the satellite communications and space industries. Decentralized and secure protocols for processing and manipulating space transactions of satellite swarms in the form of Space Digital Tokens (SDT) can be built using blockchain technology. Tokenizing space transactions using SDTs will open the door to different new blockchain-based solutions for the advancement of constellation-based satellite communications in the space industry. Developing blockchain solutions using smart contracts could be used in securely authenticating various P2P satellite communications and transactions within/between satellite swarms. To manage and secure these transactions, using the proposed SDT concept, this paper suggested a blockchain-based protocol called Proof of Space Transactions (PoST). This protocol was adopted to manage and authenticate the transactions of satellite constellations in a P2P connection. The PoST protocol was prototyped using the Ethereum blockchain and experimented with to evaluate its performance using four metrics: read latency, read throughput, transaction latency, and transaction throughput. The simulation results clarified the efficiency of the proposed PoST protocol in processing and verifying satellite transactions in a short time according to read and transaction latency results. Moreover, the security results showed that the proposed PoST protocol is secure and efficient in verifying satellite transactions according to true positive rate (TPR), true negative rate (TNR), and accuracy metrics. These findings may shape a real attempt to develop a new generation of Blockchain-based satellite constellation systems