Design of Ad Hoc Wireless Mesh Networks Formed by Unmanned Aerial Vehicles with Advanced Mechanical Automation

Ad hoc wireless mesh networks formed by unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) equipped with wireless transceivers (access points (APs)) are increasingly being touted as being able to provide a flexible "on-the-fly" communications infrastructure that can collect and transmit sensor data from sensors in remote, wilderness, or disaster-hit areas. Recent advances in the mechanical automation of UAVs have resulted in separable APs and replaceable batteries that can be carried by UAVs and placed at arbitrary locations in the field. These advanced mechanized UAV mesh networks pose interesting questions in terms of the design of the network architecture and the optimal UAV scheduling algorithms. This paper studies a range of network architectures that depend on the mechanized automation (AP separation and battery replacement) capabilities of UAVs and proposes heuristic UAV scheduling algorithms for each network architecture, which are benchmarked against optimal designs.Comment: 12 page

A Communication Architecture for Crowd Management in Emergency and Disruptive Scenarios

Crowd management aims to develop support infrastructures that can effectively manage crowds at any time. In emergency and disruptive scenarios this concept can minimize the risk to human life and to the infrastructure. We propose the Communication Architecture for Crowd Management (CACROM), which can support crowd management under emergency and disruptive scenarios. We identify, describe, and discuss the various components of the proposed architecture, and we briefly discuss open challenges in the design of crowd management systems for emergency and disruptive scenarios

Architecture design for disaster resilient management network using D2D technology

Huge damages from natural disasters, such as earthquakes, floods, landslide, tsunamis, have been reported in recent years, claiming many lives, rendering millions homeless and causing huge financial losses worldwide. The lack of effective communication between the public rescue/safety agencies, rescue teams, first responders and trapped survivors/victims makes the situation even worse. Factors like dysfunctional communication networks, limited communications capacity, limited resources/services, data transformation and effective evaluation, energy, and power deficiency cause unnecessary hindrance in rescue and recovery services during a disaster. The new wireless communication technologies are needed to enhance life-saving capabilities and rescue services. In general, in order to improve societal resilience towards natural catastrophes and develop effective communication infrastructure, innovative approaches need to be initiated to provide improved quality, better connectivity in the events of natural and human disasters. In this thesis, a disaster resilient network architecture is proposed and analysed using multi-hop communications, clustering, energy harvesting, throughput optimization, reliability enhancement, adaptive selection, and low latency communications. It also examines the importance of mode selection, power management, frequency and time resource allocation to realize the promises of Long-term Evolution (LTE) Device to Device (D2D) communication. In particular, to support resilient and energy efficient communication in disaster-affected areas. This research is examined by thorough and vigorous simulations and validated through mathematical modelling. Overall, the impact of this research is twofold: i) it provides new technologies for effective inter- and intra-agency coordination system during a disaster event by establishing a stronger and resilient communication; and ii) It offers a potential solution for stakeholders such as governments, rescue teams, and general public with new informed information on how to establish effective policies to cope with challenges before, during and after the disaster events

Reconfigurable middleware architectures for large scale sensor networks

Wireless sensor networks, in an effort to be energy efficient, typically lack the high-level abstractions of advanced programming languages. Though strong, the dichotomy between these two paradigms can be overcome. The SENSIX software framework, described in this dissertation, uniquely integrates constraint-dominated wireless sensor networks with the flexibility of object-oriented programming models, without violating the principles of either. Though these two computing paradigms are contradictory in many ways, SENSIX bridges them to yield a dynamic middleware abstraction unifying low-level resource-aware task reconfiguration and high-level object recomposition. Through the layered approach of SENSIX, the software developer creates a domain-specific sensing architecture by defining a customized task specification and utilizing object inheritance. In addition, SENSIX performs better at large scales (on the order of 1000 nodes or more) than other sensor network middleware which do not include such unified facilities for vertical integration

Opportunistic Data Gathering and Dissemination in Urban Scenarios

In the era of the Internet of Everything, a user with a handheld or wearable device equipped with sensing capability has become a producer as well as a consumer of information and services. The more powerful these devices get, the more likely it is that they will generate and share content locally, leading to the presence of distributed information sources and the diminishing role of centralized servers. As of current practice, we rely on infrastructure acting as an intermediary, providing access to the data. However, infrastructure-based connectivity might not always be available or the best alternative. Moreover, it is often the case where the data and the processes acting upon them are of local scopus. Answers to a query about a nearby object, an information source, a process, an experience, an ability, etc. could be answered locally without reliance on infrastructure-based platforms. The data might have temporal validity limited to or bounded to a geographical area and/or the social context where the user is immersed in. In this envisioned scenario users could interact locally without the need for a central authority, hence, the claim of an infrastructure-less, provider-less platform. The data is owned by the users and consulted locally as opposed to the current approach of making them available globally and stay on forever. From a technical viewpoint, this network resembles a Delay/Disruption Tolerant Network where consumers and producers might be spatially and temporally decoupled exchanging information with each other in an adhoc fashion. To this end, we propose some novel data gathering and dissemination strategies for use in urban-wide environments which do not rely on strict infrastructure mediation. While preserving the general aspects of our study and without loss of generality, we focus our attention toward practical applicative scenarios which help us capture the characteristics of opportunistic communication networks

A reliable and energy efficient cognitive radio multichannel MAC protocol for ad-hoc networks

A thesis submitted in partial ful llment for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Computer Science and Technology, University of BedfordshireRecent research has shown that several spectrum bands are mostly underutilised. To resolve the issue of underutilisation of spectrum bands across the networks, the concept of Cognitive Radio (CR) technology was envisaged. The CR technology allows Secondary Users (SUs) to acquire opportunistic access to large parts of the underutilised spectrum bands on wireless networks. In CR networks, SUs may scan and identify the vacant channels in the wireless spectrum bands and then dynamically tune their receivers to identify vacant channels and transmitters, and commence communication among themselves without causing interference to Primary/Licensed Users (PUs). Despite the developments in the eld of CR technology, recent research shows that still there are many challenges unaddressed in the eld. Thus, there is a need to reduce additional handshaking over control and data channels, to minimise large sized control frames and to introduce reliable channel selection process and maintenance of SUs' communication when PUs return to a licensed channel. A fundamental challenge a ecting this technology is the identi cation of reliable Data Channels (DCHs) for SUs communication among available channels and the continuation of communication when the PU returns. This doctoral research investigates in detail how to resolve issues related to the protocol design for Cognitive Radio Networks (CRNs) on Medium Access Layers (MAC) for Ad-Hoc networks. As a result, a novel Reliable and Energy e cient Cognitive Radio multi-channel MAC protocol (RECR-MAC) for Ad-Hoc networks is proposed to overcome the shortcomings mentioned. After discussing the background, operation and architecture of CR technology, this research proposes numerous platforms and testbeds for the deployment of personal and commercial applications of the CRNs. Side by side, optimised control frames and a reduced number of handshakes over the CCH are suggested to extend the transmitting time for data communication. In addition, the reliable channel selection process is introduced instead of random selection of DCHs for successful data communication among the SUs. In RECR-MAC, the objective of every SU is to select reliable DCHs, thereby ensuring high connectivity and exchanging the successful data frames across the cognitive network. Moreover, the selection criteria of the DCHs are based on multiple factors, such as an initial selection based on the maximum free time recorded by the SUs over the DCH channel ranking, which is proportional to the number of positive/negative acknowledgements, and the past history of DCHs. If more than two DCHs have an equal value during the second, third and following iterations, then the DCHs are selected based upon the maximum free time. The priorities of the DCHs are then assigned based on Reliable Data Channels, that is, RDCH 1, RDCH 2, RDCH 3, and RDCH 4 respectively (where RDCH 1 and RDCH 2 have the highest priority, DRCH 3 and RDCH 4 have the next priority, and so on). The impacts of channel selection process and Backup Data Channel (BDC) over the proposed RECR-MAC protocol are analysed in combination with comparative benchmark CR-MAC protocols based on the timing diagrams proposed. Finally, the RECR-MAC protocol is validated by using a MATLAB simulator with PU impact over the DCHs, both with and without BDC, and by comparing results, such as communication time, transmitting energy and throughput, with benchmark CR-MAC protocols

Communication and Control in Collaborative UAVs: Recent Advances and Future Trends

The recent progress in unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) technology has significantly advanced UAV-based applications for military, civil, and commercial domains. Nevertheless, the challenges of establishing high-speed communication links, flexible control strategies, and developing efficient collaborative decision-making algorithms for a swarm of UAVs limit their autonomy, robustness, and reliability. Thus, a growing focus has been witnessed on collaborative communication to allow a swarm of UAVs to coordinate and communicate autonomously for the cooperative completion of tasks in a short time with improved efficiency and reliability. This work presents a comprehensive review of collaborative communication in a multi-UAV system. We thoroughly discuss the characteristics of intelligent UAVs and their communication and control requirements for autonomous collaboration and coordination. Moreover, we review various UAV collaboration tasks, summarize the applications of UAV swarm networks for dense urban environments and present the use case scenarios to highlight the current developments of UAV-based applications in various domains. Finally, we identify several exciting future research direction that needs attention for advancing the research in collaborative UAVs

Internet of Things Strategic Research Roadmap

Internet of Things (IoT) is an integrated part of Future Internet including existing and evolving Internet and network developments and could be conceptually defined as a dynamic global network infrastructure with self configuring capabilities based on standard and interoperable communication protocols where physical and virtual “things” have identities, physical attributes, and virtual personalities, use intelligent interfaces, and are seamlessly integrated into the information network