Telecommunication: Aeronautical mobile and a ground station interactions

Transmission among aeronautical systems and ground stations are of a major importance for numerous operational configurations. In this study, we focus on two aspects of this subject:

1. Transmission link between an UAV (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle) and a ground station: How can we evaluate the transmission and the data rate qualities for spatially remote configurations?

2. Impact of interferences generated by an emitting ground station (such as radars) on civilian aircraft communication systems: Can we find a relationship among the interferences and the distances between civilian air traffic and a surveillance radar?

To answer both questions, we need to estimate the attenuation of transmitted signals between the ground station and the UAV. In the literature, one can find various standard models developed and tested in the last decades. Nevertheless, the accuracy and the robustness of previous models remain open to discussion especially when the aeronautical systems fly at low altitude or in areas of high reliefs. In this case, the interactions with the ground station become far more complex.

ITU (International Telecommunication Union) officially recommends a model mainly based on the IF-77 electromagnetic wave propagation model. However, French team at IUT showed some drawbacks of the proposed model related to ITU recommendations P.525 and P.526 for areas of high reliefs.

Our project consists firstly to implement, analyze and test the IF-77 model in order to highlight its weaknesses under various specific configurations (low altitude, high relief). In addition, the obtained simulation results should be also compared to the results provided by the American aeronautical agency.

In a second step, we should suggest some solutions to address the weaknesses of the classical model. We should pay a particular attention to the consistency of the modified model and various existing ITU recommendations (P.525 and P.526 for instance).

Finally, the theoretical propagation models must allow a realistic estimation for our two major concerns: the distance of coordination for the interaction between radars and civilian aircrafts, the data rate between UAV and a ground stations.

Selected Publications

Viet-Dung Nguyen, Huy Phan, Ali Mansour, Arnaud Coatanhay, Thierry Marsault. On the proof of recursive Vogler algorithm for multiple knife-edge diffraction. IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation , November 2020. [Early access]

Nguyen, Viet Dung and Phan, Huy and Mansour, Ali and Coatanhay, Arnaud. VoglerNet: multiple knife-edge diffraction using deep neural network. 14th European Conference on Antennas and Propagation (EuCAP), March 2020, Copenhagen, Denmark.

Other information

Contact: Dr. Nguyen Viet Dung