Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) acting as access points in cellular networks require wireless backhauls to the core network. In this paper we employ stochastic geometry to carry out an analysis of the UAV backhaul performance that can be achieved with a network of dedicated ground stations. We provide analytical expressions for the probability of successfully establishing a backhaul and the expected data rate over the backhaul link, given either an LTE or a millimeterwave backhaul. We demonstrate that increasing the density of the ground station network gives diminishing returns on the performance of the UAV backhaul, and that for an LTE backhaul the ground stations can benefit from being colocated with an existing base station network.

Abstract-We envision small cells mounted on unmanned aerial vehicles, to complement existing macrocell infrastructure. We demonstrate through numerical analysis that clustering algorithms can be used to position the airborne access points and select users to offload from the macrocells. We compare the performance of these deployments against equivalent simulated picocell deployments. We demonstrate that due to their ability to position themselves around exact user locations while maintaining a direct line-of-sight link the airborne access points provide a significantly improved received signal strength than the static picocell alternatives. We also find that the airborne access points provide superior service quality even in the presence of user and access point positioning errors.

Abstract-Wireless access points on unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are being considered for mobile service provisioning in commercial networks. To be able to efficiently use these devices in cellular networks it is necessary to first have a qualitative and quantitative understanding of how their design parameters reflect on the service quality experienced by the end user. In this paper we set up a scenario where a network of UAVs operating at a certain height above ground provide wireless service within coverage areas shaped by their directional antennas. We provide an analytical expression for the coverage probability experienced by a typical user as a function of the UAV parameters.

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are expected to play an important role in next generation cellular networks, acting as flying infrastructure which can serve ground users when regular infrastructure is overloaded or unavailable. As these devices are expected to operate wirelessly they will rely on an internal battery for their power supply, which will limit the amount of time they can operate over an area of interest before having to recharge. In this article, we outline three battery charging options that may be considered by a network operator and use simulations to demonstrate the performance impact of incorporating those options into a cellular network where UAV infrastructure provides wireless service.

Wireless access points on unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are being considered for mobile service provisioning in commercial networks. To be able to efficiently use these devices in cellular networks it is necessary to first have a qualitative and quantitative understanding of how their design parameters reflect on the service quality experienced by the end user. In this paper we use stochastic geometry to characterise the behaviour of a network of UAV access points that intelligently position themselves above user hotspots, and we evaluate the performance of such a network against cases where the UAVs are positioned in a rectangular grid or according to heuristic positioning algorithms.