Three dimensional channel characterization for low altitude aerial vehicles

Based on the recent developments in the area of lithium polymer batteries and carbon fiber-reinforced plastic materials Micro Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (MUAV) have significantly gained in importance. Therefore, the use of MUAV based swarms is a feasible approach for remote sensing, surveillance and in particular for emergency and rescue missions [1][2]. Developing MUAVs which operate at low altitudes opens a new and challenging use case for both aerial mesh networks and existing cellular networks. The channel characteristics are crucial for the design of the required communication system. Since channel models for cellular networks typically assume that the users are at ground level, the use of these models for aerial deployment is a questionable attempt. For this reason, we are focusing in this paper on the channel characterization and analysis of an aerial mesh network based on a MUAV swarms. A choice of well known analytical and empirical channel models are adapted to the boundary conditions of low altitude platforms and subsequently validated by raytracing measurements in order to state their applicability.