Abstract
Recent advances in communication systems provide an enabling technology for aircraft connection and safety. A promising communication system that uses stratospheric platforms provides an efficient and improved communication performance and can be an efficient solution for establishing communication networks for aviation. Therefore, in this paper, a novel communication network based on stratospheric basestation (SB) is proposed to provide fifth-generation (5G) and beyond services for civil aviation aircrafts to improve global flight connectivity, control, and safety. The proposed aircraft–SB network is demonstrated, and its coverage geometry is modelled and investigated. As the 5G and beyond networks use millimeter wave frequency bands (mm-wave), the performance of different atmospheric losses including gaseous absorption, rain, and fog/cloud is analyzed to investigate the system’s practical feasibility at different 5G proposed frequencies ranging from 3.5 to 66 GHz through a flight model including three distinct stages which are takeoff/landing, climbing/descending, and cruise stages. Also, handover scenarios in the proposed aircraft–SB network are investigated and analyzed at the proposed 5G frequencies. In addition, the aircraft–SB 5G network is compared to the most recent low-Earth orbit (LEO) Internet satellites where the proposed system is expected to provide low latency, less atmospheric attenuation, longer aircraft–SB link duration, and very low handover rate.
Highlights
Internet connectivity is currently available through wireless fifth-generation (5G) cellular networks and a few Gbps data rates is expected by using massive multi-input multi-output (MIMO) techniques at the millimeter-wave bands [3,4,5]
It is expected that most limitations of conventional communication systems will be mitigated by using stratospheric basestation (SB) where a global area and high-performance connectivity can be provided at lower system cost relative to satellite systems
As the provision of high-speed Internet connectivity is mainly impacted by the atmospheric attenuation, the proposed network performance at 5G mm-wave bands is analyzed and investigated at different atmospheric attenuation sources such as the permanent atmospheric gaseous absorption and other temporary rain and fog/cloud attenuations to stand on the feasibility of the system and choose the appropriate and reliable operational frequency bands
Summary
Aviation is one of the leading worldwide industries in which more than 4.3 billion passengers are carried annually across the world [1]. The current aviation communication networks that use satellites or terrestrial networks have very limited bandwidths to provide high-speed Internet connections to onboard passengers during flight along with transmission of extensive aircraft measurement and control data. Internet connectivity is currently available through wireless fifth-generation (5G) cellular networks and a few Gbps data rates is expected by using massive multi-input multi-output (MIMO) techniques at the millimeter-wave (mm-wave) bands [3,4,5] These high data rates can be achieved at very small cell dimensions due to the high atmospheric attenuation at the mm-wave 5G frequencies [6] and requires special analysis and investigation for application in aviation systems. It is expected that most limitations of conventional communication systems will be mitigated by using SBs where a global area and high-performance connectivity can be provided at lower system cost relative to satellite systems
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