Multilayer Virtual-Cell-Based Resource Allocation in Unmanned Aircraft Systems

Abstract

Unmanned aircraft systems (UASs) have attracted considerable attention in various industries. Furthermore, the use of unmanned aircrafts (UAs) is expected to spread rapidly and change our daily lives, in the future. However, while the number of UAs is increasing, the available frequency allocated to the UASs remains limited. Thus, when numerous UAs are used at high densities, the wireless communication between the UAs and the ground stations (GSs) may fail because of interference. To solve this issue, a time-division multiple access scheme can be adopted in the UASs. For efficient use of the allocated frequency, it is desirable that the UAs free from interference communicate simultaneously. Therefore, in this paper, we propose an efficient resource allocation scheme that increases the number of UAs that communicate simultaneously and improves the throughput. Our proposed scheme is based on the concept of multilayer virtual cells, and can increase the number of UAs that communicate simultaneously by considering the distance between the UAs and the GSs. The effectiveness of our proposed resource allocation scheme is evaluated through simulations. Our proposed scheme is found to be more efficient than other existing schemes, in terms of the number of UAs that can communicate simultaneously.