Networked UAV Command, Control and Communication
Jack S. Elston, Eric W. Frew, Brian Argrow · AIAA Guidance, Navigation, and Control Conference and Exhibit · 2006
The networked UAV command, control, and communication project has designed, im-plemented, and tested a network-centric, intelligent flight management system for UAVs. The system utilizes an existing ad-hoc network to demonstrate the ability of UAVs to make mission level decisions autonomously based upon network metrics and operator-specified parameters. Each UAV features a highly modular hardware architecture which provides a standardized interface to the onboard systems and enables system scaling. A high-level bus protocol is used on this interface to transport messages between the avionics package, network node, supervisory computer, and scientific payload. All decisions are made au-tonomously, but an operator maintains control of the mission parameters, and may modify them through the ad-hoc network using a mobile monitoring station. The station features a GUI to display feedback on node status as well as provide a visualization of any sci-ence data being collected. The collective system was tested and verified utilizing both a hardware-in-the-loop simulation, and an experiment at an outdoor range. I.