Critical Transmission Range And Capacity On A Form Of Aeronautical Ad-hoc Networks

Currently there are two dominated systems in aeronautical communications:the Aircraft Communications Reporting System (ACARS) and the Aeronautical Telecom-munications Network (ATN), As an obsolete system, ACARS is being replaced by the new system ATN. However two aeronautical communication systems are too limited to meet the tremendous increases in demand for performance based navigation and in-flight broadband Internet access in aeronautical industry. Aeronautical Ad-hoc Net-works (AANET) have been deemed as a viable solution to provide aircraft-to-aircraft communications without the aid of ground stations and satellite system.In this paper we consider the aircrafts on a single flight path and introduce a2-dimensional AANET model based on the specifications of International Civil Aviation Organization. Based on this model, the Necessary Transmission Range (NTR) and Sufficient Transmission Range (STR) are derived as a function of the aircraft density, flight path length and airspace separation, which represent the critical conditions under which the AANET is disconnected or connected respectively. The analytical results are validated through simulation studies. Besides we determine the capacity of AANET by giving an upper bound and a achieve bound. Our result demonstrate the capacity would decrease linearly with the airway length. Thus infrastructure should improve AANET’s capacity dramatically.