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Editors
Editor-in-Chief–Peter Willett, University of
Connecticut, USA
Associate Editor-in-Chief–Daniel O’Hagan,
University of Cape Town, South Africa
VP Publications–Maria Sabrina Greco,
University of Pisa, Italy
AESS President–Walt Downing, Southwest
Research Institute, USA
Operations Manager, AESS–Judy Scharmann,
Conference Catalysts, LLC, USA

Contributing Editors May 2021 ISSN 0885-8985 Volume 36 Number 5

Awards–Fulvio Gini, University of Pisa, Italy
Book Reviews Editor–Samuel Shapero, Georgia
Tech Research Institute, USA COLUMN
Conferences–Michael Braasch, Ohio University,
USA In This Issue –Technically . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Distinguished Lecturers & Tutorials–Lorenzo
Lo Monte, Telephonics Corporation, USA
Education–Lorenzo Lo Monte, Telephonics
Corporation, USA
FEATURE ARTICLE
History–Hugh Griffiths, University College
London, UK Massive Data Transfer From and to Aircraft on Ground:
Student Research–Federico Lombardi, Feasibility and Challenges
University College London, UK
S. Hofmann, S. Duhovnikov, D. Schupke . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Technical Panels–George Schmidt, MIT
Instrumentation Laboratory /Draper
Laboratory, USA (Retired) A Systematic Literature Review: Is Military Cognitive Radio System
Tutorials–W. Dale Blair, Georgia Tech Research on the Brink of the “Valley of Death”?
Institute, USA
T. Tuukkanen, S. Yrj€
ol€
a, M. Matinmikko-Blue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Website Updates–Judy Scharmann, Conference
Catalysts, LLC, USA
Flight Demonstration of a Hybrid Battery/Supercapacitor Energy Storage
Associate Editors and Areas of System in an Earth Orbiting CubeSat
Specialty
K.B. Chin, G.S. Bolotin, M.C. Smart, S. Katz, J.A. Flynn,
Scott Bawden–Energy Conversion Systems,
Arctic Submarine Laboratory, USA N.K. Palmer, E.J. Brandon, W.C. West . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
Erik Blasch, US Air Force Research Lab (AFRL),
USA A Framework for Loadable Airborne Systems
Roberto Sabatini, RMIT University, Australia– J. Marques, S. Yelisetty, L. Barros . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
Avionics Systems
Stefan Brueggenwirth, Fraunhofer Institute for
High Frequency Physics and Radar Research on Abnormal Output Current Drop of Solar Array of
Techniques FHR, Germany–AI and ML in a Low Earth Orbit Satellite
Aerospace
Dietrich Fraenken, Hensoldt Sensors, Germany–
S. Bai, W. Wang, Z. Chen, W. Yao . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Fusion and Signal Processing

NEWS & INFORMATION

Lyudmila Mihaylova, The University of
Sheffield, UK–Target Tracking
Mauro De Sanctis, University of Rome “Tor
Vergata,” Italy–Signal Processing and
Communications AESS Senior Members Elevated in 2021 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Jason Gross, West Virginia University (WVU),
USA–Navigation, Positioning AESS Magazine Distinguished Lecturers List . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
Giancarmine Fasano, University of Naples
Federico II, Italy–Unmanned Aircraft Systems Three Special Sessions on Quantum Radar at IEEE Radar Conferences
Daniel O’Hagan, University of Cape Town,
South Africa–Radar Systems
F. Daum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
Richard Linares, University of Minnesota, USA–
Space Systems IEEE Aerospace & Electronic Systems Society Organization 2021 . . . . . . . . 63
Haiying Liu, DRS Technologies, Inc., USA–
Control and Robotic Systems AESS Meetings and Conferences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . inside back cover
Michael Cardinale, Retired, USA–Electro-Optic
and Infrared Systems, Image Processing
Ruhai Wang, Lamar University, USA–Systems
Engineering
Marco Frasca, MBDA, Italy–Quantum
Technologies in Aerospace Systems
Christof Sch€ upbach, Swiss Department of
Defense, Switzerland–Radar Systems

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 AESS Senior Members Elevated in 2021

Dated: May 2021

 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON AEROSPACE AND ELECTRONIC SYSTEMS
Special Section on: Information and Communication Technologies (ICT)
for a New Space Vision

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In This Issue –Technically

MASSIVE DATA TRANSFER FROM AND TO AIRCRAFT ON GROUND:

FEASIBILITY AND CHALLENGES
The analysis of large amount of sensor data can enhance aircraft operations and maintenance. In contrast
to other use cases, aircraft sensor data are accumulated on-board during the flight. The data need to be
transferred in a short time while the aircraft is on the ground due to limited and expensive connectivity
in the air. This leads to a massive transfer of data in a short time. Therefore, we analyze the data rate
demand per aircraft in terms of generated data per flight hour. We determine the influence of different
parameters on the needed data rate per aircraft. We conclude that the needed data rates are feasible if the
full day is used for transmitting. We show that multiple terabyte of generated data per flight hour can be
supported by 5G data rates. Furthermore, we highlight challenges for the deployment of an aircraft data
transfer system.

A SYSTEMATIC LITERATURE REVIEW: IS MILITARY COGNITIVE RADIO SYSTEM ON

THE BRINK OF THE “VALLEY OF DEATH”?
Cognitive radio (CR) was coined to address evolving user needs two decades ago. Since then, it also has been
considered a way to mitigate perceived spectrum scarcity in various application areas. In this article, the status
of military CR research is assessed through a systematic literature review of 193 articles, from 2013 to 2020,
using IEEE thematic topics, technology readiness levels, as well as comprehensive capability meta-model as
analytical frameworks. The annual distribution of military CR research indicates continuing interest. The mil-
itary CR research seems to be prolific on topics like waveform design and security, not forgetting a steady
interest in CR networking topics. Significantly low numbers of papers address applications, services, and stan-
dardization. In general, military CR research seemed sporadic and scattered. Our data suggest that a transition
from individual techniques, component-level subsystem research in the direction of systems engineering
approach, and system-level studies has not yet happened, and the overall TRLs remain low. The absence of
publicly articulated comprehensive treatment of the notion of military cognitive radio system is graphic and
has led to disjointed, scattered research at the subsystem level.

FLIGHT DEMONSTRATION OF A HYBRID BATTERY/SUPERCAPACITOR ENERGY

STORAGE SYSTEM IN AN EARTH ORBITING CUBESAT
The development and demonstration of a hybrid battery/supercapacitor energy storage system (ESS) onboard
the Earth-orbiting CubeSat JPL/CSUNSat1 is described. The ESS is capable of supporting high power pulse
currents (>10C-rate) at low temperature (<–40  C). The primary operational phase of the technology demon-
stration mission includes the performance characterization of the ESS at various discharge rates (1–15 A) at
moderate to low temperatures. The internal resistances obtained from JPL/CSUNSat1 telemetry under bat-
tery-only, supercapacitor-only, and hybrid operating modes of the ESS were consistent with ground test data.
Despite the loss of telemetry downlinks due to the failure of a memory storage card in the later stages of the
mission, ten charge/discharge cycles were performed successfully to validate an impedance-based perfor-
mance model developed at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. This flight demonstrates the first use of supercapaci-
tors within a hybrid energy storage subsystem in a space environment.

4 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE MAY 2021

A FRAMEWORK FOR LOADABLE AIRBORNE SYSTEMS
The software loading occurs when a new software version corrects previously identified errors to
include new functionalities to airborne systems, such as those embedded in aircraft. The available litera-
ture has not yet scientifically addressed the characteristics of Loadable Airborne Systems (LASs).
Although the RTCA DO-178 introduced the concept of field-loadable software, which is the possibility
to update the software without the need to remove the equipment or system from its installation on the
aircraft, the industry does not yet have an organized framework of reusable requirements and tests. The
objective of this work is to present a new framework for LASs. This framework contains a set of reus-
able requirements and general test procedures for software loading, involving manual and automatic
checks. We believe that our framework can help smaller companies, especially market entrants, to
incorporate software loading capacity into system development. This work also includes the identifica-
tion of threats involving safety and security.

RESEARCH ON ABNORMAL OUTPUT CURRENT DROP OF SOLAR ARRAY OF

A LOW EARTH ORBIT SATELLITE
This article describes the phenomenon of the abnormal output current drop of a solar array (SA) of a low Earth
orbit satellite. All possible failure causes were analyzed in detail and the most likely reason was determined to
be an open-circuit in solar cell interconnectors. The failure mechanisms were comprehensively analyzed from
three aspects: solar cell replacement process, erosion of atomic oxygen, and thermal fatigue. The analysis
results were verified by corresponding ground tests. For the on-orbit failure, a solution to slow down the output
current drop of SA was given and verified to be effective by ground remote control operations on the satellite
on orbit. The improvement measures for the development of SAs to avoid the output current drop are also
proposed.

MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE 5

Feature Article:
Massive Data Transfer From and to Aircraft on
Ground: Feasibility and Challenges
Sandra Hofmann , TU Dresden, 01062 Dresden, Germany
Svetoslav Duhovnikov , Dominic Schupke , Airbus, 81663 Munich, Germany
INTRODUCTION
On board an aircraft, a large number of sensors moni-
tor the status of the aircraft structure and aircraft sys-
tems. Currently, only a subset of these data is
collected and analyzed. The data analysis provides the
opportunity to optimize aircraft operations and mainte-
nance. Failures can be predicted before a component
breaks and procedures can be optimized. For analysis,
these data needs to be transferred from the aircraft to
the ground network. In general, the data can be trans-
ferred during the flight or after the flight. In our previ-
ous work, we studied the performance of direct air-to-
ground (DA2G) and satellite links between aircraft and
ground. We conduct a general study on 4G and 5G
DA2G and satellite performance in [1]. We comple-
ment this theoretic study by measurements in [2]. In
both studies, we show that the DA2G link can provide
a few hundred megabits per second, depending on the
setup. Taking into account that this link needs to be
jointly used by different applications, including passen-
ger connectivity, a few hundred megabits per second
are insufficient. Therefore, it is favorable to transfer
delay-tolerant and high-volume data while the aircraft
is on the ground, where connectivity is less limited.
Most of the sensor data are delay tolerant; therefore, a
transmission after the flight is feasible. Hence, the gen-
erated data during the flight is accumulated. However,
the aircraft turnaround time on ground is limited. The
Authors’ current addresses: Sandra Hofmann, Deutsche
Telekom Chair of Communication Networks, TU
Dresden, 01062 Dresden, Germany (e-mail: sandra.hof-
mann2@mailbox.tu-dresden.de). Svetoslav Duhovnikov,
Dominic Schupke, Airbus, Central Research and Tech-
nology, 81663 Munich, Germany (e-mails: svetoslav.
duhovnikov@airbus.com; dominic.schupke@airbus.com).
Manuscript received June 10, 2020, revised October 18,
2020; accepted December 17, 2020, and ready for
publication January 18, 2021.
Review handled by Mauro De Sanctis.
0885-8985/21/$26.00 ß 2021 IEEE
6 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
DOI. No. 10.1109/MAES.2021.3053119
aggregation of data over many flight hours results in a
massive amount of data, which needs to be transferred
in a short amount of time. Therefore, a high-speed
connection at the airport is required. Moreover, multi-
ple aircraft need to be served simultaneously. Different
options for high-speed connectivity exist, including
wired and wireless solutions. It is important that the
connectivity solution can be connected automatically.
Extra actions for the personnel, such as plugging in a
cabled connection, should be avoided, due to the addi-
tional effort and the susceptibility to errors. Therefore,
a wireless solution is pursued to ensure automatic
connectivity. Consequently, the challenge is to transfer
a massive amount of aggregated data from multiple
aircraft at the airport within a limited time. Besides
transfer of data from the aircraft, a high-speed
connection also enables the transfer of data to the air-
craft, for instance updates for the in-flight entertain-
ment system.
Related work within the area of aircraft connectivity
mainly focuses on two areas, in-cabin networks and net-
working from aircraft to the ground, including the airport
perspective. An overview on on-board and off-board air-
craft communications is given in [3]. According to the
authors, a large amount of data is generated on board
the aircraft, with the option to send data during or after the
flight. They conclude that low-cost and high-bandwidth
connectivity is needed to transfer data during turnaround
time. Connectivity from the airport’s perspective is ana-
lyzed in [4]. While many different technologies provide
connectivity at the airport for different purposes, using
only one technology for all purposes would be beneficial.
They propose 4G as a candidate solution and describe a
possible architecture as well as respective business mod-
els. The airport network is also studied in [5]. The authors
investigate optimal energy consumption for 5G and Wi-Fi
networks at airports. They evaluate the performance with
respect to energy consumption; however, they do not
study the achievable data rate.
Several studies have been conducted for in-cabin net-
works. Properly dimensioned in-cabin networks enable the
data collection within the aircraft. In our previous work [6],
MAY 2021

we evaluated 4G mobile broadband and machine-type com-
munication (MTC) for the aircraft cabin. We studied different
MTC use cases. While the evaluated use cases do not include
massive data transfer, the network architecture within the
cabin enables the collection of data from the cabin. The per-
formance of Wi-Fi, 4G, and LiFi inside the aircraft cabin has
been studied in [7]. The authors provide a channel model and
determine the per-user performance within the cabin. How-
ever, they do not investigate any link from the aircraft to
the ground network. The case of in-flight entertainment
is studied in [8]. The authors propose a flexible 5G
experimental platform for in-flight entertainment serv-
ices. Interestingly, they propose to include an on-board
data center on the aircraft. While they propose to use
the data center for passenger services, it could poten-
tially also be used to store and process aircraft
sensor data.
Several communication systems to transfer sensor
data have already been deployed. The history of Gatelink
and the deployments used in the year 2005 are summa-
rized in [9]. Although originally designed for communi-
cation between aircraft and ground stations, Aircraft
Communications Addressing and Reporting System
(ACARS) is an option to transmit safety related data.
Today, most of the ACARS traffic is generated while the
aircraft is on ground [9]. To enable higher data rates,
AeroMACS has been introduced for airport surface com-
munications [10]. It is based on 802.16e and uses the spe-
cifically allocated band from 5091 to 5150 MHz. While
the focus is on safety and traffic control at the airport,
data download is one of the mentioned applications [11].
Additionally, there are deployments specifically for
transferring data from aircraft based on Wi-Fi or cellular
systems. Some examples are Skywise [12], Gatesync
[13], or GroundLink [14]. However, except for Skywise,
they focus on pilot- and safety-related data and not
toward massive transfer of data. Skywise offers an open-
data platform to analyze the aircraft data. However, due
to restrictions in the currently available data links on
ground, they are not yet able to offer multi-gigabits per
second upload speeds as needed in the future.
The aforementioned existing communication systems
are not designed to offload a massive amount of data in the
order of terabits per second during the short turnaround
MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
Credit: Image licensed by Ingram Publishing.
time. To the best of our knowledge, this article is the first
analysis of the requirements for massive data transfer from
and to aircraft. In a first step, a suitable technology has to
be selected. Therefore, we study the needed data rates for a
ground communication system. To achieve this, we ana-
lyze flight traces to determine the needed data rate on the
ground in terms of the generated data rate per aircraft. We
also study the challenges and the potential system architec-
ture, including a comparison of existing or proposed com-
munication systems, such as 5G. Moreover, millimeter
wave (mmWave) technology is one candidate for high-
speed connectivity and is not yet widely used. Therefore,
we conduct 802.11ad measurements to evaluate the feasi-
bility of mmWave communications for aircraft data trans-
fer. The remainder of this article is structured as follows: In
the section “System Architecture and Challenges,” we
analyze different communication system architectures
and discuss challenges for high-speed connectivity at
airports. The section “Methodology” introduces the
methodology of the flight data analysis. The section
“Results of the Flight Data Analysis” shows the results
of the analysis. In the section “Throughput Measure-
ments of 60 GHz Wi-Fi,” we evaluate the performance
of the 802.11ad standard by measurements. Last, we
present the section “Conclusions.”
SYSTEM ARCHITECTURE AND CHALLENGES
In this section, we analyze different communication system
architectures including the performance characteristics of
currently available technologies. Furthermore, we high-
light the challenges of high-volume data transfer for
aircraft.
ARCHITECTURE
A communication system for aircraft needs to take several
requirements into account. It needs to offer the required
data rate and also be available on airports worldwide. In
Table 1, we compare the properties of different cellular
and noncellular communication systems in terms of spec-
trum, data rate, range, operator, and limitations. Spectrum
can be shared or licensed. The advantage of shared
7
Massive Data Transfer From and to Aircraft on Ground: Feasibility and Challenges

Table 1.

Comparison of Different Technology Options for Data Transfer From and to an Aircraft
Technology Spectrum Peak data rate Range Operator Limitations
60-GHz Wi-Fi Shared 6.7 Gb/s (802.11ad)
10 of Airport / local Line of sight
meters operator
Wi-Fi Shared 6.9 Gb/s (802.11ac) 50 m Airport / local Number of
9.6 Gb/s (802.11ax) operator users
AeroMACS Dedicated 50 Mb/s Several Airport / local Number of
kilometers operator users / BS
4G (Cat.21) Dedicated 1.4/0.3 Gb/s (DL/UL) Several Cellular operator Number of
kilometers users / BS
5G Dedicated 20/10 Gb/s (DL/UL) Several cellular operator Number of
kilometers users / BS
5G Dedicated 20/10 Gb/s (DL/UL) 500 m Cellular operator Line of sight
mmWave

spectrum is easy availability; however, it needs to be
shared with other users. For high-capacity communica-
tions, mmWave bands can be used. However, due to
the high frequency, the range becomes very small.
Moreover, further parameters need to be taken into
account, such as influence by rain. Additionally, the
antenna size decreases with increasing frequency,
which is an advantage for mmWave bands. To cover a
large area such as an airport, hundreds of base stations
would be needed. The operator can be either a cellular
operator that might offer global connectivity or a local
operator on the airport. The advantage of a global
operator is that connectivity can be ensured for differ-
ent flights, without the need of a separate contract with
a local operator per airport. Nevertheless, also a global
operator needs to ensure sufficient capacity for the
number of aircraft at the airport.
In Table 1, we compare Wi-Fi, 4G, 5G, and Aero-
MACS. For Wi-Fi and 5G, we additionally analyze the
mmWave bands. Except for AeroMACS, all options
are ready for speeds in the order of multiple gigabits
per second. However, in most cases, experienced data
rates are significantly lower than the peak data rates.
In particular, for already deployed systems such as
Wi-Fi, it becomes evident that the experienced data
rates are a factor of ten to one hundred below the peak
speeds. This is mainly due to channel conditions
between user and access point and congestion of the
channel by multiple users. Additionally, the data trans-
fer from aircraft is uplink traffic, which traditionally
offers lower data rates than the downlink in cellular
networks. Hence, the limitation for all applications in
the sub-6 GHz frequency bands lies within the number
of users with respect to the base stations. For the
mmWave frequency, the main limitation is the line of
sight. The advantage of 4G and 5G is the dedicated
frequency and the global availability. On the other
hand, the deployment of a specific system on the air-
port, such as Wi-Fi or AeroMACS, enables adjusting
to the specific requirements at the airport.
As a conclusion, several communication systems
exist, which are able to provide high data rates. However,
according to the specific requirements, different options
might be chosen. Also a combination could be used,
depending on the type of traffic, differing in the amount of
data or the time criticality. Nevertheless, the biggest chal-
lenge is the global availability across different airports,
airlines, and aircraft manufacturers.
CHALLENGES
While the capacities of single links are promising in terms
of the peak data rates, achieving the same high data rates
for all aircraft at an airport is a challenge. Besides this, fur-
ther challenges exist. In the following, we discuss the
main challenges toward providing massive data transfer to
aircraft.
UPLINK DATA RATE
The transfer of accumulated sensor data from the aircraft
uses the uplink from the aircraft to the base station. How-
ever, cellular networks are designed to provide high
capacity in the downlink, not the uplink. In a classical
setup, this is unproblematic, as data are sent right away.
However, in the aircraft case, the data is accumulated dur-
ing the flight and needs to be uploaded during a small
time. Hence, the uplink data rate is a major limitation for
data transfer from aircraft.

8 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE MAY 2021


PER AIRPORT DATA RATE
A network needs to provide the data rate to all aircraft
present at an airport at the same time. Therefore, sufficient
connectivity for more than hundred aircraft needs to be
provided simultaneously. This tackles the required back-
haul capacity as well as the coverage at the airport. This
leads to a high number of base stations, in particular for
the mmWave spectrum due to the limited coverage.
OPERATIONS
In order to transfer data from the aircraft, the transmitter
needs power supply. If an aircraft is parked at a remote
location or for a longer time during night, this power sup-
ply might not be available. Hence, while the aircraft is
parked, power supply at the transmitter and hard drive on
the aircraft needs to be ensured.
DATA PROCESSING
The amount of data that needs to be transferred to the
ground depends on the processing location. The data could
be processed in a data center on the ground. This means
that all generated data needs to be transferred, resulting in
a large amount of data. Alternatively, the data could be
processed on board. This can significantly reduce the
needed data rate. However, it is limited by weight and
processing constraints on the aircraft. The optimal trade-
off, where to process which parts of the data is still open.
One possible driver is the cost for processing power on-
board versus transfer of the total amount of data. Addition-
ally, different types of data can be treated differently. A
small amount of time critical data could already be sent
during the flight, whereas the large amount of noncritical
data would be sent after the flight.
WORLDWIDE AVAILABILITY
For seamless operation, data transfer needs to be available
worldwide. This is in particular challenging in regions
with limited Internet connectivity. For each airport not
providing sufficient connectivity, other airports need to
support an even higher data rate, additionally resulting in
an increased delay. As we show in the section “Parameter
study,” this can be compensated to a certain extent. Never-
theless, a minimum coverage among airports worldwide
needs to be available to provide such a service.
METHODOLOGY
In order to understand the requirements of transfer mas-
sive data from and to aircraft, we studied real aircraft
traces. These data allow the analysis of the number of
aircraft at an airport at any time as well as the time
needed for the turnaround and the duration of the flights.
MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
Hofmann et al.
Figure 1.
Example for different types of flight, multiple short-haul flights
per day (aircraft 1) and one long-haul flight per day (aircraft 2).
The investigated flight data consists of two one-week
samples from FlightRadar24 [15], one in summer (23/07/
18–30/07/18) and one in winter (05/02/18–11/02/18).
While we analyze both datasets, we only show the results
of the summer dataset, if not otherwise noted. The data-
sets contain numerous parameters per flight, including
the position over time, the aircraft, and airline. Particu-
larly interesting for this analysis is the flight duration,
time on ground, number of aircraft at the same airport
and the aircraft size.
The flight route and flight duration heavily influence
the time at the airport. Figure 1 shows two representative
examples. Aircraft 1 completes multiple short-haul flights
within the same day. The turnaround time between two
flights is short, but the aircraft stays at the airport over-
night. Contrarily, aircraft 2 does a long-haul flight during
the night, but stays at the airport for several hours during
the day. Hence, the generated amount of data during one
day mainly depends on the total duration of flight on that
day, which is shown in blue in Figure 1. While on ground,
as depicted in green, the aircraft needs to transmit this
generated data. Hence, for an aircraft to transfer all gener-
ated data, the generated data during the flight(s) needs to
be smaller than the amount of data, which can be trans-
ferred during the time on ground. With this, we can calcu-
late the needed data rate of the ground network Rgnd in
terms of the data rate of generating data at the aircraft
Rgen as follows:
 
tf [s] 8 GB
Rgnd [Gb/s]    Rgen (1)
tg [s] 3600 h
with tf being the flight time and tg being the ground time.
We analyze these times in two different ways: 1) per
flight or 2) per day. Per flight means that the generated
data during one flight needs to be transferred during the
subsequent turnaround time. This results in high data rate
requirements on the ground to transfer a large amount of
data in a short time. On the other hand, the generated data
are not very time critical. Hence, it might be sufficient to
transfer some parts of the data directly and the remaining
9
Massive Data Transfer From and to Aircraft on Ground: Feasibility and Challenges

part during the night. This means that any data that cannot
be transferred during the turnaround would be saved and
transferred later during the night. We call this approach
per day as all data generated during one day needs to be
transferred at some time within that day. In this way, the
needed data rates are much lower; however, the aircraft
data storage and communication equipment needs to be
powered during night. A more detailed comparison will
be conducted later on.
Several parameters influence the needed data rate. As
already explained earlier, the time within the data needs to
be transferred, per flight or per day, plays an important
role. Furthermore, the aircraft size influences the amount
of generated data. A large aircraft has more sensors and,
thus, collects more data than a small one. Currently, an
A320 generates 10 GB/flight hour [16]. As the envisioned
Figure 2.
Duration of different phases at Frankfurt airport.
kind of data collection framework is not yet used today, a
prediction of future generated data rates is difficult. In
order to relate the calculated numbers of Rgnd and Rgen distribution of the turnaround time during day and night as
and to provide an easier understanding of the influence of well as the time needed for taxiing at Frankfurt airport,
different parameters, we assume Rgen of 500 GB/flight Germany. During the day, aircraft stay at the gate for
hour as a reference. Nevertheless, our analysis is not lim- 1.3 h in the median, whereas during night the median
ited to this and any other generated data rate can be stud- increases to 10.4 h. As Frankfurt airport restricts flights
ied as well. The availability of sufficient connectivity at during the night, the minimum time at the gate during
different airports is another factor. If an airport does not night is 5.6 h. We observe many outliers toward longer
offer connectivity, the data need to be stored until the next times at the gate, as some aircraft stay at the airport for
landing. Then, the combined data of two flights need to be days. However, these cases are not the challenging ones as
transferred. Additionally, the size of the airport and the there is a lot of time to transfer the data. The position of
time of day also influence the needed data rate. At peak the aircraft is based on Automatic Dependent Surveil-
times, many aircraft are present at the airport, leading to a lance—Broadcast (ADS-B) and is not completely accu-
potential bottleneck if the communication system is not rate, as some aircraft switch on the ADS-B very late or
properly designed. The required capacity per airport is switch it off very early. This leads to some aircraft with a
deducted from the single aircraft needs and the number of turnaround time of only a few minutes. As this is not real-
aircraft at the airport. istic, we only take aircraft with a turnaround time of at
least 15 min into account. If not otherwise stated, we eval-
uate the 95th percentile to include almost all aircraft. The
RESULTS OF THE FLIGHT DATA ANALYSIS median times for taxi are 7 min for approach and 12 min
for takeoff. The taxiing times, where the aircraft is already
This section presents the results of the flight data analysis.
on the ground, could be used for additional data transfer.
First, the duration of turnaround and taxiing times is inves-
This would provide an additional 19 min in the median for
tigated, which highly influences the available time for
transferring data. However, in the following analysis, we
transferring the data. Subsequently, we introduce the rela-
focus on the times at the gate only.
tion between the needed data rate on the ground and the
generated data rate on the aircraft. Moreover, we conduct
a parameter study to investigate the influence of different
parameters on the needed data rate. To relate the results to
RELATION BETWEEN NEEDED DATA RATE ON GROUND
actual communication systems, we conduct a case study AND DATA RATE GENERATED ON THE AIRCRAFT
comparing different technologies. Finally, we study the
In this section, we present the relation between the needed
backhaul capacity needed at the airport.
data rate on the ground Rgnd and the data rate Rgen generated
on the aircraft. The calculation is based on the turnaround
times determined in the previous section and Equation (1), as
TURNAROUND AND TAXIING TIMES
introduced in “Methodology.” Figure 3 shows the relation
In this section, we study the duration of turnaround and between Rgen and Rgnd . The case of transferring data per
taxiing at the airport. This is the basis for the calculation flight is depicted in dashed lines. In this case, the data needs
of the needed data rates. Figure 2 exemplarily shows the to be completely offloaded during the turnaround time after

10 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE MAY 2021

 Hofmann et al.

size. This can also be seen in the example in Figure 1. From

the analysis, we also see that the differences between summer
and winter times can be neglected on a global scale. On a local
scale, destinations differ with the seasons; hence, specific air-
ports can be impacted. As it is unrealistic to assume that all
airports worldwide will offer connectivity, we also analyzed
the case where a percentage of all airports are unequipped.
We vary the percentage from 0% to 80% while randomly
selecting airports without connectivity. Obviously, the needed
data rate on the ground increases with the percentage of uneq-
uipped airports. Nevertheless, even with 80% unequipped air-
ports, the needed data rate at the remaining airports is only
tripled. Hence, some percentage of unequipped airports can
easily be handled. The results of the 75th percentile show
that the rates drop significantly, for example, for the night
Figure 3.
only case from 22.2 to 5 Gb/s. This suggests that there
Relation between generated data rate Rgen and needed data rate on
ground Rgnd . are some few aircraft with a significantly higher demand
than others.

the flight. Due to this, a higher data rate is needed for flights
with turnaround during the day than for flights with turn- CASE STUDY
around during night. However, this only depends on the
In this section, we discuss the generated data rates per
time the flight is scheduled and cannot be influenced.
flight hour that can be supported with 4G and 5G technol-
Independently of day and night, a generated data rate of
ogies. We assume that the data can be transferred per day.
500 GB/h can be supported with 5.1 Gb/s on the ground.
4G supports up to 300 Mb/s uplink data rate with UE cate-
The case of transferring data per day is depicted in solid lines
gory 21 [17], which is currently available with high-end
in Figure 3. In this case, the data that cannot be offloaded
smart phones. With this uplink data rate, Rgen of up to
after one flight can be transferred later on the same day. Con-
65.9 GB/flight hour can be supported. According to the
sequently, the needed data rate for 500 GB/h drops from
IMT-2020 requirements [18], 5G will support between
5.1 Gb/s to 2.3 Gb/s compared to per flight. However, in
50 Mb/s and 10 Gb/s uplink data rate. With the peak
contrary to the first case, if only day or night is used for
uplink data rate of 10 Gb/s, Rgen of up to 2.2 TB/flight
transferring data, the needed data rate increases signifi-
hour becomes feasible. However, experienced data rates
cantly, because the total available time for data offload is
will be lower than peak speeds. Another option to increase
shortened. In particular, the required data rate in the case of
the data rate per aircraft is to use multiple modems to con-
night only is very high, as aircraft on long-haul flights during
nect to possibly more than one network operator. Hence,
night can only transfer data during the day.
with two modems per aircraft, up to 130.8 GB can be sup-
ported with 4G and up to 4.4 TB with 5G. According to
the work in [16], currently 10 GB are generated per flight
PARAMETER STUDY hour of an A320. A data rate of 45.5 Mb/s is sufficient for
this. Hence, this data rate can already be supported by 4G
In this section, we vary several parameters to evaluate their
with a data rate of 15% of the peak uplink rate. To cope
influence on the needed data rate. The varied parameters and
with future demands, 4G can support up to 6 times and 5G
results for an exemplary Rgen of 500 GB/flight hour are
around 200 times of the current rate with one modem.
shown in Table 2. In general, short-haul flights with a duration
As a conclusion, Rgen of multiple TB terabytes per flight
of less than 6 h need a much lower data rate than long-haul
hour become feasible with 5G peak data rates. Therefore, 5G
flights. The reason is that short-haul flights generate less data
is a promising technology to transfer a massive amount of
during the shorter flight duration, whereas the turnaround
data from the aircraft to the ground. Nevertheless, proper
time stays the same. We also analyzed the aircraft size and
deployment and sufficient bandwidth is necessary such that
clustered them in small, medium, and large according to their
these speeds can be supported by the network.
wake turbulence categories. In the per flight analysis, medium
aircraft need the highest data rates as they have short turn-
around times as small aircraft, but longer flight times. Interest-
AIRPORT BACKHAUL CAPACITY
ingly, if we compare different aircraft sizes per day, the
differences vanish. Hence, the relation between ground time While the previous sections focus on the needed data
and flight time during one day is independent of the aircraft rate for one aircraft, this section takes the total

MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE 11

Massive Data Transfer From and to Aircraft on Ground: Feasibility and Challenges

Table 2.

Rgnd [Gb/s] for Rgen ¼500 GB/Flight Hour

95th percentile 75th percentile

Summer Winter Summer Winter

All 2.3 2.2 1.2 1.1
Day only 6.2 7.5 3.2 3.3
Night only 22.2 21.6 5 4.1
Long-haul 2.4 2.3 1.3 1.1
Short-haul 0.6 0.6 0.3 0.4
Per Day
Small aircraft 2.3 2.2 1.2 1.1
Medium aircraft 2.3 2.2 1.2 1.1
Large aircraft 2.5 2.1 1.1 1
Unequipped 40% 3.8 3.5 1.6 1.4
Unequipped 80% 5.6 6.5 2.1 2.1
All 5.1 5.2 2.8 2.8
Day 5.3 5.4 2.9 3
Night 3.1 3.1 1 0.9
Per Long-haul 8.1 8.4 5 5.2
Flight Short-haul 4.8 4.8 2.7 2.7
Small aircraft 4.9 5 2.8 2.8
Medium aircraft 6.4 6.5 3.4 3.3
Large aircraft 5.9 6.2 3.5 3.9

capacity per airport into account. As there are multiple THROUGHPUT MEASUREMENTS OF 60-GHZ WI-FI
aircraft at the airport at any point in time, the total
data rate per airport is a critical parameter, in particu- From the currently available technologies discussed in
lar for large airports. Table 1, 60-GHz Wi-Fi promises one of the highest data
Figure 4 shows the number of aircraft over a week rates. Additionally, it is interesting, as the 60-GHz spec-
at the airport of Frankfurt, Germany. It can be seen trum is not yet as heavily used compared with other Wi-Fi
that the number of aircraft highly varies during the bands. We aim to verify the promised data rates by meas-
day. We can clearly identify the night times as hori- urements. Moreover, the existing hardware can give some
zontal lines, as there is a restriction to fly at night. The first practical insights into other technologies, such as 5G
pattern in Figure 4 looks different for other airports, mmWave. 60-GHz Wi-Fi is standardized as 802.11ad and
as, for example, some smaller airports have the highest
number of aircraft during the night. Other airports do
not have the restriction to fly at night; hence, there is
no time with a constant number of aircraft. For this
reason, the total needed data rate differs per airport
and cannot be generalized. Nevertheless, the used data
transfer systems need to be able to cope with the
expected amount of traffic per airport, depending on
the number of aircraft. For instance, if one aircraft
requires 1 Gb/s, the airport would need to provide up
Figure 4.
to 148 Gb/s concurrently, as up to 148 aircraft can be Number of aircraft at the airport in Frankfurt, Germany, during
present at the Frankfurt airport. one week.

12 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE MAY 2021


Figure 5.
Measurement setup consisting of an access point rotated with
angle a and a station in in a distance d.
802.11ay. It is also called WiGig and uses the 60-GHz
band with a channel bandwidth of 2.16 GHz. 802.11ad
supports up to 6.7 Gb/s. The standardization of 802.11ay
is ongoing and with the introduction of MIMO and chan-
nel bonding, the expected data rate increases to 176 Gb/s
including an extended range. 802.11ad has not been
widely adapted yet, but a few devices are available.
Our measurement hardware consists of two SuperMi-
cro E300-9D-8CN8TP boxes with a Qualcomm QCA9500
802.11ad chip provided by BISDN GmbH. The manufac-
turer states a peak speed of up to 4.6 Gb/s [19]. The
antenna is placed at the outside of the box and uses beam-
forming with different patterns to obtain the best link
properties as shown in [20]. We measure the throughput
from the station to the access point. As the antennas for
60 GHz are highly directive, we also investigate different
angles between the two boxes. A small impact on the
angle is beneficial for deployment, as alignment between
stations and access points is uncritical. For the measure-
ment, two boxes were placed at a distance d ¼ 5 m in an
outdoor environment. One box was acting as an access
point, the other one as a station, as shown in Figure 5. Dur-
ing the measurement, the access point was rotated with
different angles a. For the throughput measurement,
iPerf [21] was used. The throughput of each angle setup
was measured by sending UDP traffic for 30 s twice. The
measurement results are shown in Figure 6. For angles
> 90 , no connection is possible in the outdoor environ-
ment. However, in an indoor environment connections
with larger angles are feasible due to reflections. Figure 6
shows that the throughput is stable at 1.5 Gb/s irrespective
of the angle. The degraded performance at 90 compared
with 90 is due to the asymmetric antenna placement.
Nevertheless, this throughput is considerably below the
advertised peak speeds, although we observe very good
channel conditions during our measurements. The same
observation has been reported by other papers, who mea-
sured a throughput of up to 1.6 Gb/s [22] or 2.3 Gb/s [23].
According to them, the low observed throughput is due to
hardware and implementation limitations. The measured
throughput of 1.5 Gb/s is very promising compared with
MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
Hofmann et al.
Figure 6.
Measurement results of 802.11ad throughput with different angles
between access point and station.
other existing technologies today. However, compared
with the needed data rates as discussed in the section
“Relation Between Needed Data Rate on Ground and
Data Rate Generated on the Aircraft,” 1.5 Gb/s is still low.
Nevertheless, we believe that with a higher market pene-
tration and increasing number of deployments, the hard-
ware and implementation limitations vanish and higher
data rates become feasible. Still, there are a number of
limitations for mmWave links, such as range limitation,
line-of-sight limitation, high number of needed access
points, or system throughput in a real deployment. Still,
these limitations can be feasible for an airport deployment,
as there is a line of sight between the gate and aircraft and
the distance is small.
In conclusion, 60-GHz Wi-Fi is a promising technology
for massive data transfer from and to the aircraft if the data
rates can be in the promise range or can even be increased in
the future. Open questions are related to deployment and
applicability in a real scenario, such as the number of access
points needed and how to provide the respective backhaul
capacity. Also, measurements and tests need to be conducted
in a realistic environment. These results can also be applied
to 5G mmWave networks. While the frequency is lower, line
of sight and range limitations still apply. With the option to
operate a private 4G or 5G network, airports can operate their
own cellular network and adapt it to the special environment.
We also observe that the measured rates are considerably
below the peak speeds. This has to be taken into account
when deciding for a suitable technology.
CONCLUSIONS
We analyzed real flight traces from FlightRadar24 [15]
toward the needed data rate for data transfer from the air-
craft to the ground. To achieve this, we compare the dura-
tion of the flight with the duration on ground. We study
two different options: 1) transferring data per flight or
2) per day. We show that if we transfer data per day, the
needed data rate decreases up to 47% compared with per
flight. We also vary parameters such as flight time or air-
craft size. We conclude that long-haul flights are the most
challenging flights. We show that, with today’s 4G
13
Massive Data Transfer From and to Aircraft on Ground: Feasibility and Challenges
networks, it is feasible to support up to 65.9 GB generated
per flight hour, which increases to 4.4 TB with 5G. Hence,
5G is a promising technology to transfer a massive amount
of data from the aircraft to the ground. We also highlight
the challenges of deploying an aircraft data transfer sys-
tem. These are, among others, to provide a worldwide
availability or to provide a sufficient data rate to cover all
aircraft at one airport. Additionally, an analysis on the
data processing needs to be conducted. If a part of the data
could already be processed at the aircraft, the data rate
needed for transfer on ground can be reduced.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The work presented in this paper has been completed
while S. Hofmann was with Airbus, Central Research and
Technology, Munich, Germany.
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MAY 2021
Feature Article:
A Systematic Literature Review: Is Military Cognitive
Radio System on the Brink of the “Valley of Death”?
Topi Tuukkanen , Finnish Defence Research Agency, Riihima
Finland
Seppo Yrjo€la€, University of Oulu, Oulu FI-90750, Finland; and also Nokia,
Oulu FI-90620, Finland
Marja Matinmikko-Blue , University of Oulu, Oulu FI-90750, Finland
INTRODUCTION
Cognitive radio (CR) is a notion or a concept initially
coined in 1999 to address evolving user needs [1]. Since
its inception, the concept of CR has also been considered
a way to mitigate perceived spectrum scarcity [2]. The
interest in CR has continued with the evolution of mobile
telephony toward fifth generation wireless systems (5G),
but the potential for military applications is yet to be
explored for comprehensive coverage. Contemporary con-
cepts in general mobile telephony and networking such as
self-organizing networks (SON) and software-defined net-
working (SDN) [3] have adopted and paved the way ahead
to some characteristics of cognitive radio systems.
For this document, cognitive radio is considered an
evolution from a software defined radio (SDR) to support
spectrum management and optimization, interfacing to a
variety of networks, and to aid the human in his activities.
Cognitive radio system (CRS) is defined as “a radio system
employing technology that allows the system to obtain
knowledge of its operational and geographical environ-
ment, established policies, and its internal state; to dynami-
cally and autonomously adjust its operational parameters
and protocols according to its obtained knowledge in order
to achieve predefined objectives; and to learn from the
results obtained” [4]. Thereby notions like spectrum sens-
ing, modulation classification, policy engine, cognitive
radio (as a node), and cognitive radio networking are con-
sidered functions, algorithms, components, or subsystems
Authors’ current address: Topi Tuukkanen, Finnish
Defence Research Agency, Riihim€aki FI-11311, Finland
(e-mail: topi.tuukkanen@mil.fi). Seppo Yrj€ ol€a, Marja
Matinmikko-Blue, University of Oulu, Oulu FI-90750,
Finland.
Manuscript received June 25, 2020; accepted November
14, 2020, and ready for publication January 14, 2021.
Review handled by Stefan Brueggenwirth.
0885-8985/21/$26.00 ß 2021 IEEE
16 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
DOI. No. 10.1109/MAES.2021.3052310
€ki FI-11311,
of a CRS as will be elaborated later when presenting the
use of comprehensive capability metamodel (CCMM).
Greitemann et al. [5] posited that the implementation of
emerging technologies into existing production environ-
ments is often time-consuming and expensive. To better
understand the early phases and timescales of the system life-
cycle, Gross et al. [6] divided the lifecycle into a) invention,
development, and demonstration, and b) deployment and
commercialization phases. Their main finding across several
technology areas is that both the innovation and development
as well as deployment phases each take 18 years (median)
and altogether 32 years. The “Valley of Death” has been
described as a stage or a phase between discovery and com-
mercialization [7], and more specifically, as a phase between
technology readiness levels (TRLs) five and seven [8].
Within the civilian domain, the cognitive radio system
has been the object of study in some research reports just
before the time range of our enquiry. In the military domain,
cognitive radio at the system level has been associated with
the Joint Tactical Radio System (JTRS) or other U.S.
Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s (DARPA)
programs. During the second decade of the research for cog-
nitive radio technologies, the interest in cognitive radio net-
works (CRN) became evident. This interest was also
recorded in our collection of military cognitive radio
research. However, the use of the terms CR, CRN, and CRS
are not consistent and sometimes misleading. Therefore, for
the data collection for this article, the minimum common
denominator CR has been used as a search term. Even
though International Telecommunication Union (ITU) has a
definition for a CRS, the absence of research on CRSs is
noticeable. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, there is no
survey of military CRS research available to the public. The
closest match to such a study would be [9], [10], and [11].
Thereby, this article provides a comprehensive over-
view of MCRS research for the second decade since the
term CR was coined. The research question for this article
is: Does publicly available technical research data provide
MAY 2021
 Credit: Image licensed by Ingram Publishing

evidence that research and development on military cogni- although listed as a topic in the original reference, was not
tive radio systems progress toward an actual system addressed by any of the collected papers. However, spec-
proven in an operational environment. We observe that trum mobility, as a phenomenon, has been touched upon
this formulation already identifies potential data sources in the margins of several papers. The number of articles
as well as alludes to the use of Technology Readiness Lev- by topics is shown below in Table 1.
els (TRL) as a part of the analysis [12]. Third, the papers were coded according to the TRL they
portrayed. TRLs have been used since the 1980s in the U.S.
National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The use
expanded to the U.S. Department of Defense in the 1990s as
METHOD well as globally. TRLs are used to describe the maturity of
This research has been inspired by the findings of [8] as to technology, especially within procurement processes [15].
where do we stand in MCRS research today. Is there going As most of the articles address a single functionality,
to be a “Valley of Death” hindering the evolution of algorithm, or solution, the TRLs are valid and relatively easy
research into products? Or are we already standing on the to apply. For example, TRL 3 was initially described by
brink of that valley? The research method of this survey is NASA as “analytical and experimental critical function and
a systematic literature review (SLR), following the steps characteristic proof-of-concept” and by the European Union
outlined in [13]. The research question for this survey is: as “Experimental proof-of-concept” [12]. Within wireless
Does publicly available technical research data provide communications research, simulation is often used to provide
evidence that R&D on military cognitive radio systems
progresses toward an actual system proven in an opera- Table 1.
tional environment. We observe that this formulation
already identifies potential data sources as well as alludes
Number of Articles by Thematic Categories According
to the use of TRLs as a part of the analysis [12]. to IEEE Topics [15]
The primary sources selected were the IEEE Xplore Digi-
tal Library, Elsevier ScienceDirect, SpringerLink, as well as Applications and services category 14
the Association of Computing Machinery Digital Library. articles
We collected explicitly “military” AND “cognitive radio” New economics 1
related articles. As the first 14 years since the inception of the Machine learning techniques 4
notion of CR have already been covered in [9], we collected
Spectrum sharing and multiple 21
a dataset of military cognitive radio research covering the
access
years 2013 to 2020. The collected papers were then coded in
four dimensions: document type, thematic topic, the technol- Analysis of dynamic spectrum 2
ogy readiness level, as well as the CCMM level. access
First, the collected papers were manually categorized into Routing 23
conference papers, journal articles, doctoral dissertations, and
Security and electronic warfare 41
survey-type articles. The original intention was to use this
grading as an indication of the maturity and quality of the arti- Modeling of spectrum use 21
cle; however, it proved to be far from a useful indicator. Simulation tools and testbeds 11
Second, the dataset was coded into thematic catego-
Waveform design 55
ries, topics, already used in [14]. Spectrum mobility,

MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE 17

A Systematic Literature Review: Is Military Cognitive Radio System on the Brink of the “Valley of Death”?
Figure 1.
CCMM viewpoints within respective communities of interest.
Adopted from [19].
proof-of-concept [16], [17]. Therefore, articles describing
the use of simulation have been coded to TRL 3. In
this category, a significantly high number (63) of
papers have been included. If the paper shows specific
traits being a very narrow or early research paper or if
the paper is part of a broader research effort, the cod-
ing to TRL 3 may have been adjusted by a level þ-1.
As the fourth coding stage, the CCMM, depicted in
Figure 1, was applied. The model has been developed
from the Zachman framework for enterprise architecture
to support the military capability-based planning domain.
Koivisto and Tuukkanen [18] is an initial attempt to apply
CCMM to military wireless communications R&D. For
this survey, we shall apply capability viewpoints with
emphasis on left-hand side viewpoints in Figure 1. The
idea is to map our source data to the structure of the design
artifacts of military capability viewpoints.
RESULTS
Within military CR research, the keynote by Fette [9] should
already be considered as seminal. In this article, Dr. B. Fette,
at that time with DARPA, outlines the first 14 years of the
cognitive radio research and development since the incep-
tion of the notion of CR. The paper argues that, for the mili-
tary, the essential feature of CR is not necessarily the
enhanced user experience, nor spectrum access alone, but
the full range adaptivity and flexibility in support of war-
fighter communications. Another important, yet easily over-
looked, observation is that, although cognition has been
widely researched from the spectrum access perspective, the
military communication system needs to implement cogni-
tion at several layers of the communication protocol stack to
provide the expected performance improvement.
18 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
Out of the total of 193 articles1 collected for this
review, seven are doctoral dissertations, 14 surveys, 33
journal articles, and 139 conference papers. However, the
distribution of articles by publication type turned out not to
be a useful metric. The minimal number of doctoral disser-
tations is in dire contrast to generic civilian CR research,
whereby a large number of dissertations were excluded
because they did not have any recognizable bearing or rela-
tion to military CRSs. The few military CRS oriented dis-
sertations included, focus on security-related topics mostly
involving electronic warfare measures. Of the 14 surveys
included in our data, we point to Tang and Watson [10].
This report summarizes military cognitive radio research
by the end of 2014. The report covers different national and
organizational research roadmaps on military CRs and con-
siders the significance of cognitive radio networks for
future tactical wireless communications. According to the
report, CRNs are expected to provide benefits such as
dynamic spectrum access (DSA), increased communica-
tions resilience in dynamic, heterogeneous environments,
and may provide the basis for tactical electronic warfare.
Many multinational research task groups of North
Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) Science and
Technology Organization (STO) present publicly avail-
able conference papers in addition to formal research
reports. Some of the reports are also available in the public
domain, e.g., [11]. NATO STO reports used for this article
have been tagged as surveys due to their contents and the
way they address the topic. All of the included NATO
papers address dynamic spectrum access one way or
another and point toward the need to adjust current rigid
administrative and bureaucratic mechanisms.
RESULTS BY TOPICS
As can be seen in Table 1, topics of waveforms, security,
modeling spectrum use, and spectrum sharing have
received the most attention (71%) in our dataset. In con-
trast, the topic of economics has a single reference.
Within the topic of machine learning, we observe that
most years yield a steady two to three papers on the topic,
whereas the sudden late increase in 2019 to 8 papers is note-
worthy. As an example, the research team of the Royal Mili-
tary Academy of Belgium suggests the use of machine
learning techniques at the cognitive radio to avoid inten-
tional, hostile jamming or to support channel selection.
The category of theoretical analysis of dynamic spec-
trum access contains two papers. Potentially the most excit-
ing category of papers is related to security and electronic
warfare. This is the second most populous category within
the dataset with altogether 41 papers. Within this category,
1
Full listing of the reviewed articles is available from the correspond-
ing author: topi.tuukkanen@mil.fi
MAY 2021
 Tuukkanen et al.

Table 2. Table 3.

Number of articles by Technology Readiness Number of Articles by the CCMM Levels

Levels [16] CCMM level 1: 5 articles
Scope - Military power
TRL 1 basic principles 27 articles
CCMM level 2: Business model – 0
TRL 2 technology concept 73 Military capability areas
formulated
CCMM level 3: System model - 1
TRL 3 experimental proof of 63 Defence lines of development
concept
CCMM level 4: Technology 20
TRL 4 technology validated in the 25 model – System
lab
CCMM level 5: Detailed 156
TRL 5 technology is validated in a 2 representation - Sub-system
relevant environment
CCMM level 6: Functioning 11
TRL 6 technology demonstrated 1 Enterprise - Military unit
in a relevant environment
TRL 7 system prototype 1
demonstration in an operational multitransceiver DSA radios operating in the presence of
environment a legacy system, providing a detailed, quantitative assess-
TRL 8 system complete and 0 ment of the spectral and network behavior of tactical sys-
qualified tems across a diverse range of operational scenarios.
TRL 9 actual systems proven in 0 Higher up, at level TRL 6, the survey [23] discusses the
the operational environment current status of work to define transmission security func-
tions and how to implement them in radios. Finally, at
level TRL 7, the report [24] analyses one implementation
of a waveform through complementary methodologies.
e.g., Riihonen [19] considered in-band full-duplex (FD) These include operational tests, assessment of the funda-
capability as one of the great discoveries in wireless com- mental limitations of the technology, and modeling and
munications. By exploiting simultaneous transmission and simulation. Some of the identified challenges relate to
reception capability through self-interference cancellation shortcomings of the waveform design, while others reflect
techniques, the FD capability is seen to double the spectral a disparity between the original concept and its actual
efficiency of wireless data transmission. Furthermore, the implementation.
paper outlines and analyzes some potential defensive and When the distribution of articles is mapped across
offensive applications becoming available by the application publishing years (cf. e.g., Table 5 below), we observe that
of these capabilities. Full-duplex capacity is also addressed the distribution indicates a relatively steady and continu-
in [20], suggesting an integrated tri-band, dynamic spectrum ing interest in the CR paradigm and associated technolo-
shaping full-duplex cognitive radio for tactical gies. In general, the number of publicly available papers
communications. in the military domain remains significantly lower than
Although not yet there, the topic of simulation tools those addressing civilian technologies.
and testbeds alludes in the direction of gradually (in the Although one might have expected some evidence of
future) increasing TRLs through several papers on devel- logical evolution from early years-low TRLs toward later
opment, testing, and evaluation environments. years-high TRLs, such progress is not apparent in our
data. Individual papers coded to high TRLs are almost
outliers, not yet providing sufficient foundations to articu-
RESULTS BY TRLS late a general trend (cf. also Tables 4 and 5).
Table 2 portrays that the distribution of articles by TRLs is
concentrated between TRL 2 and TRL 4, indicating that
the CR related technologies are still under research and
experimentation. At level TRL 5, the dissertation [21]
RESULTS BY CCMM LEVELS
considers airborne multiple input multiple output (MIMO) As seen in Table 3, the category of CCMM 6 functioning
communications, physical layer authentication, and radio enterprise—military unit level contains 11 articles, where
design through a holistic design approach. Similarly, at the authors have either a background or professional affili-
TRL 5, Robertson et al. [22] details the field testing of ation with respective national military establishments.

MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE 19

A Systematic Literature Review: Is Military Cognitive Radio System on the Brink of the “Valley of Death”?
Within the category CCMM, 3 defense lines of devel-
opment, there is one article that applies defense lines of
development doctrine, organization, training, materiel,
personnel, leadership, facilities, information/interoperabil-
ity (DOTMPLFI) framework to assess potential military
capability implications the cognitive radio technology
could introduce.
Category CCMM 1 scope contains five articles—these
address a range of topics, for example, from military R&D
to general spectrum administration. Nevertheless, the
scope or viewpoint of these articles is above the military,
i.e., national, technology wide, or even broader.
When the distribution of articles is mapped by CCMM
levels and publishing years, it is evident that general inter-
est is ongoing at the subsystem level of CCMM level 5,
which with 156 articles, is the most populous category.
However, mapping CCMM viewpoints by TRLs in Table
4 again portrays heavy concentration to CCMM level 5
and to low TRLs 1-3.
ADDITIONAL OBSERVATIONS
As we have already observed, the most populous catego-
ries across the topics are waveforms, security, modeling
spectrum use, and spectrum sharing. Therefore, it should
come as no surprise that these articles concentrate on the
category of CCMM 5 Subsystems (156 articles).
Considering paper types across TRLs, we observe that
a large number of conference papers have been published
within the TRL1-4 domain (141 articles). Moreover,
many journal articles, dissertations, and surveys are
assigned to low TRL 1. This indicates that significant
research effort remains to clarify military cognitive radios’
functions, requirements as well as security aspects.
By far, most of the conference papers have been pub-
lished through IEEE, where IEEE/AFCEA Military
Communications Conference (MILCOM) and Interna-
tional Conference on Military Communications and
Information Systems (ICMCIS) stand out as most pro-
ductive venues. From the data, less than a dozen prolific
authors emerge. However, these authors collaborate with
established research groups we should recognize;
Fraunhofer FKIE, Intelligent Automation Inc., NATO
Science and Technology Organization, Royal Military
Academy of Belgium, Rockwell Collins Advanced Tech-
nology Center, Thales Communications, University of
Nevada, University of Oulu, and Wojskowa Akademia
Techniczna of Poland.
In the process of searching, selecting, and coding
papers, some enticing papers stand out in addition to those
already mentioned. Naeem et al. [25] provided a compre-
hensive survey of network coding techniques in CRNs.
Our data includes some other conference papers address-
ing the same topic but from a narrower perspective.
20 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
Generally, spectrum sensing can be seen as a component
or subsystem technology within a cognitive radio (as a node
or device) or within a waveform (as a service or a compo-
nent thereof). Gupta and Kumar [26] is an example CCMM
4 “system level,” well developed TRL 4, survey. In
this article, spectrum sensing is brought to a broader
context of cognitive radio networking. The article
reviews the spectrum sensing technologies and offers
future research directions for cognitive radio networks.
Spectrum sharing, spectrum access, and spectrum regu-
lation have been addressed in several papers. The journal
article of [27] is an example of CCMM 1 “above military”
way of addressing spectrum regulation for cognitive radios.
At the same time, it stands out also as an example of con-
ceptual work at a low TRL 1. A comparison can be made
with [28] at TRL 2, where the authors challenge the current
wireless coexistence paradigm. This article argues for a
more generic solution in terms of frequency reuse and coex-
istence. A new generic medium sharing model that solves
coexistence problems in a simple, efficient, and technol-
ogy-agnostic way is presented. The suggested approach is
compatible with all existing wireless communication tech-
nologies and incorporates capabilities for future modifica-
tions and additions to support emerging new technologies.
As an example of the U.S. Department of Defense
funded military-oriented R&D, Zeng et al. [29] argues
that spectrum agility should be complemented with net-
work agility to achieve mission success. The authors sug-
gest the use of a proactive and adaptive cross-layer
reconfiguration framework for autonomous network adap-
tation. As an individual potential solution to a broader
problem, the suggested approach is well in line with [11].
DISCUSSION
The military CR research seems to be prolific on topics
like waveform design and security, not forgetting a steady
interest in CR networking topics. Our data indicate that
the vast majority of papers and topics have been catego-
rized to CCMM 5 “subsystem” level, indicating that the
TRLs are still valid tools for assessing maturity, as can be
inferred from Table 4.
Significantly low numbers of papers address applications,
services, and standardization. If continued, this may harm the
scale and harmonization of the technology, as well as on
interoperability, which is critical for the practical deployment
decisions across different communities of interest.
The annual distribution of military CR research by
TRLs in Table 5 indicates continuing interest. This finding
is contradictory to general statistics from, e.g., IEEE
Xplore Digital Library, whereby the numbers of general
(civilian) CR research articles has been on the decline
since 2014. This may indicate general technology matur-
ing from singular techniques to address broader system-
MAY 2021
 Tuukkanen et al.

Table 4.

Number of articles by CCMM levels and by TRLs

CCMM levels by TRL TRL TRL TRL TRL TRL TRL TRL TRL SUM
TRL 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

CCMM 1 3 2 5
CCMM 2 0
CCMM 3 1 1
CCMM 4 3 5 5 5 1 1 20
CCMM 5 16 60 58 20 1 1 156
CCMM 6 5 5 1 11
SUM 27 73 63 26 2 1 1 0 0 193

Table 5.

Annual Distribution of Articles by TRLs

Numbers by years to TRL 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 SUM

TRL 1 5 3 4 2 8 1 4 27
TRL 2 13 9 12 9 8 13 9 73
TRL 3 11 10 9 7 7 3 14 2 63
TRL 4 7 1 8 7 3 26
TRL 5 1 1 2
TRL 6 1 1
TRL 7 1 1
TRL 8 0
TRL 9 0
SUM 36 24 35 18 30 17 31 2 193
Data for year 2020 includes articles published by the time of data collection at the end of the May 2020.

level issues. However, this is not yet evident in military
CR research data.
Machine learning and artificial intelligence seem natu-
ral techniques to implement CR, and the interest is on the
rise toward the end of our study epoch. In general, military
CR research seemed sporadic and scattered. Our data sug-
gest that a transition from individual techniques, node-
level subsystem research in the direction of the CRS sys-
tems engineering approach, and system-level studies has
not yet happened, and the overall TRLs remain low.
The authors recognize that coding, as described, may not
be clear-cut and may, at times, be arbitrary. Papers may
address topics that overlap more than one category. Although
every attempt has been made to ensure that our dataset is
comprehensive and representative, we cannot claim that all
papers applicable made their way into our dataset.
CONCLUDING REMARKS
We collected 193 articles on military CR research from
well-known publishers covering the period of 2013–2020.
Our selection of data sources led our dataset to be domi-
nated by subsystem level, low TRL-types of articles.
Therefore, our data indicate that research on military cog-
nitive radio systems remains at the subsystem (compo-
nent) level and at low TRLs. Besides one outlier, there is
no indication that anyone has been able to bridge the gap
from TRL 5 to TRL 7. Toward the end of our study epoch,
the increasing interest in machine learning techniques
may eventually lead to a shift in this technology’s TRLs
in the coming years. Higher system level or high TRL
related research questions should be addressed by select-
ing different kinds of data sources and remains a potential

MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE 21

A Systematic Literature Review: Is Military Cognitive Radio System on the Brink of the “Valley of Death”?
future research topic. Nevertheless, research on military
CRSs is nowhere near reaching the “testing validity in a
relevant environment.” The brink of the “Valley of Death”
has not been reached yet.
The absence of publicly articulated comprehensive treat-
ment of the notion of military cognitive radio system (i.e.,
CCMM levels 1-3) is graphic and has lead to nonintercon-
nected scattered research at the subsystem level (i.e., CCMM
levels 4-5). The lack of such treatment also manifests in the
absence of understanding, which components or subsystems
constitute a MCRS. Therefore, the authors suggest that mili-
tary operational, acquisition, as well as academic research
and manufacturing communities, should all come together to
frame a generic, publicly available vision for a MCRS.
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23
Feature Article:
Flight Demonstration of a Hybrid
Battery/Supercapacitor Energy Storage
System in an Earth Orbiting CubeSat
Keith B. Chin , Gary S. Bolotin, and Marshall C. Smart, Jet Propulsion
Laboratory, Pasadena, CA 91109 USA
Sharlene Katz and James A. Flynn, California State University, Northridge,
Northridge, CA 91330 USA
Naomi K. Palmer, Erik J. Brandon, and Will C. West , Jet Propulsion
Laboratory, Pasadena, CA 91109 USA
INTRODUCTION
CubeSats are a class of small, low-cost research spacecraft
that are typically launched into near-Earth orbit. Standard
CubeSat sizes are available in multiple dimensions of 10
cm x 10 cm x 10 cm (which comprises a Unit or “U”) at
approximately 1.33 kg each. The standard power system
for an Earth-orbiting CubeSat consists of a solar array and
lithium-ion battery. However, very recently a pair of
Cubesats, MarCO-A, and MarCO-B, accompanied the
NASA InSight mission and succeeded in a flyby of Mars,
relaying data to Earth from InSight as it landed on Mars.
This mission heralded a new phase of CubeSat mission for
deep space operations. Undoubtedly, the legacy power
Authors’ current addresses: Keith B. Chin, Gary S.
Bolotin, Marshall C. Smart are with the Jet Propulsion
Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Pasa-
dena, CA 91109 USA (e-mail: keith.b.chin@jpl.nasa.
gov, gary.s.bolotin@jpl.nasa.gov, marshall.c.smart@jpl.
nasa.gov). Sharlene Katz, James A. Flynn are with the
Northridge Department of Electrical and Computer
Engineering, California State University, Northridge,
Northridge, CA 91330 USA (e-mail: skatz@csun.edu,
james.flynn@csun.edu). Naomi K. Palmer, Erik J. Bran-
don, Will C. West are with the Jet Propulsion Labora-
tory, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA
91109 USA (e-mail: naomi.k.palmer@jpl.nasa.gov,
erik.j.brandon@jpl.nasa.gov, william.c.west@jpl.nasa.
gov).
Manuscript received September 15, 2020, revised
September 1, 2020; accepted November 5, 2020, and
ready for publication January 14, 2021.
Review handled by Scott Bawden.
0885-8985/21/$26.00 ß 2021 IEEE
24 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
DOI. No. 10.1109/MAES.2021.3052309
systems suitable for near-Earth orbit will be unsuitable for
deep space missions, and as such new types of power sys-
tems will be required [1]. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory
(JPL) is currently developing advanced energy storage
systems (ESS) suitable for deployment in these extreme
environments [2]. One such viable energy storage technol-
ogy is a hybrid ESS consisting of rechargeable Li-ion bat-
teries and supercapacitor (SC) cells [3]. Li-ion battery
cells are characterized by high specific energy (200–250
Wh/kg), while SCs (also called electrochemical capacitors
or electric double-layer capacitors) can provide high spe-
cific power (>10 kWh/kg) along with substantially lower
operating temperatures [4]. Combining these cells into a
single hybrid ESS offers the respective benefits of each
technology. This approach has been successfully demon-
strated in automotive applications such as electric and
hybrid vehicles [5] and for military applications [6], but
not for aerospace applications in which ESS are typically
more demanding in terms of performance and reliability
under the extreme operating requirements of space.
Hybrid ESS can offer additional benefits, particularly with
respect to high current capability at lower temperatures,
along with greater cycle life. This is due to the mitigation
of degradation mechanisms [7] associated with Li-ion
chemistries that are cycled at low temperatures and high
rates which can result in deleterious lithium metal plating
on charging. The SC can “buffer” the battery under these
low temperature/high power conditions. Depending on the
specific duty cycle, a properly configured ESS can obviate
the need to oversize a conventional Li-ion battery pack to
meet high power loads throughout the mission life [8].
Several options for hybrid ESS designs exist today,
including semi-active, active, and passive [9]. Both the
MAY 2021

semi-active [10], [11] and active hybrid [12], [13] ESS
designs attempt to optimize current flow and limitations
associated with voltage mismatches in the battery or SC
bank with the addition of power converter electronics. Of
these designs, the parallel active hybrid design is shown to
have the highest energy efficiency, reliability, and flexibil-
ity by incorporating two dc–dc converters between the
SCs and the load, and between the battery and the dc link
[14] to achieve a nearly constant output current from the
battery with the remaining power supplied by the SCs.
The addition of power converters can reduce the efficiency
of the overall system through the conversion stages. Pas-
sive hybrid ESS is by far the most preferred battery-SC
hybrid for research [15]–[18] and commercial [19], [20]
applications, as the battery and SC are connected in paral-
lel directly to the load, thereby providing nearly unim-
peded current flow as determined only by internal
resistances. It reduces the need for power electronics and
control circuitry, which significantly improves the cost,
volume, and most importantly reliability [21].
In this article, we report that JPL and California State
University Northridge (CSUN) have developed and flight
qualified a passive hybrid ESS for demonstration on the
low-Earth-orbit (LEO) CubeSat JPL/CSUNSat 1 [22],
which was successfully deployed from the International
Space Station (ISS). The goal of the mission was to dem-
onstrate a power subsystem that was capable of delivering
high power pulses at low temperatures, and to validate its
performance in an Earth orbiting mission. JPL had the
responsibility for development of the ESS payload, while
CSUN was responsible for the spacecraft development.
The full chronology of the JPL/CSUNSat1 project,
including milestones and significant events, is outlined in
Figure 1. The payload and CubeSat development efforts of
the project were completed by May of 2015. The CubeSat
design and payload cell performance results, as well as cell
MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
Image credit: Image licensed by Ingram Publishing
selection details, are described in the “JPL/CSUNSat1
Development” and “Hybrid ESS Payload Development”
sections. Upon completion of the battery payload and the
CubeSat integration, functional, and environmental testing
were performed to properly qualify all systems for space
operation, as described in the “Hybrid ESS Payload Devel-
opment” section. The launch of JPL/CSUNSat1 from the
ISS on May 17, 2017 marked the beginning of the primary
mission phase to characterize the hybrid ESS payload in
space. The performance results for the payload battery are
described in the “Primary Mission Telemetry” section.
Despite operating in a degraded mode after completing the
primary mission objectives, the spacecraft also successfully
completed an extended mission phase to evaluate cycle life
performance and model validation. The “Extended Mission
Telemetry” section describes the results obtained in the
extended mission phase of the mission.
JPL/CSUNSAT1 DEVELOPMENT
The JPL/CSUNSat1 spacecraft was designed as a 2U
“tumbler” CubeSat (i.e., no attitude control capabilities)
with the purpose of serving as a demonstration platform
for a hybrid battery/SC ESS payload. The avionics con-
sisted of two communication, three power, and one SCP
(single chip package) printed circuit boards (PCBs) con-
forming to the CubeSat 10 cm x 10 cm x 10 cm form fac-
tor. The spacecraft power system provided charging and
load distribution to both the spacecraft bus battery (a sin-
gle Li-ion 18650 cell) and the ESS payload. The power
bus supported operation from either the single Li-ion cell
or the payload hybrid battery, using a custom-designed
power conditioning and control system. To achieve the
coldest possible operating temperatures during flight, the
addition of cold and hot shunt regulator boards were used
25
Flight Demonstration of a Hybrid Battery/Supercapacitor Energy Storage System in an Earth Orbiting CubeSat
Figure 1.
JPL/CSUNSat1 project chronology.
to radiate heat away from the payload battery located near
the omnidirectional antenna, as shown in Figure 2.
The spacecraft command and data handling (C&DH)
processor was a dsPIC33 provided on a board from Pump-
kin (the CubeSat manufacturer), which has extensive flight
heritage on other CubeSats. CSUN developed a 100%
“deterministic” flight software architecture (no operating
system and limited autonomous mitigation of anomalies).
Together with unique ground station software, also devel-
oped at CSUN, a sequence of control experiments was
uploaded to characterize the ESS payload operating in
space under battery, SC, or hybrid mode. These experi-
ments could be conducted under a variety of temperatures
and durations, completely under the control of the ground
station. Taking advantage of this, experiments were car-
ried out, modified and repeated as needed. JPL/CSUNSat1
provided high resolution data at one second intervals on
the payload telemetry channels, including currents, vol-
tages, and temperatures. During operations, CSUN devel-
oped a unique data communications protocol to maximize
throughput of downlinked data during the short access
windows. This data was automatically made available to
JPL within seconds of downlink.
26 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
HYBRID ESS PAYLOAD DEVELOPMENT
JPL was responsible for the development of a fully inte-
grated hybrid ESS serving as the payload onboard JPL/
CSUNSat1, for flight demonstration. The hybrid ESS was
designed to support high pulse power capability, particu-
larly at low temperatures. The ratio of the Li-ion battery
stored capacity relative to that in the SC bank was approx-
imately 12 at 20
C. This ratio decreased with decreasing
temperatures, as the usable capacity of the Li-ion cells
tends to decrease more dramatically relative to SCs.
PERFORMANCE TEST RESULTS
A lithium iron phosphate (LFP)-based Li-ion chemistry
was chosen for the payload battery, in a cylindrical 26650
cell form factor manufactured by Navitas Systems, Inc.
To improve low temperature performance relative to the
commercially available cell, a modified low temperature
electrolyte was used, consisting of 1.20M LiPF6 (lithium
hexafluorophosphate) dissolved in a baseline electrolyte
formulation of EC (ethylene carbonate) þ EMC (ethyl
methyl carbonate) þ MB (methyl butyrate) in 20:20:60
vol%, followed by the addition of 2 vol% VC (vinylene
carbonate) [23]. Figure 3A shows the discharge capacity
of the Li-ion cell at -40
C to be 1.6 Ah at a C/5 rate,
equivalent to about 70% of the maximum baseline capac-
ity at 20
C at the same rate.
Commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) SC cells were used
in the hybrid ESS. These double-layer capacitors feature a
standard quaternary salt (tetraethylammonium tetrafluoro-
borate) dissolved in the solvent acetonitrile, and high sur-
face area activated carbon electrodes. Several sizes of
Boostcap Cells (Maxwell Technologies) in 310, 150, and
100 F capacities were evaluated. For the flight design, two
310 F cells in series were used, with the two-cell string
placed in parallel with the single Li-ion cell. These SCs
were rated at a maximum operating voltage of about 2.8 V
per cell, thus requiring two cells to be connected in series
to match the voltage of the Li-ion cell. As shown in
Figure 3B, a comparison of SCs rated at 100 to 310 F indi-
cates that excellent performance was obtained at maximum
discharge rate of 15 A at temperatures down to –40
C.
Although all cells met the minimum voltage requirements,
the 310 F rated cells were chosen for the mission, since the
precise operating conditions were unknown at the initial
design stages. Selection of the larger capacity cells ensured
there was sufficient margin to meet a variety of different
environmental conditions and load profiles.
An initial hybrid ESS prototype was assembled and
evaluated with respect to 15 A pulses at –40
C (as shown
in Figure 3C) in comparison to an isolated Li-ion cell. As
expected, the hybrid ESS was able to support the current
pulses with lower voltage sag compared to the isolated Li-
MAY 2021
 Chin et al.

Figure 2.
JPL/CSUNSat1 development. A) CAD rendering of JPL/CSUNSat1. B) CAD rendering of JPL/CSUNSat1 avionics PCBs. C) Final fit check
prior to integration. D) Stack assembly. E) Integrated spacecraft with labeled location of the Li-ion and supercapacitor cells in the 3U CubeSat.

Figure 3.
Summary of ground performance testing at JPL. A) Discharge capacity performance of 26650 LFP Li-ion cell at 20 and –40
C. B) Perfor-
mance comparison of COTS supercapacitor cells rated at 100, 150, and 310 F at –40
C. C) Pulse discharge comparison of a mockup hybrid
battery versus Li-ion cell at 15 Amp discharge rate at –40
C. D) Percent of discharge capacity distribution between Li-ion versus supercapa-
citors of the hybrid battery over various temperatures. This data was determined experimentally by separate measurements on current in the
supercapacitor bank and the Li-ion cell during discharge at approximately 2 Hz sampling rate using an external data acquisition (DAQ) cou-
pled with a known constant load source at set temperatures.

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Flight Demonstration of a Hybrid Battery/Supercapacitor Energy Storage System in an Earth Orbiting CubeSat

Figure 4.
A) Functional block diagram of payload electronics board. B) Prototype engineering model of JPL’s payload electronics board. C) Integrated
hybrid ESS, following thermal vacuum testing.

ion cell at –40
C. This is largely due to the lower imped-
ance leading to a faster response time of the SC cells under
pulse operating conditions [22]. Such power enhance-
ments at lower temperatures and higher power capability
can potentially enable future deep space flight applications
with high burst power demands, such as communication
events [24], [25]. Another significant benefit of the hybrid
ESS is its excellent load sharing capabilities. As
highlighted in Figure 3D, the SC bank takes a higher per-
centage of the discharge capacity with decreasing temper-
atures (up to 80% at lowest temperatures of –40
C).
Consequently, this could also have significant improve-
ment on cycle life of the Li-ion cell over long cycling peri-
ods, due to lower effective depth of discharge and
mitigation of known degradation mechanisms [7], [26].
PAYLOAD ELECTRONICS
The interfacing payload electronics were also designed at
JPL as part of the hybrid ESS payload development. The
payload was designed to be a fully integrated system contain-
ing the battery cell, SCs, and a payload electronics board. It
was constrained to fit within a 1/2U volume including all the
electronics necessary to control the experiment. This
approach was chosen since it allowed the payload to be
completely tested at JPL prior to integration into the CubeSat.
The payload electronics as illustrated in Figure 4 con-
tained the battery charger, a bank of discharge resistors,
fault protection (FP) circuitry, switching circuitry, com-
mandable switches, and telemetry collection circuitry.
Interfaces between the payload and spacecraft were mini-
mized in order to facilitate a more independent develop-
ment of the payload and the CubeSat at JPL and CSUN,
respectively. The only interface connections required
from the payload to the CubeSat were the spacecraft
power bus and the connection to the spacecraft’s I2C com-
munication bus.
Command and control of the payload was executed
entirely through the I2C bus. Several I2C port expanders
were used to control the various power paths, and to

28 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE MAY 2021

 Chin et al.

Table 1.

Summary of Payload Electronics FPs

FP Fault Action Detection Reset Description

type condition

Battery >3.7 V Clamp battery cell Clamp Clamp / Battery cell is

overvoltage unclamp overcharged
Battery <1.95 V Disconnect discharge FET S/W S/W Not a safety
undervoltage but not charge FET issue. Battery
below min
capacity.
Battery >40
C Payload offline - disable H/W H/W (<38
C Thermal runaway
overtemperature both charge and discharge no longer conditions.
FET safety Shorted battery
issue) cell.
SupercapCell >2.85 V Bypass charge current H/W H/W Enable supercap
overvoltage cell balancing.
SupercapCell <0 V Supercap offline S/W S/W Cell reversal
undervoltage condition.
Deploy <0.5 V Ensure battery and H/W H/W Launch
switch supercap bank are requirement
completely isolated from
spacecraft

interface to the telemetry collection analog-to-digital con-
verters. The payload electronics also included numerous
power switches which allowed the battery to be directly
charged from the spacecraft power bus and discharged
through a bank of four individually controlled resistors.
This enabled an extended mission mode, allowing the pay-
load battery to function as the primary ESS of spacecraft.
The discharge switching circuitry was programmable to
allow discharge current rates from 1 to 15 A in 1 A incre-
ments. The payload included I2C based analog-to-digital
converters, which captured telemetry including battery
voltage and current, SC voltage and current, charge cur-
rent, discharge current, and battery temperature.
The payload electronics also included extensive FP
circuitry which individually isolated the battery and
SCs from the power bus, performed cell balancing of
the two SC cells, and most importantly prevented bat-
tery overcharge (which could lead to catastrophic ther-
mal runaway and mission termination). A summary
description of all CSUNSat1 payload FP conditions is
provided in Table 1.
ENVIRONMENTAL TESTING AND FINAL INTEGRATION
To achieve flight readiness in a relevant environment
(Technology Readiness Level 6), both the ESS payload
and the JPL/CSUNSat1 spacecraft were subjected to
environmental testing, including thermal vacuum
(TVAC), pyro-shock, and random vibration testing.
PAYLOAD ESS
The Li-ion and SC cells were independently tested using a
small thermal vacuum (TVAC) system as shown in
Figure 5A-1. The chamber chassis accommodates up to
three test cells, and is packed with aluminum foil to
improve thermal conduction under vacuum. The TVAC
chamber featured feedthroughs to allow for voltage, cur-
rent, and temperature monitoring, and to enable functional
testing of the payload flight cells through its electronics
board. The functional block diagram of the TVAC testbed
is shown in Figure 5A-2, and further description provided
in a previous work [27]. The nominal base pressure was
less than 10-6 Torr which is representative of the space
environment. An Arduino microcontroller board was
employed as part of the testbed to send commands through
the payload electronics and retrieve payload telemetry.
Standard functional tests consisted of a short discharge
pulse(s) (<60 s) under vacuum conditions in order to min-
imize heat dissipation. The TVAC test plan included two
thermal cycles ranging from 60 to –40
C, with a one to
two hours dwell period prior to functional testing. The
results indicated nominal behavior with the exception of
an observed 200 mV difference between the two SC

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Flight Demonstration of a Hybrid Battery/Supercapacitor Energy Storage System in an Earth Orbiting CubeSat

Figure 5.
Summary of environmental testing for JPL/CSUNSat1 project. A-1) JPL/CSUNSat1 payload inside JPL’s TVAC chamber, including flight
cell test chassis (picture on right) for TVAC environmental testing. A-2) Functional block diagram of the CubeSat TVAC system. A-3) Rep-
resentative TVAC discharge pulse test data under vacuum (pressure < 10-6 Torr) at –40
C. B-1) Block diagram on the integrated JPL/
CSUNSat1. B-2) Random vibration test profile on the integrated CSUNSat1. The overall root mean square acceleration (grms) in the x, y,
and z directions was determined to be 9.51, 9.49, and 9.53 grms, respectively. B-3) Integrated voltage measurements under TVAC.

cells, most likely attributable to variations in resistance before and after the TVAC testing. As summarized in
between the voltage measuring electronics and contact Table 2, the cell mass differences of all the flight cells
with the cell terminals. Figure 5A-3 illustrates a represen- were negligible after TVAC testing, indicating no electro-
tative pulse discharge test at –40
C of 7 A in hybrid lyte leakage from a cell can breach.
ESS mode through one of the integrated load resistors.
The voltage and current distributions provided good indi-
cations of functionality and performance of the entire pay-
load assembly including optimization of payload
CSUNSAT1 INTEGRATION TESTING
electronics to minimize cell leakage and electrical resis- After successful environment cell testing, the hybrid
tances. Individual cell masses were also measured both ESS payload assembly was integrated into an aluminum
block casing designed specifically to interface to the
JPL/CSUNSat1 spacecraft, as shown in Figure 4C. The
Table 2.
hybrid ESS payload was successfully integrated into the
Summary of Cell Mass Pre- and Post-TVAC spacecraft, and was subsequently subjected to environ-
mental testing.
The pyroshock, random vibration and TVAC testing
Cell Mass (gm)
on the CubeSat with the ESS payload in place were then
Cell ID Pre-Tvac Post-Tvac carried out. The test data (see Figure 5B-2) was used to
calculate the overall root mean square acceleration (grms)
Li-ion 85.120 85.110
in the x, y, and z directions to be 9.51, 9.49, and 9.53
Supercap #1 73.350 73.350 grms, respectively. In addition, no debris or particles were
Supercap #2 75.000 75.000 detected upon inspection after the test up to launch ran-
dom vibration levels.

30 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE MAY 2021

 Chin et al.

Figure 6.
Summary of downlinked telemetry data from CSUNSat1 during primary operations. A) Payload battery initial charge cycle. Telemetry cov-
ers over 20 h over multiple downlinks from CSUNSat1. The data provided an initial estimate of the available capacity of the hybrid capacity
at about 2.3 Ah. B) Initial hybrid mode checkout test. This data shows expected load-sharing distribution between the Li-ion cell and super-
capacitor bank at about 20
C temperature. C) Nominal temperature experiment on Jun. 7, 2017 from CSUNSat1 operating in battery mode.
D) Cold temperature experiment on Jun. 14, 2017 from JPL/CSUNSat1 operating in battery mode. E) Supercapacitor performance experi-
ment on Jun. 8, 2017 from CSUNSat1 operating in supercapacitor mode. F) Representative nominal temperature experiment on Jun. 16,
2017 from JPL/CSUNSat1 operating in hybrid mode.

The JPL/CSUNSat1 TVAC test configuration block
diagram is shown in Figure 5B-1. The TVAC test incor-
porated a solar simulator to provide power generation
and command capabilities through the actual ground
control equipment. Prior to TVAC testing the spacecraft
solar array was installed. This prevented the CubeSat
from being directly mounted on the cooling baseplate,
which limited thermal conduction within the system.
Coupled with significant thermal dissipation, the space-
craft was unable to achieve sub-zero temperature under
vacuum. Actual test results from JPL/CSUNSat1 under
TVAC conditions are shown in Figure 5B-3. The 3 V
logic supply voltage, bus voltage, Li-ion cell voltage,
and SC voltage behaved as expected under various
charge and discharge conditions throughout the two to
three day TVAC test campaign. The analog data noise
resulted from use of a single-ended 8-bit data acquisi-
tion (DAQ) system. Upon completing the TVAC test,
the JPL/CSUNSat1 successfully passed all environmen-
tal testing and was delivered to NanoRacks (CubeSat
launch services provider) for preparation for launch to
the ISS.
PRIMARY MISSION TELEMETRY
The JPL/CSUNSat1 launch from the ISS marked the
beginning of the operational phase to characterize the
hybrid ESS payload. Typical communication time
windows with JPL/CSUNSat1 from the CSUN Tracking
Stations were 10–20 min for command uplink and/or
telemetry downlinks, including the transfer of space-
craft state-of-health and payload battery flight experi-
mental data. The JPL/CSUNSat1 provided telemetry at
a resolution of up to 1 s. The initial charge cycle of the
Li-ion cell is shown in Figure 6A. The 20þ h of teleme-
try required multiple downlinks, resulting in a capacity
estimate of 2.3 Ah, in good agreement with ground
test data. During the initial hybrid battery checkout test,
the expected load-sharing performance of the hybrid
battery was confirmed using a 1 A discharge rate (see
Figure 6B). At 20
C, the percentage of discharge
capacity for the Li-ion cell was 60% versus 40% for
the SC bank, in excellent agreement with ground test
data shown in Figure 3D. Overall, the payload battery
appeared to be in a good state-of-health, based on the
initial checkout tests during flight.
The primary mission phase also included payload
battery characterization experiments at nominal and
cold temperatures in battery, SC, and hybrid ESS oper-
ating modes and at pulse discharge rates up to 15 A.
The nominal and cold temperature flight experiments in
battery mode were conducted (see Figure 6C and D).
During the 15 A pulse, the temperature for the nominal
test was approximately 4
C. Due to a combination of
thermal radiation from LEO and the CubeSat thermal
environment, the lowest achievable temperature
onboard CSUNSat1 was –2
C. Table 3 displays the

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Table 3.

Summary of Internal Resistances from Flight Data

Test description Pulse Num Internal resistances (mO)

Battery (mOhm) Supercap #1 Supercap #2 Temp. (
C)

Battery Exp. #1 1 57.8 – – 4.2

2 61.7 – – 4.0
3 61.6 – – 3.8
Supercap Exp. 1 – 16.5 3.2 6.4
2 – 17.7 6.0 6.5
3 – 16.5 6.0 6.9
Hybrid Exp. #1 1 62.3 16.2 2.7 –1.6
2 66.9 17.3 5.8 –1.2
3 63.3 16.0 4.8 –0.9
Battery Exp. #2 1 68.1 – – –1.3
2 64.8 – – –1.6
3 68.1 – – –1.9
Hybrid Exp. #2 1 64.9 17.4 4.9 –1.1
2 62.8 16.1 5.1 –1.3
3 66.7 17.4 6.5 –1.6

internal resistance of the battery observed during both
flight experiments, which was 60 mV in battery oper-
ating mode. There was a 5–10 mV decrease from the
nominal versus low temperature experiments, which
highlights the accuracy of the JPL/CSUNSat1 telemetry
resolution.
The telemetry from the SC mode is shown in
Figure 6E. Similar to ground tests, a 150 mV difference in
voltage between SC cell 1 versus cell 2 was observed in
flight. The corresponding capacitance calculated from
flight data was 318 and 302 F, respectively, with an effec-
tive capacitance of about 155 F for the two cells in series.
The internal resistance of SC cell 1 was determined to be
over two times higher than that of SC cell 2 (about 20
mOhm total), which is likely due to the resistance differ-
ences in the lead and terminal connectors to the payload
electronics. These differences resulted in no appreciable
impact on overall performance in hybrid mode.
Figure 6F highlights one of two flight experiments
on the performance telemetry in hybrid battery mode.
The temperatures from both experiments, unfortunately,
were similar at about –2
C, resulting in similar values
of internal resistances as shown in Table 3. These resis-
tances are significantly higher than values from ground
performance testing, which indicates that non-trivial
ohmic resistances were present in the overall payload
battery assembly. For the hybrid experiment, the opera-
tion included an observable SC charge cycle. Prior to
enabling the hybrid ESS mode, the bank was charged to
a voltage difference of <10 mV, to minimize transients
and overcharging. As expected, the SC exhibited a
much lower resistances of about 5.5 mOhm average as
compared to over 60 mOhm for the single Li-ion cell.
The battery resistances are lower by an average of 2.2
mOhm during the low temperature hybrid experiments
as oppose to the battery experiments which suggests
improved load capabilities from the Li-ion cell in the
hybrid ESS. These in-flight results are in good agree-
ment with ground test results reported previously [22].
EXTENDED MISSION TELEMETRY
The JPL/CSUNSat1 extended mission was carried out to
provide life cycle characterization of the hybrid ESS and
to support performance model validation. In addition, the
payload ESS was also successfully used as the primary
ESS of JPL/CSUNSat1 for a brief period of several hours.
However, the 2 GB storage device card onboard the space-
craft failed during flight, prohibiting telemetry data pack-
aging and downlinking. CSUN developed a workaround
that used the conditional sequence execution capability

32 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE MAY 2021


Figure 7.
A) Discharge capacity profiles from JPL/CSUNSat1 operating in reduced data mode during the extended mission, after its SD card
failure. B) Summary of maximum/minimum temperatures and coulombic efficiency from JPL/CSUNSat1 operating in degrade mode
after its SD card failure. The coulombic efficiencies of the hybrid battery were calculated from estimated charge and discharge
capacities.
along with the response poll feature. The sequence execu-
tion capability included the feature that each step in the
sequence was conditionally executed based on one of any
of the 44 sensor values on the spacecraft along with abso-
lute time and relative time. This capability provided suffi-
cient telemetry data to compete the extended mission
successfully.
PERFORMANCE DATA
Using the CSUN workaround for telemetry access on the
payload battery, only 10–12 data points were available for
each of the 10 charge/discharge cycles performed. Figure 7A
compares the estimated discharge capacities based on the
reduced data set from the extended mission phase. No appre-
ciable differences were observed in the discharge cycles,
with an average of 2.6 þ/– 0.1 Ah. The coulombic efficiency
of the hybrid battery of each cycle was also estimated and
summarized in Figure 7B. The average value was 96.8 þ/–
1.5%. The hybrid ESS cycle life performance is in close
agreement with ground testing with differences attributable
to temperature variations during flight testing.
HYBRID BATTERY MODEL DEVELOPMENT AND
VALIDATION
An impedance-based circuit model of the JPL/CSUNSat1
hybrid ESS is shown in Figure 8A-1. The model can be
used to describe both voltage and current distribution by
application of Kirchhoff’s circuit laws. Further mathemati-
cal details on these circuit models are described elsewhere
in the literature [28]–[30]. The SC impedance is represented
by a resistor (RESR) in series with a variable capacitor (Csc),
MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
Chin et al.
in parallel with the Li-ion impedances containing electro-
lyte resistance (Ro) in series with three –RC parallel units
known as time constants to account for the total contribu-
tions on voltage polarization during discharge. The –R1C1
is the time constant for charge transfer, –R2C2 is the time
constant for the solid electrolyte interphase (SEI) and cath-
ode electrolyte interphase (CEI), and –R3C3 provides the
estimated time constant corresponding to diffusion [31]. It
is worth noting that the impedance contribution from SEI
formation is relatively small compared to charge transfer
and diffusion impedances at the beginning of cycle life
[32], [33]. Parameterization of the model comes from meas-
urements on open-circuit potential along with electrochemi-
cal impedance spectroscopy (EIS) measurement over
various temperatures and state of charge (SOC). As illus-
trated in Figure 8B-1, the impedance data vary significantly
with SOC as expected with the highest impedances at 0%
SOC. The electrolyte resistance (Ro) exhibited no signifi-
cant change versus SOC but rather varied only with temper-
atures. The equivalent circuit shown in Figure 8B-2
exhibited a sufficiently good fit to the EIS measurement
with changes in both temperature and SOC.
Despite the lack of telemetry resolution, the extended
mission telemetry data could be used to validate the hybrid
ESS performance model on prediction of useable capacity.
As the impedance of the SC (Csc) goes to infinite during dc
(continuous) discharge, the capacity contributions of SC
are negligible leaving the Li-ion cell as the sole energy
storage source as described in Figure 8A-2. Solving this
circuit for V(t) results in the following equation:
X
3  t

V ðtÞ ¼ Vocv þ Iapp  R0 þ Iapp  Rn  1  eeRn Cn
n¼1
33
Flight Demonstration of a Hybrid Battery/Supercapacitor Energy Storage System in an Earth Orbiting CubeSat

Figure 8.
Summary of hybrid battery model development. A-1) Equivalent circuit model on the operation of the hybrid energy storage system. The
supercapacitor impedance is described by RESR in series with Csc. A-2) The circuit model for performance characterization during extended
mission phase. The Ro is the electrolyte resistance. The charge-transfer time constant is associated with R1 and C1. The SEI time constant is
associated with R2 and C2. The diffusion time constant is associated with R3 and C3. B-1) Example of complex plane plot from EIS measure-
ments for parameterization of impedance-based circuit model for Li-ion cell. A collection of EIS measurements were performed at various
SOC and temperatures. B-2) Each measurement fits sufficiently well to an impedance equivalent circuit containing R0 in series with three
–RC time constants. C-1) Simulation time profile of JPL/CSUNSat1 payload battery on discharge at T ¼ 5, 0, –5
C. C-2) Comparison of
simulation versus the telemetered discharge capacity profile. The simulation current rate was performed at 0.91 A.

with all three time constant variables as parameterized
by EIS measurements performed on the ground on the
same electrochemical cell chemistries using lookup
tables. The simulation of the discharge profile compar-
ing JPL/CSUNSat1 telemetry is shown in Figure 8C-2.
The simulated discharge rate of 0.91 A represents the
average actual discharge rate through the 3.3 Ohm resis-
tance in the electronic payload. The simulated tempera-
ture of –5
C to achieve minimum residual error is lower
than the actual payload battery temperature, which again
suggests significant ohmic resistances (i.e., leads, con-
nectors, etc.) which are mostly present in the payload
assembly. These were unaccounted for from ground-
measured impedances from EIS on individual cells (see
Figure 8C-1). Overall, these data provided a good agree-
ment with the model and basis for future improvements
on development of such circuit models, for flight opera-
tions on ESS life, and long-term state-of health
characterization.
SUMMARY
The JPL/CSUNSat1 project successfully demonstrated a
hybrid ESS consisting of a Li-ion battery and SC technol-
ogies in flight onboard a 2U tumbler CubeSat. Both the
primary and extended mission phases were completed suc-
cessfully. The performance characteristics of the payload
hybrid ESS in flight were in excellent agreement with
ground test results, particularly with respect to the percent
of capacity contributions between the Li-ion cell and the
SC. The large differences in internal resistances from
flight experiments as compared to ground tests were attrib-
utable to significant ohmic resistances of the payload bat-
tery interconnects (i.e., leads, connectors, etc.) and not
due to the inherent cell impedances. Despite operating in
LEO, the spacecraft was able to achieve sub-zero tempera-
tures critical for flight experiments on JPL’s cold capable
hybrid ESS.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
NASA’s 2013 Small Spacecraft Technology Program
funded the payload development that was carried out at
the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of
Technology, under a contract with the National Aeronau-
tics and Space Administration and the CubeSat develop-
ment carried out at the California State University,
Northridge. The JPL/CSUNSat1 primary operational
phase was funded by NASA’s Center Innovation Fund.
The JPL/CSUNSat1 extended mission phase was funded
by JPL’s Lunar Flashlight CubeSat Project. This work is
dedicated to the memory of Dr. Sharlene Katz, an excep-
tional educator and mentor to many students throughout
the CSUNSat1 project.

34 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE MAY 2021


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36 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE MAY 2021

 2021 Aerospace & Electronics Systems Society Distinguished Lecturers
Contact: Lorenzo Lo Monte, Vice President – Education
Yaakov Bar-Shalom, University of Connecticut
ƒ Target Tracking & Data Fusion
W. Dale Blair, Georgia Tech Research Institute
ƒ Tracking Maneuvering Targets in a World of
Netted Sensors
ƒ Systematic Filter Design for Tracking
Maneuvering Targets
Erik P. Blasch, US Air Force Research Lab
ƒ Overview of High-Level Information Fusion
Theory, Models, & Representations
ƒ Multispectral Image Fusion & Night Vision
Colorization
Michael S. Braasch, Ohio University
ƒ Characterization & Mitigation of Multipath in
GNSS
ƒ Fundamentals of Inertial Navigation
ƒ Fundamentals of Inertial Aiding
Eli Brookner, Raytheon (Retired)
ƒ Radar, Phased-Arrays, Metamaterials (Invisible
Man), Stealth, Anti-Stealth, Ultra-Wideband,
Cognitive Adaptivity, MIMO, 5G: Advances and
Breakthroughs
ƒ MIMO Radar: My Story Taken Out of It
ƒ Metamaterial for Low Cost Electronic Scanning,
Wideband Conformal Antennas, Cloaking (The
Invisible Man), Stealth and Waim.
ƒ Around the World in 60 Minutes
ƒ Cognitive Adaptive Array Processing for Radar
David Brown, Southwest Research Institute
ƒ Application of SOSA to Airborne EW
ƒ Cognitive DF for Airborne Systems
Frederick E. Daum, Raytheon
ƒ Is There a Royal Road to Robustness?
ƒ MIMO Radar: Snake Oil or Good idea?
ƒ Never Trust a Simulation without a Simple
Back-of-the-Envelope Calculation that Explains It
ƒ Nonlinear Filters with Particle Flow
ƒ Real World Data Fusion
Mark E. Davis, Independent Consultant
ƒ Ultra Wideband Surveillance Radar
Antonio De Maio Università "Federico II" di
Napoli
ƒ Radar Detection, Performance, & CFAR
Techniques
ƒ Optimization Theory in Radar Signal Processing
Walter D. Downing, Southwest Research
Institute
ƒ Space Avionics & Scientific Instruments for
Unmanned Space Missions
ƒ Bridging the Valley of Death
Giuseppe Fabrizio, Defence Science &
Technology
ƒ Robust Adaptive Array Processing for Radar
ƒ Over-The-Horizon Radar
Alfonso Farina, Selex (Retired)
ƒ Radar Adaptivity: Antenna Based Signal
Processing Techniques
Demoz Gebre-Egizabher, University of
Minnesota
ƒ Design & Validation of Fault-Tolerant Integrated
Navigation Systems for Small UAVs
ƒ Cooperative & Networked Navigation
ƒ Signal of Opportunity Navigation for Small
Spacecraft in Deep Space
Felix Govaers, Fraunhofer FKIE
ƒ Multi Sensor Fusion in Distributed Systems
Maria Sabrina Greco, University of Pisa
ƒ Sea & Land Clutter Statistical Analysis &
Modeling
ƒ Advanced Techniques of Radar Detection in Non-
Gaussian Background
ƒ Sensor Selection for Multistatic Radar Networks
Hugh D. Griffiths, University College London
ƒ The Challenge of Waveform Diversity
ƒ Bistatic & Multistatic Radar
Wolfgang Koch, Fraunhofer FKIE
ƒ Multistatic Exploration: Intro to Modern Passive
Radar & Multistatic Tracking & Data Fusion
ƒ Tracking & Sensor Data Fusion
Kathleen Kramer, University of San Diego
ƒ Feature Object Extraction
ƒ Navigation: The Road to GPS & Getting
Beyond It
Krzysztof Kulpa, Warsaw University of
Technology
ƒ Passive Radar Technology: Ground-based &
Moving Platform Challenges
ƒ Noise Radar Technologies
ƒ Radar Technology: New Trends & Frontiers
ƒ Passive & Active Radar
Lorenzo Lo Monte, Telephonics
ƒ Radar Systems Prototyping
ƒ History & Future of Radar & EW
Uttam Kumar, US Air Force Research Lab
ƒ Deep Learning for Radio Frequency Target
Classification
Y. Jade Morton, University of Colorado Boulder
ƒ Satellite Navigation & Sensing
Athina Petropulu, Rutgers University
ƒ Optimum Co-Design for Spectrum Sharing
Between MIMO Radar & MIMO Communication
Systems
ƒ On Radar Privacy in Shared Spectrum Scenarios
ƒ Multidimensional Sparse Fourier Transform &
Application to Digital Beamforming Automotive
Radar
Robert C. Rassa, Raytheon Company
ƒ Business Case for Systems Engineering
Luke Rosenberg, DST Group
ƒ New Concepts in Maritime Detection
ƒ The Importance of Sea Clutter Modeling
Roberto Sabatini, RMIT University
ƒ Aerospace Cyber-Physical Systems
George T. Schmidt, MIT/Draper Lab (Retired)
ƒ Inertial System & GPS Technology Trends
ƒ Navigation Sensors & Systems in GNSS Degraded
& Denied Environments
ƒ Inside Apollo: Heroes, Rules & Lessons Learned
in the Guidance, Navigation, & Control (GNC)
System Development
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ƒ How it Works: UAV Technology Overview
ƒ How it’s Used: UAV Applications & Business
Opportunities
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ƒ A Course for New Drone Operators
Roy Streit, Metron, Inc.
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& Higher-Level Fusion
Hongbo Sun, Nanyang Technological University
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Peter Willett, University of Connecticut
ƒ A Primer on Various Approaches to Data
Association
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& Fundamental Results on Trackability
ƒ Distributed Detection & Data Fusion
Yuanxin Wu, Shanghai Jiao Tong University
ƒ Inertial Navigation: Sensing & Computation into
the Future
Birsen Yazici, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
ƒ Machine Learning for Radar Sensing & Imaging
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Radar
Feature Article:
A Framework for Loadable Airborne Systems
Johnny Marques , Sarasuaty Yelisetty, and and Lilian Barros, Instituto
Tecnologico de Aeronautica (Aeronautics Institute of Technology), Sao Paolo
12228-900, Brazil
INTRODUCTION
Norms and standards regulate the development of safety-crit-
ical systems. Domains such as aviation, automotive, medical,
rail, space, and nuclear have many safety-critical products.
Safety-critical systems can integrate, for example, medical
devices, nuclear power equipment, satellites, aircraft, and
vehicles. Nowadays, safety-critical systems have embedded
software [1]. A characteristic always present in the standards
of these domains is the requirements specification. The litera-
ture addressed the various problems in the requirements spec-
ification, which may involve incomplete, incorrect,
ambiguous, conflicting, or inconsistent requirements [2]–[5].
In this work, we call aviation safety-critical systems with
embedded software as airborne systems. In commercial avia-
tion, the use of advanced technologies reflects the need for
software to meet a high degree of technology, combined with
safety concerns [1]. Aviation regulatory agencies enforce
products, including airborne systems, to meet strict certifica-
tion requirements, such as RTCA DO-178C [6] for software.
Software loading occurs when a new software version
(NSW) corrects previously identified problems, including
new features or improvements. In this work, a Loadable
Airborne System (LAS) is a system with field-loadable
software (FLS) capability. This work proposes a frame-
work that includes a set of reusable requirements and test
procedures for LAS.
Our proposed framework contains reusable system
requirements for a LAS project. These system require-
ments should be refined in each LAS development through
hardware and software requirements to make the possibil-
ity of loading feasible. Our framework also contains gen-
eral test procedures to ensure the coverage of the reusable
system requirements. We believe that our framework is a
necessary contribution since the available literature is
Authors’ current addresses: Tecnologico de Aeronautica,
Sao Paolo 12228-900, Brazil (e-mail: johnny@ita.br).
Manuscript received May 13, 2020, revised August 10,
2020; accepted November 6, 2020, and ready for
publication November 23, 2020.
Review handled by Roberto Sabatini.
0885-8985/21/$26.00 ß 2021 IEEE
38 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
DOI. No. 10.1109/MAES.2020.3040511
composed of standards that do not detail the needs, only
defining them. Based on our best knowledge and search
for scientific papers, no reports of experience are available
for public consultation.
We also believe that the use of systems with loading
capacity has increased in smaller transport aircraft, such
as those certified in Part 23. Our framework can help
smaller companies, especially market entrants, to incorpo-
rate software loading capacity into system development.
In addition to this introduction, this work contains sec-
tions on “Background,” “Related Standards,” and
“Methodology.” The section "Surveys” presents our surveys
carried out with systems developers and aviation mainte-
nance technicians. “Framework for Loadable Airborne Sys-
tems (F-LAS)” presents our framework. “Analysis” presents
the analysis performed, and finally, we present our conclu-
sion and future work in the “Conclusion.”
BACKGROUND
Software development is already standardized in aviation
using RTCA DO-178C [6] and its supplements. In recent
years, several works discussed advances and new method-
ologies for software development, especially in the fol-
lowing areas.
 Impacts on the transition from RTCA DO-178B [7]
to DO-178C [6], as described in the works of Marcil
[8] and Youn et al. [9].
 Model-based development, as described in the
works of Paz and Bousaidi [10], Eisemann [11], and
Marques and Cunha [1].
 Use of agile methods in software development, as
described in the works of Vanderleest and Buter
[12], Marques et al. [13], and Marsden et al. [14].
 Formal verification, as described in the works of
Moy et al. [15] and Marques and Cunha [16].
 Tool qualification, as described in works of Marques
and Cunha [17], [18] and Mahmoodi et al. [19].
The available literature has not yet addressed the char-
acteristics of FLS. Although the RTCA DO-178B [7]
introduced the concept of FLS, the industry does not have
MAY 2021

an organized framework, which motivates the existence of
this work. This framework is also compatible with RTCA
DO-326A [20] and RTCA DO-356 [21].
RELATED STANDARDS
The development of aeronautical systems is guided by
several existing standards. In this section, we identify the
main existing standards with correlation of our work.
The early 1990s were characterized by a rapid increase
in the extensive software usage in aircraft, engines, and air-
borne pieces of equipment [22]. This trend has resulted in
the industry’s need to create its guide and regulatory mate-
rial to drive system and software development. The SAE
ARP 4754A[23] and RTCA DO-178C [6] were created sat-
isfying these needs. It guides the aeronautical community
on system and software development processes [24].
The SAE ARP 4754A [22] discusses the development
of aircraft systems taking into account the overall aircraft
operating environment and functions. This includes the
validation of requirements and verification of the design
implementation for certification and product assurance.
The RTCA DO-178C [6] has a significant number of
objectives associated with software requirements develop-
ment, using as input system requirements that will be
implemented by software. There are two levels of software
requirements on RTCA DO-178C. Software high-level
requirements generally represent “what” should be
designed. They include functional, performance, interface,
and safety-related requirements. The software low-level
requirements represent the how-to, providing details on
implementing software in code [25]. They include the fea-
tures required for source code development, such as data
coupling and control features.
The RTCA DO-326A [20] guides by defining activi-
ties for supplementing the aircraft development and certi-
fication process to demonstrate that the effects on the
safety of the aircraft of such unlawful interference are con-
fined within acceptable levels.
The RTCA DO-356 [21] describes guidelines, methods,
and tools used in performing an airworthiness security pro-
cess. Airworthiness security is the protection of the airworthi-
ness of an aircraft from intentional unauthorized electronic
interference. This includes the consequences of malware and
forged data and access to other systems to aircraft systems.
The security perimeter catalogs the parts of the aircraft
or system that contact external systems or populations.
MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
Credit: Image licensed by Ingram Publishing
These are the parts that support the interfaces and pro-
cesses by which a system can be affected or interacted
with[20]. Airworthiness security is the necessary protec-
tion that an aircraft must provide to mitigate information
security threats. The security perimeter includes the por-
tions that support the following:
 physical links (e.g., Ethernet ports, wireless
transceivers);
 logical links (e.g., IP stack);
 network protocols (e.g., DNS, ICMP, gateways,
packet filters);
 network services and clients (e.g., HTML server,
FTP client/server, IPSEC server);
 remote applications (e.g., file transfer services,
remote monitoring, and web applications).
The ARINC 666 [26] defines the airline industry
standards for the electronic distribution of software. It
describes the common principles and rules applied when
transferring FLS from suppliers (SUP) to aircraft mainte-
nance facilities. The software loading has become a com-
mon maintenance action. It is therefore desirable to make
the software readily available to the mechanic. The soft-
ware may be stored on physical media such as a floppy
disc, hard drive, CD-ROM, PC Card, or other devices until
needed. To ensure availability, the physical media con-
taining the software is either installed on the aircraft or
located where aircraft maintenance is performed.
The ARINC 667-2 [27] guides the in-service manage-
ment of the FLS. This standard defines aircraft controlled
software, which describes how aircraft software is con-
trolled regardless of how the software is loaded. Although
ARINC documents provide good information about FLS,
they do not specify a framework.
METHODOLOGY
We initially researched the existing standards in the industry
associated with the development of systems. Then, we
looked for related works that eventually describe experience
reports on the development of systems with field-loadable
capability. It is important to say that there is no other pub-
lished paper that describes or evaluate field-loadable capa-
bility. So, we identified this as a lack of research, which
motivates this work and the framework proposal.
39
A Framework for Loadable Airborne Systems
Figure 1.
Results of Survey 1.
With this motivation, we applied two surveys to iden-
tify the relevance of creating a reusable framework for the
development of systems with field-loadable capability.
Our surveys involved two audiences: systems developers
and aviation maintenance technicians, as these are usually
responsible for the loading task. Next, we define the
framework itself, by identifying the actors, how an NSW
can become available in the field, its reusable require-
ments, and testing procedures.
SURVEYS
This research conducted two surveys. Survey 1 identified
the main needs and practices performed by system devel-
opers and mapped their knowledge and practices in LASs.
On the other hand, Survey 2 focused on aviation mainte-
nance technicians, responsible for the task of loading in
aeronautical maintenance facilities.
Survey 1 involved 20 systems developers and included
eight statements. Out of the 20 system developer, 15 are
considered senior, as they have more than ten years of avi-
ation experience. The other five are considered junior, as
they have less than ten years of experience. The system
developers answered a set of questions with the following
scales: (1) Strongly disagree; (2) Disagree; (3) Neutral;
(4) Agree; and (5) Strongly agree. Figure 1 presents the
results of Survey 1.
We found seven findings during Survey 1. We con-
sider responses (3) Neutral, (4) Agree, and (5) Strongly
agree, to consider that answers provided agree with the
proposed statements (ST1–ST7). The findings identified
during Survey 1 are as follows.
 Finding 1: 100% of systems developers agree that
integrity is important to ensure completeness and
correctness (ST1).
40 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
 Finding 2: 95% of systems developers agree that
identity is important to ensure completeness and
correctness (ST2).
 Finding 3: 80% of systems developers agree that
interchangeability analysis among different redun-
dancies must be always performed (ST3).
 Finding 4: 60% of systems developers agree that
software must be always controlled separately from
the hardware (ST4).
 Finding 5: 100% of systems developers agree that a
framework with reusable requirements and tests
will be useful for System Developers (ST5).
 Finding 6: 60% of systems developers do not spec-
ify the requirements for software loading during a
LAS project (ST6).
 Finding 7: 60% of systems developers do not con-
duct tests to ensure different scenarios of software
loading (ST7).
Survey 2 involved 12 aviation maintenance techni-
cians, responsible for software loading. Out of the 12 avia-
tion maintenance technicians, eight are considered senior,
as they have more than ten years of aviation experience.
The other four are considered junior, as they have less
than ten years of experience. Survey 2 involved a ques-
tionnaire with three questions. The aviation maintenance
technicians answered the questions with the following
scales: (1) Never (0%); (2) Rarely (0%–5%); (3) Eventu-
ally (5%–20%); and (4) Often (more than 20%). Figure 2
presents the results of Survey 2.
The findings identified during Survey 2 are as follows.
 Finding 8: Load capacity—to ensure that the LAS
has an interface capable of transferring the software
from the source (Q1, Q2, and Q3).
MAY 2021

Figure 2.
Results of Survey 2.
 Finding 9: Loading integrity—to ensure that the soft-
ware is completely loaded, avoiding partial loading,
which would lead to a lack of functionalities (Q3).
 Finding 10: Loading identity—to ensure that the
loaded software is correct and expected by the air-
craft (Q3).
 Finding 11: Update of all copies—to ensure that all
redundant copies of the software were updated when
different versions cannot coexist on the aircraft (Q2).
FRAMEWORK FOR LOADABLE AIRBORNE SYSTEMS
(F-LAS) FRAMEWORK
F-LAS is the name of our proposed framework. The F-
LAS project contains (A) Actors; (B) Software Distribu-
tion; (C) Requirements; and (D) Test Procedures. Figure 3
presents the F-LAS framework.
Figure 3.
F-LAS framework structure.
MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
Marques et al.
ACTORS
The Actors are important definitions to make the require-
ments feasible. The following actors are part of the F-LAS
framework.
 Aircraft Configuration Control System (ACCS): Sys-
tem for automatic check to ensure the proper loading
of the NSV.
 Aircraft Display System (ADS): System that will
display the Software Identification (SI) of the NSV.
 Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC): Error detection
method used in digital networks and storage devices
to detect accidental changes in data strings [28].
 Field Software Loading Procedure (FLSP): Proce-
dure describing the loading of an NSV.
 Loading Computer (LC): Computer responsible for
loading an NSV.
41
A Framework for Loadable Airborne Systems
Figure 4.
Software distribution.
 Loading Interface (LI): Physical interface for soft-
ware loading.
 Logbook (LB): Book for aircraft recording mainte-
nance operations.
 Manual Check Procedure (MCP): Procedure for
manual (human) check to ensure the proper loading
of the NSV.
 NSV: A newer version of the software.
 Previous Software Version: Software Version
before loading the NSV.
 SI: Identification of a software version.
 SUP: Entity responsible to supply the NSV. It may
be an aircraft manufacturer or a system supplier.
SOFTWARE DISTRIBUTION METHODS
According to ARINC 667-2 [27], the NSV may be pro-
vided using physical or electronic methods. Independently
of the distribution method, it is the responsibility of the
supplier to ensure that the NSV meets specification against
which it is supplied. The users must ensure that NSV is
properly replicated in any subsequent copies of that
software.
The software distribution is different from the soft-
ware load. The software distribution is the process of
transferring software parts between aviation business part-
ners or to an aircraft maintenance facility. This includes
software parts transferred on physical media or via elec-
tronic distribution. The software load is the process of
transferring the NSV from the LC to the target hardware.
Figure 4 presents the possible methods of distribution.
When the electronic distribution is used, additional instruc-
tions must be provided to the users (aircraft maintenance
42 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
facilities) to load the NSV inside the LC, and then proceed
in aircraft installation. We assume that the professionals
who carry out the software loading have clear and well-
defined instructions available for the loading task.
REQUIREMENTS
According to IEEE 610.12:1990 [29], a Requirement is a con-
dition or capability that must be met or possessed by a system
or system component to satisfy a contract, standard, specifi-
cation, or other formally imposed documents. The term
stakeholder is essential in requirements engineering. Stake-
holders are the most important sources of requirements. Not
considering a stakeholder often results in fragmentally eli-
cited requirements, i.e., incomplete requirements[30]. Stake-
holders are those people or organizations that have some
impact on the requirements. In the project of LASs, the stake-
holders are system developers, software developers, certifica-
tion authorities, aviation maintenance technicians, suppliers
of supporting equipment for loading, and other interested.
During the development process, requirements engi-
neering must elicit the stakeholder’s requirements, docu-
ment the requirements suitably, validate and verify the
requirements, and manage the requirements throughout the
entire life cycle of the system [31]. Some of the categories
presented in ISO/IEC 25010:2011 [32] are necessary to
allow the field software loading capability, in this work, the
types of requirements must address: performance, security,
and fault tolerance. An NSW must achieve the performance
of the system. The security of the system must ensure the
authenticity and integrity of the loading. Finally, fault tol-
erance must ensure when software loading is inappropriate.
Using Actors presented in the section “Actors,” we
create the 23 reusable requirements, and we classified the
requirements into four types, depending on the character-
istics of each LAS.
MAY 2021

Figure 5.
Flowchart for the identification of applicable requirements for
each LAS.
 Basic Loading Requirements (BLR)—These require-
ments are for any LAS.
 BLR-1: The LAS shall have a LI to enable the load-
ing of the NVS.
 BLR-2: The SUP shall develop the FLSP.
 BLR-3: The SUP shall identify NSV.
 BLR-4: The LLC shall be compatible with the LI.
 BLR-5: The LC shall be able to transfer the NSV to
the LAS.
Manual Check Requirements (MCR)—These require-
ments are for the LAS that need a human inspection to
ensure that loading was correctly performed.
 MCR-6: The FLSP shall include the MCP.
 MCR-7: The MCP shall include the expected SI of
the NSV.
 MCR-8: The MCP shall include the expected CRC
of the NSV.
 MCR-9: The MMCP shall contain instructions to
verify that all LAS have the same CRC.
Automatic Check Requirements (ACR)—These
requirements are for LAS that have a system independent
to ensure that loading was correctly performed.
MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
Marques et al.
 ACR-10: The ACCS shall be able to guarantee that
the loaded version is complete, comparing the
loaded CRC with the expected CRC.
 ACR-11: The ACCS shall be able to guarantee that
the loaded version is correct.
 ACR-12: The ACCS shall communicate to the ADS if
the loaded version has a different CRC than expected.
 ACR-13: The ACCS shall communicate to the ADS
if the loaded version has a SI than expected.
 ACR-14: The ADS shall display a confirmation
message if the loaded software version is complete.
 ACR-15: The ADS shall display a confirmation
message if the software version loaded is correct.
 ACR-16: The ADS shall display an error message if
the loaded software version is not complete.
 ACR-17: The ADS shall display a confirmation mes-
sage if the loaded software version is not correct.
 ACR-18: The ACCS shall inform the SI and the
CRC of the NSV installed for the ADS.
 ACR-19: The ADS shall display the SI and the CRC
of the NSV installed after loading.
Version Exchange Requirements (VER)—These
requirements are for LAS that have redundancies and dif-
ferent software versions cannot coexist in the aircraft.
 VER-20: The ACCS shall compare whether all LAS
have the same SI.
 VER-21: The ACCS shall notify the ADS if the
LAS has different SI.
 VER-22: The MCP shall contain instructions to ver-
ify that all LAS have the same SI.
 VER-23: The ADS shall provide a message inform-
ing that different versions of the software exist.
Figure 5 presents the flowchart allowing the identifica-
tion of the types of requirements applicable for each LAS,
according to loading, checking, redundancy, and inter-
changeability characteristics. The F-LAS framework con-
tains a useful flowchart to select which requirements, by
type, apply to a new LAS project.
TEST PROCEDURES
Based on the results specified in Surveys 1 and 2, we iden-
tified the following three threats.
 Threat 1: Improper configuration—the aircraft oper-
ates with nonvalid software for its configuration, as
a result of a loading identity error.
43
A Framework for Loadable Airborne Systems
Figure 6.
Test Procedures 1 and 2.
 Threat 2: Incomplete loading—the aircraft operates
with nonfunctional software or with restricted func-
tionalities, as a result of a loading integrity error.
 Threat 3: Malfunction with version conflict—the
aircraft operates with conflicting configurations of
software coexisting.
The Test Procedures must exercise the Requirements
identified in this work. The F-LAS contains six Test Pro-
cedures, divided into three scenarios. The scenarios are
normal software loading, incomplete software loading,
and conflict of different software versions. For each sce-
nario, we have two possibilities: manual (with MCP) or
automated check (with ACCS).
Figure 6 presents Test Procedures 1 and 2 involving
the scenario of normal software loading with a manual
check (TP1) or automatic check (TP2). Test Procedures 1
and 2 guarantee that the loading of an NSV inside of the
LAS is correct and complete. TP1 starts with the NSV
available (Initial State). The connection of the LC and LI
allows the transfer of the NSV to the LAS (Step 1). After
the complete software loading (Step 2), the tester records
the SI of the NSV in the LB (Step 3a). Finally, the tester
checks if the SI of the NSV and the CRC match with the
Figure 7.
Test Procedures 3 and 4.
44 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
MPC (Step 4a). For the TP2, Steps 1, 2, and 3 are the
same as presented in TP1. The ACCS identifies that the SI
and the CRC loaded are the expected (Step 3b). ADS dis-
plays a loading confirmation message (Step 4b). In the
end, the LAS will be loaded with the NSV (Final State).
Figure 7 presents Test Procedures 3 and 4 involving
the scenario of incomplete software loading with the man-
ual check (TP3) or automatic check (TP4). For TP3 and
TP4, the Initial State and Step 1 are the same as presented
in TP1 and TP2. Before the complete software loading,
the tester abruptly turns OFF the LAS (Step 2). The aviation
maintenance technician checks and confirms the CRC
does not match with the MPC (Step 3a). For TP4, the
ACCS identifies that CRC is different than expected, due
to incomplete software loading (Step 3b). The ADS dis-
plays a loading error message (Step 4). In the end, the
LAS will not be loaded with the NSV (Final State).
Figure 8 presents Test Procedures 5 and 6 involving
the verification of different software versions in the
units of the LAS. In this hypothetical procedure pre-
sented in Figure 8, one of the three units contains the
NSV. The TP5 and TP6 start with the NSV available
(Initial State). The connection of the LC and the LI
allows the transfer of the NSV to the LAS 1 (Step 1).
MAY 2021
 Marques et al.

Figure 8.
Test Procedures 5 and 6.

After the complete software loading (Step 2), the tester
reboots the aircraft (Step 3). The tester checks that the
LAS units have different software versions (Step 4a).
For the TP6, The ACCS identifies a mismatch of the SI
and the CRC among units (Step 4b). The ADS informs
the existence of different software versions (Step 5). In
the end, all the LAS units do not have the same software
versions (Final State).
Test Procedures 1–6 cover all the 23 Requirements
identified in the F-LAS framework. Table 1 contains the
traceability between Requirements and Test Procedures.
The verification of some Requirements in multiple Test
Procedure is notable.

Table 1.

Traceability between Requirements and Test ANALYSIS

Procedures
SAFETY AND SECURITY
Test Scenario Requirements Avoiding the identified threats identified, we defined asso-
Procedures ciated assurances. These threats may provide critical
impacts on the operation of the aircraft, affecting the
TP1 Normal software BLR-1 to BLR- safety of the occupants and crew. We can identify the cor-
loading with 5, MCR-6 to
relation of threats and associated assurances, as presented
manual check MCR-9
in Table 2.
TP2 Normal software BLR-1 to BLR- Threats 1 and 2 identified in Table 2 appear as adverse
loading with 5, ACR-10, 11,
effects on security due to human action (intentional or
automatic check 14, 15, 18, 19
unintentional) using access, use, disclosure, denial,
TP3 Incomplete MCR-7 to
software loading MCR-9
with manual Table 2.
check
TP4 Incomplete ACR-12, 13, Threats and associated assurance
software loading 16, 17
with automatic Threat Description Associated
check Assurance
TP5 Different VER-22
software 1 Improper Use of MCP or ACCS.
versions with configuration
manual check 2 Incomplete Use of CRC.
TP6 Different VER-20, 21, 23 loading
software 3 Malfunction Check that the LAS
versions with with version units have same
automatic check conflict software versions.

MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE 45

A Framework for Loadable Airborne Systems
interruption, modification, or destruction of data and/or
data interfaces. It includes the consequences of damage
done, false data, and possible access by other systems out-
side the aircraft systems. According to RTCA DO-326A
[20], the intended or unintended use of information sys-
tems available on the aircraft will impact the airworthiness
of future aircraft, such as the potential software update
error. When external data is transmitted to the aircraft
from the external connections, this can add new opportuni-
ties for the introduction of false or modified data in the
security perimeter.
DEVELOPMENT STANDARDS
We believe that our framework will help to define
parts of the systems architecture, as required by SAE
ARP 4754A, identifying the needs of the system so
that it becomes possible to load new versions of soft-
ware in the field. From the requirements presented and
the characteristic of the system design, it will be possi-
ble to refine them to more detailed requirements of
systems and software.
At the software level, our framework seems to be
suitable for directing the software project to meet the
RTCA DO-178C, especially in section 2.5 of this stan-
dard, which deals with the FLS capacity. Our frame-
work provides specific requirements that address
integrity and identity.
CONCLUSION
This work presented a new framework for airborne sys-
tems, allowing the FLS capability. This framework con-
tains a set of Requirements and Tests Procedures to ensure
that software loading will be properly specified and veri-
fied, including the threats involving information security.
This work deepens, illustrates, and details the need pre-
sented in DO-326A [20].
Surveys 1 and 2 identified ten findings. Survey 1
has confirmed that an F-LAS is useful for systems
developers (Finding 5). Our Survey 1 identified that
60% of systems developers do not specify the require-
ments for software loading during an LAS project
(Finding 6). Survey 2 confirms the interchangeability
problems are more frequent (Finding 10), but the other
threats are also observable, although with less fre-
quency (Findings 9 and 10).
“Framework for Loadable Airborne Systems (F-
LAS)” presented the F-LAS framework, which included a
definition of Actors, Requirements, and Test Procedures.
Although RTCA DO-178C[6], ARINC 666 [26], and
ARINC 667-2[27] provide important content about the
FLS, these documents do not define a reusable framework.
Our framework also specifies robustness conditions for
46 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
testing the inappropriate loading and conflict of software
versions.
Although the F-LAS framework was presented to the
professionals who kindly answered our surveys, we plan
to conduct a Survey 3 with the respondents of Surveys 1
and 2. This is the first future work that will formally cap-
ture their feedback.
As the second future work, we will explore the use of a
digital certificate signing scheme that could be an optional
verification method instead of using CRC. An extension
of the surveys carried out and synthesized in “Surveys” is
also planned.
As the third future work, we assume that when a soft-
ware version is made available for installation, the supplier
has already made a compatibility analysis between the soft-
ware and other components that coexist in the same system.
However, this analysis is of paramount importance and is a
good future extension for our framework.
A fourth future work is a validation of the framework
with ARINC working groups that defined standards
ARINC 666 [26] and ARINC 667-2 [27]. We can conduct
specific surveys with the participants of such working
groups and identify their feedback on our framework.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The authors would like to thank: the Instituto Tecnologico
de Aeronautica (Aeronautics Institute of Technology) for
the support provided in this research; the 20 systems
developers that answered Survey 1; and the 12 aviation
maintenance technicians that answered Survey 2.
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47
Feature Article:
Research on Abnormal Output Current Drop of Solar
Array of a Low Earth Orbit Satellite
Shuhua Bai, Nanchang Institute of Technology, Nanchang 330044, China
Wenyan Wang , Nanchang Institute of Technology, Nanchang 330044,
China; and also China Academy of Space Technology, Beijing 100094, China
Zhilong Chen and Weiguo Yao, Nanchang Institute of Technology, Nanchang
330044, China
INTRODUCTION
Solar arrays (SAs) have always been the main energy
source for spacecraft applications. Since the SA is directly
exposed to space environment in prolonged missions, it is
unavoidably affected by the space environment. Basic
factors of influence of the environment medium are as
follows [1]: ionizing radiation, solar ultraviolet (UV)
emission, thermal cycling, radiation electrization, plasma
jets of electric propulsion engines of spacecraft, contami-
nation of protective glasses by the products of functioning
of operated systems and products of destruction, sublima-
tion, and gassing of materials and coatings of spacecraft’s
external surfaces, micrometeoroids, space debris or dust,
atomic oxygen (AO) in low Earth orbit (LEO). Some typi-
cal on-orbit failures related to SAs have occurred from
time to time. For example, from 1997 to 2002, two com-
mercial satellites experienced 32 sustained SA arcing [2]
and, on March 12, 2010, two anomalies which were also
caused by a sustained arc on the SA backside occurred
simultaneously on NASA’s Aura spacecraft [3]. Since
April 18, 2000 and September 6, 1999, the SESAT and
the YAMAL commercial telecommunication spacecrafts,
respectively, experienced the radiation induced degrada-
tion of SAs caused by solar proton flares [4]. The SAs
Authors’ current address: Shuhua Bai, Zhilong Chen, and
Weiguo Yao, Nanchang Institute of Technology, Nan-
chang 330044, China (e-mail: 281440743@qq.com;
2608929454@qq.com; weiguoyao@foxmail.com). Wenyan
Wang, Nanchang Institute of Technology, Nanchang
330044, China, and also China Academy of Space Tech-
nology, Beijing 100094, China (e-mail: wangwy09@gmail.
com).
Manuscript received October 14, 2020; accepted
November 26, 2020, and ready for publication
December 4, 2020.
Review handled by Scott Bawden.
0885-8985/21/$26.00 ß 2021 IEEE
48 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
DOI. No. 10.1109/MAES.2020.3043137
returned to the Earth from the Hubble Space Telescope
were found to have been impacted probably by dust flu-
ence during the cometary encounters and the nonlinearity
and magnitude of its degradation are consistent with open-
circuit failure of solar cell strings, possibly by impacts on
or near cell interconnects [5].
In order to reduce the probability of on-orbit failure of
SAs, significant research on the on-orbit reliabilities of
SAs have been carried out. Richardson et al. quantitatively
analyzed the SA gradation due to meteoroid impacts on
the SA front and rear surface [6]. Shuvalov et al. derived
calculation and experimental relations characterizing the
reduction in the electric power of SAs under prolonged
(
10 years) action of the environment on orbit, consider-
ing the space comprehensive environment factors [1].
Toyoda et al. conducted a degradation test study on high-
voltage SAs against electrostatic discharge under a simu-
lated LEO environment [7]. In order to prevent solar cell
arcing into the plasma due to spacecraft charging,
Ferguson’s team carried out research on solar cell edge,
interconnect, and cover glass designs and their effect on
spacecraft charging and plasma interactions [8]. In addi-
tion to some ground tests for studying the SA performan-
ces, some space flight experiments were also carried out.
In 1977, the first space-based GaAs SA was tested on-
board the Navigation Technology Satellite 2 (NTS-2) and
already achieved conversion efficiencies of around 22%
[9]. In the 1980s, NRL flew the “Living with a Plume
Shield” (LiPS III) program for conducting further technol-
ogy demonstrations on newly developed solar cell [10].
For evaluating the performance of several multi-junction
solar cells, a test module was incorporated into the
MISSE-5 (Materials International Space Station Experi-
ment 5) which was deployed on the exterior of the Interna-
tional Space Station (ISS) [11]. As part of the TacSat Solar
Cell Experiment, ultra-thin (100 mm) GaInP/GaInAs/Ge
triple-junction solar cells, as well as a stretched lens
concentrator solar cell module, were integrated on
MAY 2021

the Tactical Satellite-4 mission for on-orbit tests [12].
With the help of the Mir Space Station, the solar cells
were found to suffer severe damage to their structure and
interconnect due to hot-spotting processes caused by
the effect of shadowing from structural members of the
spacecraft [13]. Those space experiments are mainly for
the performance of the solar cell itself affected by the
space environment.
In addition, with demand for increased orbital life and
with more severe temperature extremes due to various
space missions, the importance of solar cell interconnector
reliability has become more emphasized and the effect of
thermal or mechanical fatigue of the solar cell interconnect
structure on the SA performance is a subject that has
received extensive attention in the context of aerospace
applications. As early as 1969, Luft et al. [14] investigated
the temperature cycling effects on solar panels and found
that the most common failure mode was the separation of
interconnections at the cell interface. Some investigations
also showed that both contact and fatigue problems are
associated with solar cell interconnects and fatigue of solar
cell interconnectors is one of the key failure modes for
SAs [15], [16]. Luft [17] also studied the design of solar
cell interconnectors through fatigue tests under extended
temperature cycling and thought that the most desirable
interconnector for each specific case must be specially
considered on all pertinent factors including electrical out-
put, space environment, and reliability. Evans et al. [18]
and Kosseim [19] respectively investigated the experimen-
tal methods of the fatigue characteristics of interconnectors
for different applications. The mechanism of the fatigue
behavior of the solar cell interconnector was analyzed by
Wiese et al. [20] and a correlation with the relevant micro-
structures of crack growth was given. Meier et al. [21]
described methods for an estimation of interconnector life-
time and gave an enhancement method of this lifetime by
microstructural optimization. As the fabrication of space
SAs is a very critical process to ensure the quality and reli-
ability of SAs and serious power losses can result from SA
rework being done improperly [22], the ECSS-E-ST-20-
MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
Credit: Image licensed by Ingram Publishing
08C standard [23], section 5.5.3.2.10 specifies the quality
inspection content of interconnectors. In summary, fatigue
of the cell interconnectors is one of the main reasons for
SA failure, especially with respect to SA application in
extreme environment.
However, there are few reports related to on-orbit fail-
ure caused by the fatigue of solar cell interconnectors due
to the difficulty of on-orbit failure analysis because the
occurrence of on-orbit fatigue is a gradual process. This
article investigated the output current abnormal drop of a
LEO satellite SA caused by the fatigue of solar cell
interconnectors. First, the abnormal phenomenon was
described in detail. Second, all possible failure causes
were analyzed and the most likely reason was determined.
Then, the failure mechanisms were explained and verified
by experiments. Finally, the solution to slow down the
output current drop on the satellite on orbit was given and
the improvement measures for the development of SAs
were proposed.
ABNORMAL CURRENT IN SA OF A LEO SATELLITE
The Technology Test Satellite No. 5 (TTS-5) developed
by the China Academy of Space Technology was
launched at 10:35:12 on December 22, 2017. It is a sun-
synchronous orbit satellite with an average altitude of
560 Km. It was found that the output current of TTS-5 SA
circuits was reduced from 26.8 A
28.2 A in May 2018
to 23.6 A
25.3 A in May 2019 by telemetry. The SA of
TTS-5 consists of four subsolar arrays (SSAs). In order to
evaluate the power generation capacity of each SSA and
the health status of the SA circuit, the output current test
of each SSA is carried out to locate the health status of
each SSA on May 31, 2019 by sending remote control
commands to disconnect each SSA in turn. The test result
is shown in Table 1, where it can be seen that the current
loss is 1 A, 0.5 A, and 1.5 A in the SSA-1, SSA-2, and
SSA-3, respectively, and the SSA-4 is normal. Each
SSA consists of 13 strings of solar cells in parallel,
49
Research on Abnormal Output Current Drop of Solar Array of a Low Earth Orbit Satellite
Table 1.
Test Result of the Power Generation Capacity for Each
SSA of the TTS-5
Item The output current of each SSA (A)
SSA-1 SSA-2 SSA-3 SSA-4
Design 6.5 6.5 6.5 6.5
Value
Test Value 5.5(-1) 6.0(-0.5) 5.0(-1.5) 6.5(0)
Note: The value in parentheses in Test Value indicates a reduced
value compared to Design Value.
and the power generation capacity of each string is
about 0.5 A under normal conditions. As the SA con-
sists of four SSAs, the total output current of the SA
circuit is about 26 A due to 52 strings of solar cells in
parallel. The reduction of the SSA current is in units
of a string of current (about 0.5 A), which can occur
in any one of the four SSAs.
By querying the on-orbit telemetry data of the SA cir-
cuit, we can find the time and phenomenon of each output
current drop. The first drop in the output current of the SA
circuit occurred at 22:19–23:14 on June 15, 2018. The out-
put current fluctuates several times in the stable stage, and
the fluctuation range is between 26.066 and 26.592 A,
namely 0.526 A, as shown in Figure 1 (NO.1). Based on
the output current of 0.511 A (26.592 A/52 parallel) of a
single SSA at the stable stage on June 15, the output cur-
rent of one SSA was loss.
The second drop in the output current occurred
between September 17, 2018 and September 18, 2018, as
shown in Figure 1 (NO.2). The output current at the stable
stage from 21:16 to 21:50 on September 17 is about
26.658 A compared with about 26.132 A at 11:30–12:03
on September 18, which is reduced by 0.526 A with being
about the output current of one string of solar cell as being
calculated by 26.658 A/51 parallel ¼ 0.523 A.
The third output current drop occurred between
November 5, 2018 and November 6, 2018, as shown in
Figure 1 (NO.3). The telemetry data showed that the output
current was 26.691–26.954 A during the last orbit period
on November 5 and 26.164–26.526 A at the 9:43–10:35
orbit period on November 6. The output current difference
between the two adjacent days is 0.527 A, which is also
about the output current of one string (26.691 A/50 parallel
¼ 0.534 A). After 10 days, the output current in the stable
stage returned to about 27 A again.
The fourth output current drop occurred at 8:42–14:21
on December 20, 2018, as shown in Figure 1 (NO.4). The
output current dropped from 27.448 to 26.362 A with a
drop amplitude of 1.086 A, which is about the output cur-
rent of 2 strings (27.448 A/50 parallel ¼ 0.549 A).
50 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
Figure 1.
SA circuit output current drops for six times.
The fifth output current drop occurred on January 3,
2019. About one string of the output current was loss and
the current fluctuates repeatedly in the same orbital period,
as shown in Figure 1 (NO.5).
The sixth output current drop occurred on February
17, 2019 as shown in Figure 1 (NO.6). As the season
changes from winter to summer, the output current in the
stable stage gradually decreases. However, the output cur-
rent dropped from 25.243 to 24.717 A between February
17 to February 18, 2018, the difference of which is 0.526
A nearly equivalent to the output current of a string of
solar cells. In the subsequent orbital period, the drop was
restored to the previous stable value of output current and
repeated many times. In addition, It can be found that the
output current increased from 24.717 to 26 A between
21:30 and 22:30 on February 18, 2019. The increase value
of 1.283 A is about the output current of two strings of
solar cells. In other words, two strings of solar cells are
restored to work at the same time.
The above six drops of the output current of the SA
can be summarized in Table 2. The first drop of the current
occurs about half a year after the TTS-5 enters orbit. There
is no current drop during the on-orbit test because of on-
orbit test for the first month when being launched for the
TTS-5. The minimum unit of current drop is about 0.5 A
(one string of solar cells), and there are cases where multi-
ple strings of output current are loss at the same time. Fur-
thermore, the drop output current can be recovered within
a certain period of time and multiple strings of output cur-
rent can also be recovered simultaneously.
MAY 2021
 Bai et al.

Table 2.

Output Current Changes for the SA of the TTS-5 During the Period of a Year and a Half
No. Time of Steady Steady String number change Estimated single string
occurrence current current (bar) current(A)
before falling after falling
(A) (A)

1 2018-06-15 26.592 26.066 52!51 0.511

With seasonal changes, the steady current gradually rises from 26.066 to 26.658 A
2 2018-09-17 26.658 26.132 51!50 0.523
With the season changes, the steady current gradually rises from 26.132 to 26.691 A
3 2018-11-5 26.691 26.164 50!49 0.534
With seasonal changes and the third drop recovery, the steady current gradually rises from 26.164 to 27.448 A
4 2018-12-20 27.448 26.362 50!48 0.549
5 2019-01-03 25.770 25.210 48!47 0.537
6 2019-02-17 25.243 24.717 47!46 0.537

FAILURE CAUSE ANALYSIS ANALYSIS AND DETERMINATION OF FAILURE CAUSES

Through the analysis of the SA circuit on-orbit failure
STRUCTURE OF TTS-5 SA CIRCUIT phenomenon and the re-examination of the SA
manufacturing process, the components and materials
TTS-5 SA adopts a double-wing design and each wing has
used in the power circuit, the manual operation process
two panels, and each panel is equipped with one SSA, as
and the ground test result, the possible failure causes are
shown in Figure 2. The þX wing inner panel, þX wing
listed as shown in Table 3, including 3 classifications of
outer panel, -X wing inner panel, and -X wing outer panel
15 possible failure causes. The possible failures for the
are indicated with the SSA-1, SSA-2, SSA-3, and SSA-4,
three categories in the table are analyzed as follows.
respectively. The design uses high-efficiency gallium arse-
nide triple junction solar cells with a size of 80.0 mm 
40.0 mm. SA CIRCUIT SHORT
The single-wing SA circuit is composed of two Since the solar cell strings in each panel are output in par-
SSAs with the same design. Its power output is fed into allel to the on-panel and interpanel power connector and
the satellite body by a terminal power connector which
is connected to on-panel connector through interpanel
cables. The schematic diagram of single-wing SA circuit
connection is shown in Figure 3. The SSA consists of
13 strings of solar cells in parallel and each string is
formed by 30–34 solar cells in series. Each string of
solar cells is connected in series with one isolation
diode. The physical photo of each single-panel SA is
shown in Figure 4, including the front and back pictures.
From Figure 4(a), we can see that each SSA is
composed of 424 solar cells.

Figure 2. Figure 3.
TTS-5 SA layout. Schematic diagram of single-wing SA circuit connection.

MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE 51

Research on Abnormal Output Current Drop of Solar Array of a Low Earth Orbit Satellite

sealed with insulating silicone rubber. Through rechecking

Figure 4.
Physical photo of the single-panel SA: (a) front view and
(b) back view.
then output to the terminal power connector, the effect of
the short-circuit of these connector contact points on the
output current of the SA will be circuit level, that is, at
least about 6.5 A of output current is loss, which is not
consistent with the failure phenomenon. Therefore, F1-1
and F1-2 can be excluded.
In order to reduce the residual magnetic moment, the
positive and negative poles of the solar cell string are adja-
cent to each other in the front side of the SA circuit. Their
interconnectors are pasted on the substrate with silicone
rubber. After the test is completed, its surface is coated
with three-proof paint for protection and its periphery is
the front physical photo of the SA circuit before launch, it
can be found that the distance between the positive inter-
connector and the negative interconnector is not less than
2 mm, which is larger than the parallel gap of the SA.
Therefore, solar cell positive and negative interconnector
is short-circuited impossibly and F1-3 can be excluded.
As a string of solar cells consists of 30 to 34 solar
cells, the effect of the short-circuit of one single solar cell
on the output current is generally no more than 5% of the
output current of the string, which contradicts the failure
phenomenon. Therefore, F1-4 cannot happen.
In order to prevent the output current of the SA from
leaking through the cable, the cable is covered with a pol-
yimide film for secondary insulation protection at the
cable rack position and the edge of the substrate. Through
rechecking the manufacturing process data before launch,
it was found that the insulation resistance of the SA circuit
and the substrate at each manufacturing process was not
less than 200 MV, which met the design requirements of
not less than 100 MV. Therefore, there is no possibility of
a short-circuit between the solar cell circuit and the sub-
strate (F1-5).
OUTPUT CURRENT DROP DUE TO EXTERNAL FACTORS
The electrical performance of the solar cells can degrade
when the SA is affected by the radiation of space charged
particles. According to the ground test results, the output

Table 3.

List of Possible Failure Causes

Failure classification Possible failure cause

F1: SA circuit short F1-1: Terminal power connector contact point is short-
circuited
F1-2: Inner-panel or interpanel connector contact point is
short-circuited
F1-3: Solar cell positive and negative interconnector is short-
circuited
F1-4: Solar cell is short-circuited
F1-5: SA circuit and substrate is short-circuited
F2: Output current drop due to external F2-1: Solar cell performance degradation
factors F2-2: Solar cell is damaged due to electrostatic discharge
F2-3: Solar cell is impacted by micrometeoroids or space
debris
F2-4: Solar wing fails to orient to the sun after movement
F2-5: SA circuit current telemetry is abnormal
F3: SA circuit open F3-1: Power connector solder joint is open
F3-2: Inner-panel or interpanel power connector is
disconnected
F3-3: Isolate diode body or its solder joint is open
F3-4: Solar cell interconnector is open
F3-5: Solar cell is fractured and open

52 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE MAY 2021


current degradation of the SA for 18 months is expected to
be around 0.3 A in the orbital space environment of TTS-
5, which is much smaller than the actual current drop.
Moreover, the on-orbit output current drop caused by the
irradiation of charged particles is a slow changing process,
which is not consistent with the failure phenomenon.
Therefore, F2-1 can be excluded.
When the potential difference between the SA strings
is higher than the threshold voltage, the secondary dis-
charge is easy to occur between the adjacent two SA
strings. The parallel gap of the TTS-5 SA is increased to 2
mm to prevent secondary discharge. It has been verified
by the ground test that when the parallel gap is 1.7 mm,
the threshold voltage of secondary discharge is 145 V.
However, the maximum potential difference between the
adjacent strings is 81 V, which is much lower than the
threshold voltage of secondary discharge. There is no pos-
sibility of damage for solar cell due to electrostatic dis-
charge (F2-2).
The impact of space micrometeoroids and space debris
on the performance of SAs has received widespread atten-
tion [6]. If the TTS-5 solar wing is impacted by microme-
teoroids or space debris on orbit, the output performance
of the solar cell will be affected to varying degrees
depending on the size of the space micrometeoroid or
debris. When the size is appropriate, it will cause solar
cell string damage to the output current of SA. However,
there is a phenomenon that the solar cell strings on differ-
ent panels are open at the same time. Therefore, the proba-
bility of different parts of the SA circuit being hit by
micrometeoroids or space debris at the same time is
extremely small and F2-3 can be excluded.
As one of the TTS-5 tasks is to image the ground tar-
gets, the SA will carry out directional operations to the
sun when necessary. If the solar wing fails to orient to the
sun, the output current of the two SSAs of the same wing
will drop by roughly the same magnitude. However, the
telemetry data show that the X wing inner panel has a cur-
rent drop but the outer panel does not, which does not
coincide with the failure phenomenon and F2-4 cannot
happen.
The telemetry of the output current of the SA circuit is
carried out by the power controller, which communicates
with the satellite mission management unit via the CAN
bus. By telemetry in January 2018, the TTS-5 SA circuit
current is 28 A, its load current is 9.7 A and the charging
current is about 17.9 A. Three different current telemetry
values meet the equation of “SA Circuit Current - Load
Current  Charging Current.” Similarly in June 2019, the
TTS-5 SA circuit current is 23 A, its load current is 8.8A,
and the charging current is about 14 A. They also meet the
equation of “SA Circuit Current - Load Current  Charg-
ing Current.” Since the SA circuit current and charging
current use independent current sensors and sampling cir-
cuits, and the relationship between the two has always
MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
Bai et al.
Figure 5.
(a) Schematic diagram of interconnect and (b) cross-sectional
schematic diagram of silver interconnector indicated by the four
circles in (a).
been matched in the one and a half years since launch, it
can rule out the possibility of abnormal current telemetry
of the SA circuit (F2-5).
SA CIRCUIT OPEN
Similar to the above analysis that excludes F1-1 and
F2-1, the effect of the open-circuit of power connector
solder joints and the disconnection of inner-panel or
interpanel power connectors on the output current of
the SA will also be circuit level, that is, at least about
6.5 A of output current is loss, which is not consistent
with the failure phenomenon. Therefore, F3-1 and F3-2
can be excluded.
The isolation diodes used in TTS-5 SSA have been
used in dozens of similar satellites and have rich flight
experience. They are all used in accordance with MIL-
STD-975M [24], Appendix A. By reviewing the prelaunch
process assembly data and physical photos, the probability
of open-circuits caused by some diodes in multiple SSAs
or multiple strings of SAs is very small. Therefore, the
open-circuit fault of the body or solder joint of these
diodes (F3-3) can be completely excluded.
The adjacent two solar cell of the TTS-5 SA is con-
nected by four interconnectors with being soldered and
each interconnector has three or four solder pins, as being
shown in Figure 5(a). The connector is made of pure silver
with a design thickness of 20 mm. The cross-section of the
interconnector is shown in Figure 5(b). The replacement
of solar cells during the production process may cause
damage to the interconnector. Hence, a re-examination
was carried out for the replacement process of solar cell.
The results of the re-examination are shown in Table 4.
From the table, we can see that there exists some continu-
ous replacement cases of adjacent solar cells in different
time during the SA circuit manufacturing process and the
open circuit string number of a certain panel on orbit has a
certain corresponding relationship with the continuous
replacement number of adjacent solar cells. The panel
without continuous replacement of adjacent solar cells
was not found to have an open-circuit string on orbit.
Through the analysis of the solar cells replacement pro-
cesses (see section “Damage Mechanism of the Intercon-
nector During Solar Cell Replacement Process” for
53
Research on Abnormal Output Current Drop of Solar Array of a Low Earth Orbit Satellite
Table 4.
Re-examination for Replacing Solar Cells
Substrate Replacing Continuous replacement
number number of adjacent solar
cells in different time (2)
þX inner panel 12
þX outer panel 10
-X inner panel 29
-X outer panel 14
details), it is found that the stress relief loop of the inter-
connector is bent during the solar cell replacement pro-
cess. If the adjacent solar cells in a certain string of solar
cell are replaced twice or more times, the stress relief loop
of the solar cell interconnector will be bent multiple times
and be probably damaged potentially. In addition, the
TTS-5 experienced a severe environment of the LEO AO
when being launched and then entered the work orbit with
AO environment [25]. The silver interconnector is suscep-
tible to erosion in the AO environment, resulting in a fur-
ther decline in the fatigue resistance of the interconnector.
The damaged interconnector may gradually be broken
under stresses such as high-low alternating temperature.
Therefore, it cannot be ruled out that the solar cell inter-
connector is open (F3-4).
Each solar cell of the TTS-5 is connected in parallel
with a bypass diode. When a certain solar cell is dam-
aged and its output current is much smaller than that of
the solar cells in the same string, the bypass diode con-
nected in parallel with the solar cell will turn ON. The
output current of the string in which the damaged solar
cell is located will only drop slightly, as is not consis-
tent with the failure phenomenon. In addition, after the
solar cell body is completely broken, it cannot be con-
nected and its output current cannot be restored, which
is also inconsistent with the failure phenomenon. There-
fore, it can be excluded that the solar cell is fractured
and open (F3-5).
DETERMINATION OF FAILURE CAUSES
According to the above analysis, the most likely reason
which causes the output current drop of the SA circuit on
orbit is the solar cell string open due to the solar cell inter-
connector open-circuit. In the process of the solar cell
replacement, the stress relief loop of the cell interconnec-
tor was bent and damaged many times during the second-
ary replacement of adjacent solar cell due to unskilled
operations, causing microcracks which reduced the fatigue
resistance of the interconnector. Along with the
54 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
Open-circuit Fragmentation
string number rate
on orbit
2 2 2.83%
2 1 2.36%
5 3 6.84%
0 0 3.30%
denudation and corrosion of AO and the actions of other
stresses such as high-low alternating temperature, it gradu-
ally breaks and causes the solar cell interconnector to be
open-circuited.
FAILURE MECHANISM
DAMAGE MECHANISM OF THE INTERCONNECTOR
DURING SOLAR CELL REPLACEMENT PROCESS
The solar cell replacement process is shown in Figure 6
and the solar cell to be replaced is the B cell between the
A and C solar cell as shown in Figure 6(a). When replac-
ing, use a blade to cut off the silver interconnector 1#
between the A and B cells, slowly tilt it from the left side
of the B cell to expose the part where the back of the B
cell are connected with the C cell interconnector, and cut
off the soldering area and remove the B cell. In this pro-
cess, the interconnector 3# of the C cell will be bent for
the first time, as shown in Figure 6(b). Then, slowly tilt up
from the right side of the A cell, remove the residual adhe-
sive and silver interconnector on the bottom and put it
back in place. During this process, the interconnector 1#
of the A cell will be bent for the first time, as shown in
Figure 6(c). Put the replacing D cell into the position of
the B cell, use a tape to fix the front of the A and D cell so
that they do not move relative position, turn up the A and
D cells, solder the interconnector on the back of the solar
cell, and then paint the NQ-704 silicone rubber on the
back of the A cell. During the process, the interconnector
1# of the A cell will be bent for the second time, as shown
in Figure 6(d). Put down the A cell and paste it on the sub-
strate and temporarily fix it with tape, solder the silver foil
of the D cell to the interconnector 3# of the C cell, and
then coat the back of the D cell with the NQ-704 silicone
rubber. Finally, put down the D cell and paste it on the
substrate. In this process, the interconnector of the D cell
will be bent once, as shown in Figure 6(e).
MAY 2021

Figure 6.
Flowchart of the solar cell replacement.
The above process is a normal one-time solar cell
replacement, which will cause 1 to 2 bends to the intercon-
nector. This bending will not cause damage to the fatigue
resistance of the interconnector. Subsequently, if the adja-
cent cell is to be replaced due to the occurrence of frag-
mentation into many pieces, the removal of the NQ-704
silicone rubber coated on the back of the replaced cell is
more difficult than the conventional two-component film
adhesive and will cause the interconnector to be bent
many times. Therefore, the multiple replacements of the
adjacent solar cell will increase the number of bending of
the interconnector. The bending part is the stress relief
loop of the interconnector as shown in Figure 7. As silver
is a face-centered cubic crystal with 12 slip systems, the
silver material in the bending zone will enter plastic defor-
mation under the action of mechanical stress and cause a
certain degree of microstructure multisystem slip when
the bending angle is large. As the number of bending
increases, the multisystem slip and cross-slip of the micro-
structure will further intensify. When it intensifies to a cer-
tain extent, the entanglement of these slip dislocations
causes the crystal grains to elongate and break and micro-
cracks are generated in local areas of the silver matrix.
EROSION MECHANISM OF AO ON THE
INTERCONNECTOR
As we all know, in the LEO 200 to 700 km away from the
Earth’s surface, AO is the most abundant residual gas par-
ticle, accounting for more than 90% of neutral gas [26].
From the summary of data obtained from space flight
MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
Bai et al.
experiments shown quantitatively in [27, Table 2-1], it
can be seen that silver has the worst resistance capacity to
AO erosion and its AO reaction efficiency is more than
4  10-24 cm3/atom.
The erosion of silver by AO is divided into two
stages: during the initial oxidation process, a layer of
Ag2O film is formed on the surface of the silver; the
second stage of the oxidation process is the formation
of AgO on the top of the oxide film. When the thick-
ness of the oxide film increases, a great growth stress
will be generated in the oxide film, leading to wrin-
kling, cracking, and peeling of the oxide film. Under
the action of OA, uneven corrosion pits will be formed
on the silver surface, which will easily cause stress
concentration and result in a reduction in the thickness
of the silver body.
We can obtain the AO reaction efficiency, that is, the
erosion yield, which is 10.5  10-24 cm3/atom, and
the average front AO flux of 7.39  1011 atoms/cm2s or
the front AO fluence of 3.496  1019 atoms/cm2 for
1.5 years from the ESA’s SPace ENVironment Informa-
tion System (SPENVIS) website [28] with the orbital
parameters of the TTS-5. The front erosion depth for silver
surface can be calculated to be 3.67  10-4 cm, that is,
3.67 mm for a year and a half.
FRACTURE AND OPEN-CIRCUIT MECHANISM OF THE
INTERCONNECTOR
After the silver interconnectors are eroded by AO, the
surface evolves into uneven corrosion pits to form
stress concentration areas and the interconnector
strength decreases. Under the action of the alternating
stress of the space environment temperature, these
weak areas (high-concentration stress areas) are the first
to initiate fatigue microcracks. These microcracks
steadily grow under the action of temperature stress
and other external stresses, and finally cause fatigue
fracture and open-circuit of the silver interconnector.
The schematic diagram of microcrack growth under
alternating temperature stress and other external
stresses is shown in Figure 8.
Figure 7.
Schematic diagram of stress relief loop being bent.
55
Research on Abnormal Output Current Drop of Solar Array of a Low Earth Orbit Satellite
Figure 8.
Schematic diagram of microcrack growth under alternating tem-
perature stress and other external stresses.
Figure 9.
Flowchart of the experiment.
EXPERIMENTS AND RESULTS
In order to verify the above failure mechanism analysis,
we designed an experimental flow as shown in Figure 9.
On the ground, we simulated the impact of the solar cell
replacement process on the silver interconnector. Then,
the bent samples were subjected to the AO test and the
fatigue resistance test to check whether their capacity of
the fatigue resistance was reduced.
From the qualified lots of silver interconnectors with
the same specifications as the TTS-5, we randomly
selected eight samples to divide into two groups for bend-
ing test. Each group had four samples, respectively, for
once solar cell replacement use which are numbered 1#,
2#, 3#, and 4# and for secondary replacement use of the
adjacent solar cells which are numbered 5#, 6#, 7#, and
8#. After bending test, both groups of samples were
observed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). For the
samples for once solar cell replacement use, no cracks
were observed. However, the samples for secondary
replacement use of the adjacent solar cells appeared
microcracks, as shown in Figure 10.
The AO test was carried out in a microwave source
AO simulation test device for the samples the serial num-
ber of which was 3#, 4#, 7#, and 8#. In the experiment,
the AO flux was 11015 atoms/cm2s (110%), and the
cumulative fluence reached up to 3.496  1019 atoms/
cm2, which simulates the cumulative flux of AO in an
Figure 10.
Microcrack SEM photograph of the silver interconnector sample
after secondary replacement of the adjacent solar cells.
56 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
orbit of about 560 km altitude for one and a half years.
The AO energy is from 5 to 8 eV. The sample appearance
before and after AO test is shown in Figure 11. From the
figure, it can be clearly seen that the surface of the sample
becomes gray-black and loses its brightness due to being
eroded by OA. The interconnectors were weighed after the
AO test and compared with the sample before the AO test,
and the thickness of the interconnectors were calculated to be
about 2 mm thinner than that of the sample before the AO
test. The result is basically consistent with the relative mass
loss of about 10% for the Ag film samples in [29] and is less
than the calculated result of 3.67 mm in the section ‘‘Erosion
Mechanism of AO on the Interconnector” because the silver
oxide was not completely peeled off from the sliver intercon-
nector body after being eroded.
For solar cell interconnector thermal fatigue test, the pre-
vious investigations have shown that the thermal cycling can
be replaced by a mechanical cycling in order to decrease the
test time [30], [31]. Hence, the stretching and compression
method was used to carry out fatigue test and a universal test-
ing machine (ElectroForce 3500 Mechanical Test Instru-
ment) was used during test. The stretching displacement of
the silver interconnector was set to 0.03 mm and the compres-
sion displacement was set to 0.04 mm. The test frequency
was set to 2 Hz. During the test, the number of stretching and
compression cycles was recorded when the interconnector
was broken. The test stopped when the number of the stretch
and compression cycles reached 75 000 times if no fracture
occurred. The test results were shown in Table 5.
According to the TTS-5 orbit altitude, the satellite
orbit period Tc can be calculated by
sffiffiffiffiffi
r3
Tc ¼ 2p c (1)
m
where rc is the distance between the satellite and the
center of the Earth, which is equal to R þ H. R is the
average radius of the Earth which is 6367 km and H is
the orbit altitude which is 560 km. m is the Kepler con-
stant which is 398603 km3 =s2 . From the (1), it can be
calculated that Tc is 5738.80 s and the number of high
and low temperature alternation cycles within 1.5 years
on orbit is 8242 times, which is roughly close to the num-
ber of fatigue test cycles of the 7# and 8# samples. The
Figure 11.
Sample appearance before (left) and after (right) AO test.
MAY 2021

Table 5.
Fatigue Test Results of Silver Interconnectors
Serial number 1# 2# 3#
Cell replacement Once
OA test No No Yes
Fatigue test cycles 75000 75000 75000
experiment results show that the output current drop of
the SA of the TTS-5 is due to the silver interconnector
facture, which is caused by two or more times replace-
ment of adjacent solar cells.
SOLUTION AND CONCLUSION
According to the above failure mechanism analysis and
experiment results, the temperature alternation on orbit
may further aggravate the fracture of the interconnector
and thereby reduce the output current of the SA of the
TTS-5. In order to slow down the speed of interconnec-
tor factures, the temperature gradient of the SA is
reduced by adjusting the on-orbit working state of the
SA oriented to the sun. Through the ground remote
control of the additional task program, the TTS-5
management execution unit automatically determines
the geographical latitude of the subsatellite point in real
time. When the satellite turns from the shadow area to
the sunlit area, the satellite attitude will switch from the
ground orientation mode to the sun orientation mode
187 s ahead of time to ensure that the orientation to the
sun has been completed before entering the sunlit area.
Similarly, when the satellite turns from the sunlit area
to a shadow area, the satellite attitude will switch to the
ground orientation mode in advance. And from
the TTS-5 on-orbit operation in the past few months,
the output current drop of the SA of TTS-5 is appar-
ently reduced and the mitigation solution is proved to
be effective, which also validates the analysis results
for the abnormal output current of SA of TTS-5.
From the above analysis and experimental verification,
the following conclusions can be drawn. The reason for the
drop in the on-orbit output current of the SA circuit is that
during the production process of the SA, the operators are
unskilled in replacing the adjacent large solar cells of
80.0mm40.0mm. When the adjacent solar cells are
replaced twice or more, the stress relief loop of the inter-
connector is bent and damaged many times to produce
microcracks, causing the fatigue resistance of the solar cell
to be reduced. During flight, the interconnector gradually
fractures under the action of alternating temperature and
other stresses together with the corrosion of AO, causing
MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
Bai et al.
4# 5# 6# 7# 8#
Two times
Yes No No Yes Yes
75000 12586 14013 7628 9241
the solar cell string to be open circuit. And eventually the
output current of the SA of the TTS-5 decreases. Based on
the conclusions, the improvement measures for the devel-
opment of SAs are proposed as follows: 1) Strengthen the
inspection of solar cell fragmentation before loading the
board, and use electroluminescence apparatus to defect
microcracks in order to eliminate early failure cells; 2) It is
prohibited to replace adjacent solar cell fragments twice or
more; and 3) Strictly control the replacement process of
adjacent solar cell fragments and strengthen the training of
replacement operators. And by adopting those measures,
subsequent satellites using similar SAs have no longer
experienced a drop in output current of SAs.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This work was supported by the National Natural Science
Foundation of China under Grant 61663033.
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China, 2017, pp. 1–5.
[26] T. Li, L. Jiang, L. Guo, X. Liu, W. Feng, and R. Zhai,
“The effects of atomic oxygen on space solar array,”
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Aug, 2010.
[27] E. M. Silverman, “Space environmental effects on space-
craft: LEO materials selection guide,” TRW Space Elec-
tron. Group, Redondo Beach, CA, USA, Tech. Rep.
NASA Contractor Report 4661, Part 1, Aug. 1995.
[28] SPace ENVironment Information System. (SPENVIS), ver.
4.6.10, Aug. 19, 2019. [Online]. Available: https://www.
spenvis.oma.be/
[29] Z. Shen, Z. Wang, X. Zhao, and H. Jin, “Experiment of
silver interconnects of photovoltaic solar array in IFM
ground-based AO effect simulation facility,” J. Beijing
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Dec. 2000.
[30] R. E. Neff, W. R. Baron, and H. E. Pollard, “Fatigue simu-
lation testing of solar cell interconnectors,” in Proc. Conf.
Rec. 18th IEEE Photovolt. Specialists Conf., Las Vegas,
NV, USA, 1985, pp. 629–633.
[31] H. W. Boller and J. Koch, “Accelerated fatigue tests of
solar cell interconnectors for simulation of thermal cycles,”
in Proc. 11th Conf. Rec. IEEE Photovolt. Specialists Conf.,
1975, pp. 153–161.
MAY 2021
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2021
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News & Information
..................................................
Three Special Sessions on Quantum Radar at IEEE Radar Conferences
..................................................
Fred Daum , Raytheon, Woburn, MA 01801, USA
Quantum radar is a hot topic for several reasons, espe-
cially because of the two recent experiments at X-band
reported in [2] and [3]. The second reason is the story that
microwave quantum radar was used in the real world by
Chinese to track aircraft and missiles at 100-km range [5].
The third reason is the assertion that microwave quantum
radar can defeat stealthy aircraft and missiles [5]. Such
claims have been published by highly respected peer-
reviewed archival journals, such as Popular Mechanics,
but most experts say that these assertions are highly dubi-
ous [7]. The fourth reason is that the taxpayers of China,
Canada, Sweden, the United Kingdom, the United States,
Italy, Austria, and other countries have apparently spent a
significant amount of money for research on quantum
radars. Consequently, a special session on quantum radar
was held (virtually) at the IEEE International Radar
Conference on April 30, 2020, which did not occur in
Washington, DC. The five talks varied widely in perspec-
tive: Three were upbeat, but two were rather negative.
Marco Frasca and Alfonso Farina presented a new idea to
entangle atoms with photons, rather than the boring old
method of entangling pairs of photons; the purpose here is
to allow a greater number of photons to be usefully
entangled for microwave quantum radar. Marco Frasca is
a real physicist who deeply understands quantum mechan-
ics, and Alfonso Farina is a famous expert in real radar
systems. Han Liu, Amr Helmy, and Bhashyam Balaji
explained how to use temporal correlation of photons
rather than boring old polarization entanglement to
improve quantum radar performance by roughly 10–20
dB relative to a classical radar. A crucial point in this com-
parison is that the classical radar was not optimized,
which is an important theme throughout all three special
sessions. The third talk analyzed the benefits of
using multiple quantum transmit devices in parallel;
Marco Lanzagorta, who literally wrote the book on
Author’s current address: Fred Daum, Department of
Quantum Information, Raytheon, Woburn MA 01801
USA (e-mail: daum@raytheon.com).
Manuscript received June 8, 2020; accepted June 11,
2020, and ready for publication January 29, 2021.
Review handled by Peter Willett.
0885-8985/21/$26.00 ß 2021 IEEE
MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
DOI. No. 10.1109/MAES.2021.3056703
quantum radar [6], is the physicist on this team, and Jeff
Uhlmann (who invented the unscented Kalman filter) is
the engineer in this collaboration. All three of these talks
were upbeat about the potential for quantum radar. In con-
trast, J
er^
ome Bourassa and Chris Wilson showed that a
certain important class of quantum radars cannot beat the
optimal classical radar if the transmit signal and the
so-called “idler” (i.e., the other partner in the entangled
photon pair) are amplified equally. This negative result is
useful to know. Of course one wonders what happens with
asymmetrical amplification of the transmitted signal and
the idler, and this important question was answered at the
special session on quantum radar at the IEEE Radar Con-
ference in Florence, Italy (September 2020), which we
shall review later. Both Wilson and Bourassa are real
physicists who have quantum mechanics for breakfast.
The fifth talk, by Daum (not to be confused with the author
of this note), was also rather negative. Daum showed that
the cost of X-band quantum radars is roughly 10 orders of
magnitude more than the corresponding classical radar
with today’s technology. In the future, with the most opti-
mistic assumptions, the relative cost can be reduced to
only five orders of magnitude. During the chat for this
special session Professor Ravi Advi (the organizer of this
special session) said that he was in tears after learning
about this cost analysis, and these were not tears of joy.
But one could put a positive spin on the huge cost of quan-
tum radars, because companies typically make a profit of
10%–20% on sales, and hence, quantum radars would put
them in clover. The chat was continuously active through-
out the entire 2-h session. This allows for 10 times more ques-
tions from people around the world than is typical at face-to-
face meetings. Many participants said that virtual meetings
were much better than face-to-face sessions, because they
avoid the cost and time and inconvenience of travel, hotels,
and parking. Michael Zatman, the Chairman of the IEEE
Radar Conference, asked some good technical questions, and
he said that this chat was probably the best at the whole con-
ference. Zatman asked about the assumptions used to com-
pute 10–20 dB of improvement in performance for quantum
radar relative to classical radar; as we shall see ahead, this is
a recurring crucial question for all three special sessions.
The second special session on quantum radar was held
virtually at the IEEE Radar Conference on September 22,
61
2020, which unfortunately did not happen in Florence,
Italy. The five talks at this special session were also a mix-
ture of positive and negative results. An experiment on
X-band quantum radar was reported by Shabir Barzanjeh,
David Vitali, Stefano Pirandola, and Johannes Fink, a
powerful team of physicists from Italy, Iran, U.K., and
Austria. The results of this seminal experiment, performed
at Vienna Austria, were in good agreement with theory for
this special class of quantum radar, which uses digital
receivers and digital signal processing. Marco Frasca and
Alfonso Farina quantified the benefits of using multiple
quantum transmit devices in parallel for a quantum
MIMO radar, rather than using boring old phased array
radars. Another strong team of physicists and radar engi-
neers from Sweden and Finland explained that a certain
important class of quantum radars could not beat the opti-
mal classical radar using any version of amplification of
the transmitted signal and the idler, even assuming ideal
quantum processing in theory. This team consists of
Robert Jonsson, Anders Str€om, Roberto Di Candia, Martin
Ankel, and G€oran Johansson. Another negative result
was reported in a paper by Nizar Messaoudi, Chung Wai
Sandbo Chang, A. M. Vadiraj, J
er^ome Bourassa,
Bhashyam Balaji, and Chris Wilson, which shows the lim-
itations of an important class of quantum radars due to
amplification of the transmitted signal and the resulting
destruction of entanglement of the photon pairs. On a posi-
tive note, David Luong, Bhashyam Balaji, and Sreeraman
Rajan computed the receiver operating curves (ROC) for a
certain class of quantum radars using both Monte Carlo
simulations and Gaussian approximations to obtain simple
formulas. This quantum radar gives substantially better
performance than a classical noise radar, but it does not
beat the optimal classical radar, as explained in [1], [8],
and [9]. Daum talked about a radically different quantum
radar design, which does not use any cryogenic dilution
refrigerators and, hence, reduces the cost by many orders
of magnitude; however, this talk was theoretical and
highly speculative, with no experimental results. Daum
generates the desired electromagnetic field using the
square root of a huge covariance matrix multiplied by
thermal noise rather than boring old entanglement of real
physical photons [9]. This idea was greeted skeptically by
62 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
most real quantum mechanics, but no mathematical flaws
were exposed in this surprising and counterintuitive idea.
However, the real drama of this special session played
out during the reviewing process of the papers. All of the
reviewers were world class experts in quantum radar. But
the reviews of many papers varied widely from definite
reject to definite accept. Apparently there is substantial
disagreement among the world experts on quantum radars.
One heroic reviewer wrote four reviews that were twice as
long as the papers being reviewed with original research
and improved results as part of the reviews. This reviewer
was extremely reluctant to review any papers, but some-
how or other we were able to twist his arm by pointing out
that, owing to COVID-19 strictures, he was not allowed to
leave his house, and there were no classes to teach at his
school, and all restaurants, museums, concerts, plays,
movies, and bars were closed, removing nearly all distrac-
tions from the important task of reviewing papers.
The third special session on quantum radar is planned
for the virtual IEEE Radar Conference in May 2021, which
will not be held at Atlanta Georgia. This will consist of
eight talks plus an hour long panel discussion, which will
actually be a debate about the crucial open questions in
quantum radar, including: How much better is a quantum
radar than the optimal classical radar? The opinions about
this issue vary widely: 6 dB, 3 dB, 10 dB to 20 dB, zero, as
well as BT, in which BT is the time bandwidth product of
the transmitted waveform. Here, we compare radar perfor-
mance in terms of equivalent SNR for a ROC curve. For a
special class of quantum radars, the correct answer is 6 dB
quantum advantage in effective SNR at low photon flux per
mode, assuming equal transmit power for the quantum
radar and the classical radar (see [1] for details). This analy-
sis also assumes Gaussian states and optimal quantum
detection and very little amplification of the signal and
idler, and no sampling of the idler, with constant RCS tar-
get (and exactly known range, azimuth, elevation, polariza-
tion, amplitude and phase of the target). This 6 dB quantum
advantage further assumes that the classical radar does not
exploit the known polarization of the target; it also assumes
that we have a lossless analog quantum (arbitrarily large)
memory for the idler (see [1] for details). However, for
non-Gaussian states of photons and entanglement of more
MAY 2021

than pairs of photons and polarization entanglement jointly
with squeezing of the quantum vacuum and other more
REFERENCES
general assumptions, the jury is still out. Moreover, the cur-
rent analysis uses the boring old Schr€odinger equation,
whereas the correct analysis would use the Belavkin–Zakai
equation. The debate at Atlanta will be among the world’s
experts in quantum radar, and we will strictly enforce the
quantum Marquess of Queensberry rules, including: no
entanglement, no squeezing, and no tunneling. Essentially,
all experts now agree that the two experiments reported
in [2] and [3] are not actually quantum radars, owing to the
amplification of the transmitted signal and the idler, and
hence, they do not offer any quantum advantage relative to
the optimal classical radar with the same transmit power,
as explained in [1], [8], and [9]. This is not debatable; it is a
mathematical fact. Some researchers think that quantum
radar today is like Wright Brothers’ airplane. But for the
airplane, we had an existence theorem: Birds can fly. Also,
the Wright Brothers only required improving the engine
efficiency and lift-to-drag ratio and stability margins by
less than one order of magnitude relative to the state of the
art. In contrast, the cost of quantum radar is 10 orders of
magnitude more than optimal classical radar, and we can-
not fix this problem using amplification [9]. This is not
debatable; it is a mathematical fact. But hope springs
eternal in the breasts of some quantum radar researchers,
who dream of new technology and much more general
methods of entanglement as well as new clever ideas and
new physics yet to be discovered.
MAY 2021 IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
Daum
[1] J. H. Shapiro, “The quantum illumination story,” IEEE
Aerosp. Electron. Syst. Mag., vol. 35, no. 4, pp. 8–20,
Apr. 2020.
[2] S. Barzanjeh, S. Pirandola, D. Vitali, and J. Fink,
“Microwave quantum illumination using a digital
receiver,” Sci. Adv., vol. 6, no. 19, 2020, Art. no. eabb0451.
[3] C. W. S. Chang, A. M. Vadiraj, J. Bourassa, B. Balaji, and
C. Wilson, “Quantum-enhanced noise radar,” Appl. Phys.
Lett., vol. 114, no. 11, Mar. 2019, Art. no. 112601.
[4] C. F. Gauss, “Nicht-Gaubsch quantenradar besiegt
stealth,” in Werke, Herausgegeben von Der K€
oniglichen
Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zu G€
ottingen. Leipzig,
Germany: Teubner, 1900.
[5] H. Vella, “Could quantum radars expose stealth planes?,”
Eng. Technol. Mag., Apr. 2019. [Online]. Available :
https://eandt.theiet.org/content/articles/2019/04/could-
quantum-radars-expose-stealth-planes/
[6] M. Lanzagorta, Quantum Radar. San Rafael, CA, USA:
Morgan & Claypool, 2011.
[7] A. Cho, “The short, strange life of quantum radar,” Sci-
ence, vol. 369, pp. 1556–1557, Sep. 2020.
[8] G. Sorelli, N. Treps, F. Grosshans, and F. Boust,
“Detecting a target with quantum entanglement,”
May 2020. [Online]. Available: https://arxiv.org/abs/
2005.07116
[9] F. Daum, “Quantum radar with digital waveform gener-
ators,” in Proc. IEEE Radar Conf., Nov. 2020, pp. 1–6.
63
 AESS MEETINGS & CONFERENCES
Michael Braasch, VP Conferences

The information listed on this page was valid as of March 31, 2021.
Potential attendees are urged to get up-to-date information directly from the respective conference organizers.

DATE MEETING LOCATION CONTACT

10-14 May 2021 IEEE Radar Conference (RadarConf21) Atlanta, Georgia, https://ewh.ieee.org/conf/radar/2021
2021 USA
VIRTUAL

31 May - 2021 28th Saint Petersburg International Conference on Saint Petersburg, http://www.elektropribor.spb.ru/en/conferences
2 June Integrated Navigation Systems (ICINS) Russia /141
2021 AND VIRTUAL

1-3 June 2021 International Conference on Localization and Tampere, https://events.tuni.fi/icl-gnss2021

2021 GNSS (ICL-GNSS) Finland
VIRTUAL

21-22 June International Radar Symposium (IRS) Belin, https://www.dgon-irs.org

2021 Germany
VIRTUAL

23-25 June 2021 IEEE International Workshop on Metrology for Naples, http://www.metroaerospace.org
2021 AeroSpace (MetroAeroSpace) Italy
VIRTUAL

8-11 August 2021 IEEE 19th International Symposium on Antenna Winnipeg, https://antem2021.ieee.ca
2021 Technology and Applied Electromagnetics (ANTEM) Manitoba,
Canada
VIRTUAL

1-3 September 2021 IEEE International Carnahan Conference on Hatfield, UK https://site.ieee.org/iccst

2021 Security Technology (ICCST) VIRTUAL

14-15 September International Conference in Sensor Signal Processing for Edinburgh, https://sspd.eng.ed.ac.uk
2021 Defence (SSPD 2021) Scotland, UK
AND VIRTUAL

21-23 September 2021 Signal Processing Symposium (SPSympo) Lodz, Poland http://spsympo.p.lodz.pl
2021 VIRTUAL

26-30 September 40th Digital Avionics Systems Conference (DASC) San Antonio, https://2021.dasconline.org
2021 Texas, USA

1-3 November IEEE Conference on Microwaves, Communications, Tel Aviv, https://www.comcas.org

2021 Antennas, and Electronic Systems (COMCAS) Israel

POSTPONED TO 2021 IEEE 24th International Conference on Information Sun City, https://www.fusion2021.co.za
1-4 November Fusion (FUSION) South Africa
2021

This information is taken from the IEEE Conference Database. For corrections or omissions, contact conference-services@ieee.org. May 2021