Computer Networks 197 (2021) 108366

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Computer Networks
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/comnet

Beyond 5G for digital twins of UAVs

Zhihan Lv a, *, Dongliang Chen a, Hailing Feng b, *, Ranran Lou a, Huihui Wang c
a
College of Computer Science and Technology, Qingdao 266071, China
b
School of Information Engineering, Zhejiang A & F University, Hangzhou 311300, China
c
St. Bonaventure University, 3261 West State Road, St. Bonaventure, NY, 14778 USA

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: The purpose is to explore the application effects and limitations of Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) in 5G/B5G
Unmanned aerial vehicle (Beyond 5G) mobile and wireless communication. Based on 5Gcommunication, the deep learning (DL) algorithm
B5G is introduced to construct the UAV Digital Twins (DTs) communication channel model based on DL. The Co­
Deep learning
ordinated Multi-point Transmission (COMP) technology is adopted to study the interference suppression of
Coordinated multi-point transmission
Physical layer security
UAVs. The key algorithm in the physical layer security is employed to ensure information communication se­
Digital twins curity. Finally, the model constructed is simulated and analyzed. The transmission error rates and transmission
estimation accuracy of several algorithms, including the proposed algorithm and ordinary Deep Neural Networks
(DNNs), are compared under different Signal-to-Noise Ratios (SNRs). Results find that the convergence speed and
convergence effect of the proposed algorithm has prominent advantages, presenting strong robustness; the
proposed algorithm’s estimation accuracy is about 150 times higher than the traditional algorithms. Further
analysis reveals that the proposed algorithm’s accuracy reaches 82.39%, which increases by at least 3.2% than
other classic machine algorithms. The indicators of Precision, Recall, and F1 are compared as well. Apparently,
the Precision, Recall, and F1 values of the proposed algorithm are the highest, while the transmission delay is the
smallest. Therefore, the constructed UAV DTs wireless communication channel model has strong robustness and
further reduces UAV limitations, providing a reference for improving UAV system performance in the later stage.

1. Introduction
As science and technology advances quickly, the Unmanned Aerial
Vehicle (UAV) has become increasingly accepted in various fields. UAV
applications in the military field include land security, air defense,
border-coastal defense patrols, police security, anti-terrorism, and ar­
rests; those in the civil field include agriculture, forestry protection, pest
control, traffic monitoring, electricity, environmental climate assess­
ment, and geological prospecting [1,2]. While UAVs are universally
applied, operations in high-risk environments place higher re­
quirements, such as collisions with civil aircraft and accidents that cause
injuries after UAV operation errors. Hence, as communication technol­
ogy develops rapidly, using Digital Twins (DT) to map the physical space
during UAV flight into the virtual space in real-time has become a hot
topic.
The UAV communication system has the characteristics of mobility,
flexibility, and adaptability, making it widely employed in the wireless
communication field. Challenges are posed to the existing communica­
tion networks to cope with UAV’s rapidly growing application fields and
business needs. UAV networking and the combination of the Fifth-
Generation (5G) communication technology have become an inevi­
table trend of future development. 5G base stations support flexible 3D
beamforming and large-scale antenna technologies, providing UAVs
with more 3D and comprehensive coverage and better transmission
performance. Simultaneously, 5G networks’ ultra-low latency will pro­
vide strong support for UAV Command and Control (C&C) signaling.
The next stage of the 5G can be referred to as “Beyond 5G (B5G).”
Furthermore, the 5G technology can be optimized from two aspects:
Ultra-Reliability Low Latency Communication (URLLC) and massive
Machine type of Communication (mMTC). The air interface character­
istic supports 52.6~114.25GHz Millimeter-Wave (MMW) frequency
band can be designed, thereby optimizing the 5G technology [3,4]. With
the emergence of B5G communication technology, data flow and
equipment will expand, and the number of mobile connections will keep
growing, even exceeding 100 billion. This result is inseparable from the
rapid development of artificial intelligence (AI) and deep learning (DL)
algorithms [5]. The accelerated development of high-tech approaches,
such as AI, the Internet of Things (IoT), and big data, has promoted the

* Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: lvzhihan@gmail.com (Z. Lv), hlfeng@zafu.edu.cn (H. Feng).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.comnet.2021.108366
Received 11 December 2020; Received in revised form 23 April 2021; Accepted 27 July 2021
Available online 29 July 2021
1389-1286/© 2021 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Z. Lv et al. Computer Networks 197 (2021) 108366

information transmission between S and the legitimate UAV receiver.

Finally, the proposed analysis model was verified by Monte Carlo
simulation [8]. Zhang et al. (2019) analyzed how to achieve UAV MMW
channel capture and precoder design by understanding the research
progress, research opportunities, and UAV MMW communication chal­
lenges. In the meantime, the challenges and possible schemes faced by
UAV MMW cellular networks were discussed, including the communi­
cation and spectrum sharing of UAV to base stations and UAV to users
[9]. To further improve the UAV communication system’s coverage and
performance, Yang et al. (2020) proposed a reconfigurable UAV scheme
based on Reconfigurable Intelligent Surface (RIS), which used the RIS
installed on the building to reflect the signal from the ground source to
the UAV. The UAV was deployed as a relay to forward the decoded signal
to the destination. Results suggested that RIS technology could effec­
tively improve the UAV communication system’s coverage and reli­
ability [10].

2.2. Application and development trend of AI in wireless communication

With its rapid development, AI technology has also played a role in

promoting the further development of wireless communication tech­
nology and proposed some new challenges, which have become the
focuses of some scholars in relevant fields. Li et al. (2017) introduced the
basic concepts of AI and discussed the relationship between AI and
candidate technologies in 5G cellular networks. They emphasized the
opportunities and challenges of using AI for accomplishing intelligent
Fig. 1. A schematic diagram of typical UAV application areas.
5G networks and demonstrated the effectiveness of AI in managing and
coordinating cellular network resources [11]. Feng et al. (2018) adopted
digital development of industrial production exceedingly. The virtual
a composite channel model including large-scale and small-scale fading
world corresponding to the physical world develops at an unprece­
in a 5G environment to describe a typical propagation environment.
dented speed; in turn, the physical world is driven by the digital world
Simultaneously, an optimization problem was proposed for the entire
for efficient and orderly production. Under this background, DTs ap­
flight trajectory. The transmission duration and transmission power of
plications are born. Moreover, DTs innovation and development in the
all devices were jointly designed to maximize the data collection effi­
intelligent manufacturing industry has brought new guiding concepts to
ciency of the entire flight. Finally, results demonstrated that compared
solve UAV intelligent control driven by DTs [6]. Therefore, the 5G
with the traditional scheme, the proposed scheme could provide a sig­
communication is further optimized by combining the UAV and wireless
nificant performance gain and fast convergence speed [12]. Li et al.
networks and enabling the flexible coverage of wireless communication
(2019) applied two cases of UAV as a flying base station and UAV as an
signals, in an effort to increase the channel capacity, channel link sta­
air node to illustrate the security mechanism of the physical layer of the
bility, and transfer rate.
communication network in the context of 5G networks, in an effort to
In summary, although the application ranges of UAVs become
ensure security and show the superior performance gains numerically.
extensive and the number further increases, there are major problems in
Finally, new opportunities in the emerging network architecture were
the flexible coverage of UAV communication signals. The innovative
revealed, which could serve as a guide for future research directions
points are using DTs to remotely control UAVs in high-risk environments
[13]. Chowdhury et al. (2020) introduced the future development
and introducing deep learning algorithms based on 5G communication
prospects of the Sixth-Generation (6G) wireless communication and its
to build a UAV DTs communication channel model. The Coordinated
network architecture. Meanwhile, they tried to apply AI, terahertz
Multi-point Transmission (COMP) technology is applied to UAV inter­
communication, wireless optical technology, free-space optical network,
ference suppression, and the key algorithm in the physical layer security
blockchain, and other technologies to develop wireless communication
is applied to ensure information communication security. Finally, the
technology, providing a direction for the future 6G technology and an
constructed algorithm’s performance is simulated and analyzed,
experimental basis for wireless communication technology with higher
providing an important contribution to improving the UAV system
system capacity, higher data rate, lower latency, higher security, and
performance in the future.
better Quality of Service (QoS) [14].
In summary, the above works demonstrate that most wireless
2. Related work
communication networks (WCNs) in UAV are analyzed based on 5G. In
contrast, the further improvement of WCNs is mostly combined with AI
2.1. Development trend of UAV communication
rather than UAV and UAV-related contents. Therefore, based on wireless
communication, applying AI technology and combining it with UAV DTs
Today, when UAVs are widely used in various fields, there are also
has an important value for developing UAVs and communication
many accidents linked to UAVs. Wireless communication, a fundamental
technologies.
technology for controlling UAVs, has been studied by many researchers.
Fawaz et al. (2018) relaxed these two highly restrictive assumptions by
3. Key technologies of UAV DTs communication scheme
integrating UAV as a buffer auxiliary mobile relay into the traditional
relay auxiliary File System Object (FSO) system, thereby improving the
3.1. Wide application of UAV and analysis of its problems
performance of the existing relay auxiliary FSO system [7]. Ye et al.
(2018) studied the confidentiality performance of a UAV to the UAV
3.1.1. UAV Application and challenge analysis
system. One UAV served as the source (S) to transmit information to the
With UAV as the subject, the Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS), an
legal UAV receiver. A group of UAVs tried to eavesdrop on the
integrated system, connects the ground station via the communication

2
Z. Lv et al.
Fig. 2. A schematic diagram of the UAV performance indicator.
data link and assists various elements such as the mission load and
personnel. The current UAV communication schemes often depend on
simple point-to-point communication on the unlicensed frequency band
(ISM, 2.4GHz). Its data rate is low, unreliable, unsafe, susceptible to
interference, hard to legally monitor and manage, and can only operate
within a minimal range [15,16]. If the number of UAVs and their ap­
plications will further expand in the next few years, the development of
new UAV communication schemes will be extremely urgent. The typical
application areas of UAV are shown in Fig. 1.
Today, as UAV’s application scope becomes increasingly extensive,
its limitations in emerging fields are becoming evident, rising many
problems. First, UAV has strong air interference is. Compared with
ground UAV users, UAV receives interference from users not only in
neighboring cells but also in cells that are far away due to its flying
height. Second, the coverage of mobile cellular networks is weak. Many
weak network coverage and cavities exist in the air coverage provided
by the ground mobile network. The current field test data shows that
when the UAV flight altitude exceeds 120m, the probability of loss of
connection increases, and many airspaces are in a no-signal state.
Finally, UAV data communication ability is reduced. The coverage
provided by the current ground mobile communication network is not
enough to support UAV’s requirements for high speed, low latency, and
mobility. Most UAVs cannot interconnect with communication devices
[17,18]. Many challenges exist while solving these problems, such as
improvements in UAV speed, delay, coverage, and positioning
performance.
3.1.2. UAV Performance indicator analysis
Many challenges exist while solving these problems, such as im­
provements in UAV speed, delay, coverage, and positioning perfor­
mance. The performance indicators of UAVs are shown in Fig. 2.
Regarding the UAV rate, different application scenarios and different
business capabilities have different requirements for rate indicators.
When the uplink 200kbps can meet the demand for control signaling
transmission, the data transmission rate should also be improved
continuously with the perpetual evolution of information rendering
methods. At this stage, a UAV single terminal usually meets the needs of
720P and 1080P video transmission. Nevertheless, future UAVs need to
meet higher-definition video transmissions, such as 4K and 8K. Simul­
taneously, with the gradual popularization of UAV services, the demand
for multiple concurrent transmissions may gradually become prominent,
posing higher challenges to the network’s uplink transmission rate
under new service requirements.
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Computer Networks 197 (2021) 108366
Regarding UAV delay, different application scenarios and different
service capabilities also have different levels of requirements for the
end-to-end delay and network-side delay indicators. Data return only
involves uplink, while the end-to-end delay includes encoding delay,
wireless network-side delay, external network transmission delay,
server processing delay, decoding delay, and display delay. As science
and technology advances quickly, UAV has higher requirements on the
delay indicator in the application process at all levels, putting forward
higher requirements for future network construction capabilities.
The UAV application puts forward higher dimensional requirements
for communication network coverage. For example, agricultural pro­
tection only needs to be operated at 10m; electric power/base station
exploration needs to be operated at 50-100m; farmland information
mapping needs to be operated at 200-300m. In contrast, high-altitude
inspections such as oil pipelines require a coverage requirement of
300-3000m. As a result, with the gradual increase of UAV services, the
coverage height will be extended from a fixed height of fewer than 120m
to a larger height, which poses greater challenges to the traditional low-
altitude mobile communication network.
Regarding UAV’s positioning system, with the diversification of
UAV’s business, its positioning requirements have gradually increased.
Ordinary regulatory services only need to maintain positioning accuracy
within 50m. In contrast, agricultural surveying and mapping and auto­
matic charging need to achieve high-precision positioning of 0.1m. As
UAV’s application areas increase, UAV positioning accuracy will need to
transition from tens of meters to sub-meter level.
Therefore, when the UAV performance indicator is improved, there
are more requirements for the WCN’s performance.
3.2. Application of communication technology in UAV and analysis of
physical layer security
In 2020, the 5G mobile communication has become a global research
and development hot spot. Mobile communication technology and in­
dustry will enter the 5G stage, meeting people’s needs for high service
throughput, high connection density, high mobile speed, high reli­
ability, and low latency. The spectrum efficiency, energy efficiency, and
cost-efficiency of the communication network have been greatly
improved, and the development space of the mobile communication
industry has been significantly expanded [19]. However, as the UAV
application field is becoming increasingly extensive today, its applica­
tion limitations in emerging fields are becoming prominent, facing many
challenges. Accordingly, analyses from the perspectives of the UAV
Z. Lv et al.
Fig. 3. Two link configuration diagrams of UAV communication universal networking.
communication channel model, physical layer security technology, in­
formation theory, and confidentiality capacity are vital.
3.2.1. UAV Channel model analysis
Although there have been many mature and complete research re­
sults on air-to-ground channels in the aviation field in recent years,
UAV’s communication channel is still in the research stage in actual
measurement and channel modeling. There is a big difference between
the communication channel of the aircraft and the UAV communication
channel. The ground terminal of the former is usually located in an open
area with a high antenna tower. Simultaneously, the air-to-ground
channel of the UAV is more complicated due to the different flight
environment of the UAV. Two common basic communication links
include Control and Non-payload Communication (CNPC) link and data
link. These two links are based on the universal networking structure of
UAV communication networks, as shown in Fig. 3 [20].
Compared with the CNPC link, the data link has lower requirements
for latency and security. The data link is mostly used to support
communication services between UAVs and ground terminals (a few are
used for communication transmission between UAVs). Hence, most of
the communication channels are air-to-ground channels. Ground ter­
minals are divided into ground base stations, mobile terminals, gateway
nodes, and wireless sensors in different application scenarios. The
channel capacity of these data links varies greatly according to different
application scenarios. For example, UAV has only a few kbps for wireless
sensors, while the channel capacity from UAV to gateway nodes can
reach tens of Gbps. At the same time, the data link does not need to run
in a particular frequency spectrum. Conversely, data link can run in a
specific frequency band that has been occupied by other applications
and reallocate dedicated frequency bands to enhance system perfor­
mance. UAV to UAV channels are mainly line-of-sight channels.
Although UAV may have multi-path fading due to reflections from
mountains, ground, and buildings during flight, this multi-path fading is
limited and can be basically ignored compared with UAV-to-ground or
terrestrial channels.
3.2.2. Analysis of UAV physical layer security
Because wireless communication is exposed to the air and has
broadcasting characteristics, UAV communication is vulnerable to ma­
licious attacks or eavesdropping. To avoid eavesdropping attacks on the
system and ensure system communication, the general system adopts an
4
Computer Networks 197 (2021) 108366
encryption method. The traditional security technology uses the upper
layer encryption technology, and the physical layer security technology
can be treated as a supplement to the traditional security technology by
studying the physical layer’s characteristics. It is based on information
theory and uses the wireless channel’s physical characteristics as the
system improves security performance. Because it makes full use of the
channel’s interference noise and multi-path characteristics, the physical
layer of security technology is not affected by the complexity of the
eavesdropper’s eavesdropping algorithm. It can make the eavesdrop­
per’s information acquisition rate approach zero.
The security probability means that every communication link is
exposed to all malicious Eve. In this case, only the performance indicator
of the most malicious Eve needs to be considered because it has the
strongest Signal to Interference plus Noise Ratio (SINR) [21]. Therefore,
a typical heterogeneous cellular network link’s security probability can
be expressed as:
{ }
PSec (Tε ) = P maxSINRE (z) < Tε (1)
z∈Φc
In (1), PSec indicates the probability of system security, SINRE rep­
resents the SINR value received by Eve, and Tε refers to the security
threshold. The security capacity is the maximum secure transmission
rate available between the sender and the legal receiver, commonly
referred to as the maximum-security rate or security capacity [22]. In
the eavesdropping channel, for the case of only one sender, one desti­
nation, and multiple Eves, the security capabilities available to the
system can be expressed as follows:
{ }
CS = max 0, RD − max RjE , j = 1, 2, ..., K (2)
1≤j≤K
In (2), CS indicates the security capacity of the system, RD denotes the
information rate obtained at the destination node, RjE represents the
information rate obtained at the j-th eavesdropping node, and K refers to
the total number of Eve nodes in the system. Besides, the probability of
security interruption refers to the probability when the SINR of the
received signal in the system is less than a given target information se­
curity rate (the secure transmission cannot be performed); that is, within
the range of this target information, communication interruption will
occur, which can be expressed as:
POut = P{CS ≤ RS } (3)
Z. Lv et al.
Fig. 4. The framework of UAV DTs communication channel modeling based
on DL.
In (3), Pout is the probability of security interruption, and Rs repre­
sents the security rate for the given target information.
Information theory is a branch of the physical layer security tech­
nology. In information theory, any event has a definite probability, and
the probability of its occurrence determines the amount of information it
carries. When an event comprises multiple messages, the average in­
formation volume of these messages is calculated by calculating the
information volume to facilitate the calculation. For example, the
average information volume of discrete information sources is defined as
the following equation:
∑
N
H(X) = − P(xi )log2 (P(xi )) (4)
i=1
The average amount of information can also be called entropy. En­
tropy includes two physical meanings: one is the average uncertainty
before the message is sent. The other is the average amount of infor­
mation per symbol after the message is sent. The entropy sent by the
source per second is defined as the information rate, denoted by R:
∑
N meta-learning algorithm ideas are introduced into channel estimation to
R = rH(X) = − r P(xi )log2 (P(xi )) (5)
i=1
In (5), r refers to the rate at which the source sends messages. A
measure of the maximum information rate that a channel can transmit is
the channel capacity, divided into discrete channels and continuous
channels. There are also two ways to describe channel capacity. For
instance, in discrete channels, C refers to the maximum average amount
of information that the channel can transmit per unit time, which is
defined as:
5
Computer Networks 197 (2021) 108366
C = max{r[H(x) − H(x|y)]} (6)
P(x)
For Gaussian white noise continuous channels with limited band­
width and limited average power, the channel capacity calculation
equation is:
( )
S
C = Blog2 1 + (7)
N
In (7), S refers to the average power of the source, and N refers to the
noise power. If Eq. (6) is replaced by N = n0B, where n0 refers to the
noise power spectral density, and B is the bandwidth, then the following
equation is obtained:
( )
S
C = Blog2 1 + (8)
n0 B
Eq. (8) is also known as Shannon’s equation. The channel capacity C
is linked to channel bandwidth B, signal power, and noise power spectral
density n0. The security capacity is the difference between the channel
capacity of the legal link and the channel capacity of the eavesdropping
link. Then the security capacity can be expressed as the following
equation:
Cs = Cr − Ce (9)
In (9), Cr refers to the legal link channel capacity from the source to
the legal receiver, and Ce refers to the channel capacity from the source
to the illegal eavesdropper. The confidentiality capacity can also be
understood as the maximum data transmission rate that can ensure
secure communication between the source and the receiver.
3.3. Deep learning-based UAV DTs communication channel model
The remote control of UAVs driven by DTs can transcend the
boundaries of time and space, deeply integrate humans and the physical
environment, and make UAVs working in high-risk environments
interact with virtual interactive platforms in real-time. The physical
space uses various sensors to perceive UAVs and high-risk environments
and feedbacks the perceived information to the virtual data interaction
center via remote communication technology. The data interaction
center preprocesses the sensed multi-source information and stores them
in data sheets, respectively. The virtual interactive platform controls the
synchronous movement of the virtual prototype by calling the infor­
mation in data sheets and displays the equipment status information on
the interactive interface in real-time, providing the operator with a vi­
sual aid for decision-making. By observing the information on the virtual
interactive platform, the operator issues control decision instructions to
the data interactive center, which are finally sent to the physical ter­
minal equipment, realizing the remote control of the UAVs. Therefore,
constructing the UAV DTs communication channel model is very
important.
3.3.1. Modeling of the UAV DTs communication channel
In a wireless network, the UAV communication system’s perfor­
mance is restricted by the wireless channel environment. Therefore,
channel modeling is the basis for system performance evaluation. The
evaluate the performance of the UAV DTs communication scheme. A
meta-learning-based DL algorithm, Robust channel Estimation with
Meta neural Networks (RoemNet), is proposed to solve the problem that
the existing DL channel estimation algorithm is inefficient in a single
training, converges too slowly, and is difficult to adapt to the time-
varying channel environment, as shown in Fig. 4.
This system is implemented through offline training and online
deployment; that is, after preliminary training, the meta-network is
transformed in one step combined with the actual time-varying channel
conditions (transceiving pilot frequency sequence) for channel
Z. Lv et al. Computer Networks 197 (2021) 108366

Table. 1 In (10), the network input is the received symbol Y, the network
RoemNet meta-learning algorithm flowchart. output is the corresponding symbol estimated by the network X, ̂ the
1 Input: Ti : channel task set of network training; N2: training slice number of corresponding true label is X, hϕi refers to the neural network parameter.
single channel task; α1 α2 : Super parameter step size of network training;
If N1 represents the number of channels with different parameters dur­
2 Output: hϕ : the trained meta learning network with good initialization
ing training, there will be N1 different tasks. Assuming that all tasks obey
parameter ϕ randomly initializes the parameter Hϕ of network ϕ;
the same distribution p(T), these tasks will be defined as a set: {Tl, T2, ...,
3 while the network is not convergent
4 for i=1,2, …,N1 do Ti, ..., TN1}. The number of slices is defined for each channel in the set;
5 2 N2 training slices of K1 DFT output Yand corresponding X are sampled to form that is, the actual number of channel data for training is N2. For the j-th
data pairs; training slice data pair of the Ti-th task, there is the following equation:
6 The 2 N2 training slices were divided into B1 and B2; ( )
7 for j=1, 2,…, N2 do ϕji = ϕi − ∇ϕj L hϕi (11)
i
8 ∇ϕj L(hϕi ) is obtained by B1 and Eq. (12);
9
i
j In (11), ϕi refers to the neural network parameters after the i-th
The adaptive network parameter ϕi is obtained based on Eq. (11);
update, the loss function’s gradient equation for the j-th training slice of
10 end
11 According to α2 B2 and Eq. (13), the network parameter ϕi is further updated the second term is:
12 end ( ) K1 ( )
( ) ∂L hϕi 1 ∑
13 The network parameter hϕ is updated according to α1 and Eq. (13); (12)
m m m
∇ϕj L hϕi = j =− X − hϕj Y Y j
14 end
i ∂ϕi K1 m=1 i

15 return
In (12), K1 refers to the actual number of training symbol pairs, and
K1 should be ≥ the OFDM subcarrier number. After traversing N1 sub­
tasks and their corresponding N2 slices, the final network parameters are
Table 2
updated by the following equation:
System settings and simulation parameters.
∑ ( )
Software Operating system Linux 64bit ϕ = Φ − α∇ϕ L hϕ (13)
Python version Python 3.6.1
Simulation platform Matlab In (13), α refers to the hyperparameter of the network’s step length,
Development platform PyCharm and Φ refers to the initial weight vector.
Open-source software package TensorFlow Furthermore, the effectiveness of the algorithm is analyzed. For a
Hardcore CPU Intel Core i7-7700@4.
given task set Ti, the training sample B1 is used for optimization training,
2GHz 8 cores
Internal memory Kingston ddr4 2400MHz and the initial loss value obtained is calculated using the test sample B2.
16G Therefore, the objective function of RoemNet is:
GPU Nvidia GeForce 1060 8G [ ( )]
Parameters SNR during training 5:5:30 dB minimizeETi LTi ,B2 UTi ,B1 (ϕ) (14)
Doppler shift interval during training [0,50] Hz
Multi-path number interval during [1,16] In (14), UTi ,B1 refers to the network weights updated based on
training training samples, whose essential function is to add a gradient vector
Maximum path delay interval during [0.2,8.0) μs sequence g to the initial weight vector ϕ. Through meta-training and
training
meta-testing, the expected value of the loss function of the task set is
Number of channels with different 100
parameters for training reduced as much as possible. Then, the optimization direction of the
Number of data slices per channel 100 parameters on the new task can be expressed as:
Number of subcarriers 64 ( )
∂LTi ,B2 UTi ,B1 (ϕ) ( )
Number of pilot frequencies 100
gRoemNet = ̃
= U ′Ti ,B1 L′Ti ,B2 ϕ (15)
∂ϕ
estimation, and the transmission sequence is restored. In (15), ϕ̃ = UT ,B (ϕ), while U′ (ϕ) is the Jacobian matrix of
i 1 Ti ,B1
During the offline network training, first, pre-training is performed, UTi ,B1 (ϕ). For UTi ,B1 (ϕ), assuming there is a k-order gradient update
the training data are collected, and task sets are generated. The data for calculation operation, then:
each training is a random channel extracted from the channel dataset,
and the channel data for each parameter is used as a subtask. Meta- UTi ,B1 (ϕ) = ϕ + g1 + g2 + ⋯ + gk (16)
learning pre-training is performed to get the initial meta-network. In Stochastic Gradient Descent (SGD) further expands and derives
the present study, a model-independent meta-learning algorithm MAML gRoemNet . Generally, the gradient equation of SGD can be expanded by
[23] is adopted, and the initial weights of the meta-network obtained Taylor expansion, as follows:
will be adaptable to different sub-tasks. Next, the meta-network com­ ( )
bines the received pilot sequence of the real channel to perform online gSGD = L′ (ϕ) = L′ (ϕ0 ) + L′′(ϕ − ϕ0 ) + O ‖ ϕ − ϕ0 ‖2
fine-tuning; after several gradient descent steps, a meta update is per­ ∑
k− 1
( )
formed to obtain an adaptive network for the current changing channel, = g0 − αH0 g0i + O α2 (17)
which is a small sample learning of K-Shot Adjust. Finally, the learning
i=1

results are verified by simulation tests. If the bit error rate and estima­ In (17), g0 = L′ (ϕ0 ) refers to the gradient of the starting point of the
tion accuracy meet the requirements, the model can be put into the weight, H0 = L′′(ϕ0 ) refers to the second step of the starting point, g0i
online fine-tuning deployment. If the design requirements are not met, refers to the gradient value calculated in the SGD process, and i ∈ [1, k]
the training will be retrained until convergence. The flow of RoemNet refers to different batches. Further calculating the gradient of RoemNet
meta-learning algorithm is shown in Table 1. can obtain the following equation:
In the system design, the received symbols try to recover the origi­
∂LUk (ϕ)
nally transmitted symbols as much as possible. This is a fitting problem, gRoemNet = = U ′k (ϕk )⋯U ′k− 1 (ϕk− 1 )L′k (ϕk ) (18)
∂ϕ0
so the Mean Square Error (MSE) is selected as the loss function:
( ) ∑ In (18), Uk (ϕ) refers to the operation of updating the parameter
(j) 2
(10) vector in a single step.
(j)
L hϕi = (j) (j)
X Y ∼T
‖ hϕj Y i − X i ‖ α1 α2 B2 ϕi Hϕ ϕji
i i 2

6
Z. Lv et al. Computer Networks 197 (2021) 108366

Fig. 6. Comparison of transmission bit error rates under different SNRs and fine-tuning performance of different deep learning strategies (a. Using different esti­
mation methods; b. Using different length pilots; c. Comparison of fine-tuning performances of different deep learning strategies).

3.3.2. UAV DTs COMP-based interference suppression Then the data flow after detection can be expressed as follows:
Due to the high LOS channel probability caused by the UAV’s flight q
∑
altitude, strong interference will be generated to neighboring cells and ⌢
st = GSH + G H (j) S(j) + Gn (24)
seriously affect the quality of ground user services. Therefore, COMP j=1

based on base station cooperation uses multi-user detection and inter­

If A=GH, A(j)=GH(j), then the SINR of the t-th stream data can be
ference suppression combining methods to convert interference signals
expressed as:
from neighboring cells into useful signals, thereby improving the Signal-
to-Noise Ratio (SNR) of the received signals and effectively improving |A(t, t)|2
SINRt = (25)
the performance of cell-edge users. pN
∑T 2
q (
∑ ( )H ) ( )
The channel matrix from the paired user k to the j-th base station |Ai (t, k)| + Ai (j) Ai (j) n + σ 2 Gi GHi
k=1,k∕
=t j=1
cluster is defined as Hj Fj , 1 ≤ j ≤ q, where Hj is the fast fading channel
from the paired user to the j-th base station, and is the diagonal matrix. In (25), σ2 refers to the noise variance.
Thus, the equivalent MIMO channel of the COMP system is: Furthermore, the communication security issues in the UAV
communication channel are considered. The key transmission technol­
H = [H1 F1 , H2 F2 , ..., HP FP ]T (19) ogy in the physical layer security is applied to the UAV communication
The data stream sent is: channel modeling, which has higher robustness to the complicated
working environment and further improves the system security.
S = [S1 , S2 , ..., SP ]T (20)
In (20), Sk refers to the r stream data sent by the k-th user, calculated 3.4. Simulation experiment
as follows:
The effectiveness of the constructed new technical schemes is veri­
[ ]T
Sk = Sk,1 , Sk,2 , ..., Sk,r (21) fied through simulations. Based on the perspective of cost-saving con­
siderations, the actual deployment and testing of each scheme are
Then the received signal at the cluster end of the collaborative base usually not performed. Instead, the performance and effectiveness of the
station can be expressed as: program are verified through the system-level modeling of the appli­
q
∑ cation scenarios of the UAV DTs communication program to speed up
y = HS + H (j) S(j) + n (22) the technical program development. Regarding the dataset generation,
different parameters are randomly selected in the parameter interval
j=1

In (22), H(j) S(j) refers to the interference from the j-th interfering base
station cluster. The Combined Short Intelligence Test (MMSE) is used to
detect the collaborative base station cluster to eliminate inter-user
interference. The MMSE equalization matrix used can be expressed as:
( )− 1 H
G = H H H + σ 2 IpNT H (23)
according to the above channel model and simulated and generated in
MATLAB software. First, random channel parameters are generated;
then, several random data to be sent are generated converted into
16QAM symbol format as the transmitted symbol label. According to the
data format, the first K2 symbols are used as the pilot of the OFDM frame.
The obtained dataset is divided into training and testing sets according
to the ratio of 4:1.

7
Z. Lv et al.
Fig. 7. The estimation accuracy of different estimation methods (a. different SNRs; b. different bit quantizers; c. different length pilots; d. different pilot pollution
coefficients; e. different antenna numbers).
The UAV communication channel model’s transmission prediction
performance is analyzed from the perspectives of accuracy, precision,
recall, F1, and error; the proposed model is compared with some other
state-of-art algorithms, including Decision Tree (DT) [24], Naive Bayes
(NB) [25], Multilayer Perceptron (MLP) [26], Deep Neural Networks
(DNN) [27], and Long Short Term Memory (LSTM) Recurrent Neural
Network (RNN) [28]. As for the channel estimation method, the pro­
posed algorithm is compared with the Least-Squares (LS) channel esti­
mation method [29], the Linear Minimum Mean Square Error (LMMSE)
channel estimation [30], and the ordinary DNN network. LS channel
estimation is a low-complexity algorithm. Without using any channel
statistics, it is also the input data of the neural network. A comparison of
the two obtains the improvement of estimation accuracy brought by the
neural network. LMMSE channel estimation refers to the linear mathe­
matical modeling of the low-precision ADC quantization function
through Bussgang decomposition before channel estimation. It has a
fairly high estimation accuracy and a fairly competitive algorithm
complexity. In the accuracy estimation and analysis of the channel, a
1-bit quantizer and an ideal quantizer are used in the estimation process
(that is, the number of ADC bits at the receiving end is infinite). The
8
Computer Networks 197 (2021) 108366
system settings and simulation parameters are shown in Table 2.
4. Results and discussion
4.1. Transmission error rate of each algorithm under different SNRs
The transmission error rate of each algorithm is compared under
different SNR, as shown in Fig. 6.
According to Fig. 6a, among the four channel estimation schemes,
under the condition of low SNR, the traditional LMMSE channel esti­
mation performs the best, and the scheme of learning network (DNN and
RoemNet) cannot achieve the desired effect. However, as the SNR in­
creases, the relationship between the data and the label becomes
increasingly apparent. At about 25dB, the performance of RoemNet
surpasses the traditional LMMSE channel estimation. This result shows
that DL schemes have good development potential. Fig. 6b shows that
when the number of pilot frequencies is 8 or 98, the RoemNet algorithm
can reduce the bit error rate to 10-3. This result reflects the robustness of
the DL scheme for estimating the number of pilot frequencies required.
As shown in Fig. 6c, the convergence speed and convergence effect of the
Z. Lv et al.
Fig. 8. Prediction accuracy of different algorithms with the iterations (a. Accuracy; b. Precision; c. Recall; d. F1 value).
Fig. 9. Data transmission delay of each algorithm under different successful transmission probabilities (a. p=100%; b. p=90%).
meta-learning RoemNet scheme has undeniable advantages over ordi­
nary DNNs. In actual tests, ordinary DNNs are prone to overfitting and
has excellent loss performance during training. However, the perfor­
mance in the test link is very different. This result reflects the advantages
of the proposed meta-learning scheme in generalizing neural networks.
4.2. Transmission estimation accuracy of each algorithm under different
SNRs
The proposed algorithm, LS, and LMMSE are compared respectively
using a 1-bit quantizer and an ideal quantizer in the estimation process
(that is, the number of ADC bits at the receiving end is infinite), and the
estimation accuracy is shown in Fig. 7.
According to Fig. 7a, as SNR increases, the three schemes all show a
downward trend, and the RoemNet has the best performance in almost
all SNR situations. When ADC is an ideal quantizer, the estimation ac­
curacy of RoemNet is improved by about 150 times compared with the
original LS algorithm. When a 1-bit quantizer is utilized, the RoemNet
has, nevertheless, an 80-time performance improvement compared with
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Computer Networks 197 (2021) 108366
the original LS algorithm using a 1-bit ADC. Fig. 7b illustrates that the
accuracy of the ADC greatly affects the estimation performance. From an
ideal quantizer (dashed line) to a 1-bit quantizer, LS’s performance has
dropped by eight times, the performance of LMMSE has dropped by
nearly 30%, and the performance of RoemNet has dropped by 20%.
Fig. 7c suggests that as the number of pilot frequencies increases from 10
to 50, all methods’ MSE performance has improved. After 50, the MSE
performance of the three schemes has not changed much. Fig. 7d reveals
that in different pilot pollution coefficients, traditional methods (LS and
BLMMSE) cause significant performance degradation due to pilot
pollution. However, with the increase of pilot pollution coefficient,
RoemNet can still maintain its MSE basically unchanged, and the per­
formance degradation is only 1/3 of BLMMSE. As shown in Fig. 7e, when
the number of antennas increases, the MSE of the two traditional
methods increases linearly because the size of the channel matrix to be
estimated increases linearly. The performance degradation of using an
ideal quantizer is more serious than using a 1-bit quantizer. For Roem­
Net, the change in the number of antennas only means that the size of
the input “image” is different, which has little impact on the
Z. Lv et al.
performance of the DL network. Therefore, the enhanced DL network
training can make the model robust.
4.3. Model transmission prediction performance
The constructed model is compared with classic ML algorithms. The
performance of Accuracy, Precision, Recall, and F1 values are analyzed
respectively, as shown in Fig. 8. The transmission delay of each neural
network algorithm is analyzed under different successful transmission
probabilities (p=100% and p=90%), as shown in Fig. 9.
As shown in Fig. 8, the proposed model and some classic ML algo­
rithms are compared and analyzed from the perspectives of Accuracy,
Precision, Recall, and F1. The proposed algorithm’s accuracy can reach
82.39%, which increases by at least 3.2% compared with other classic
machine algorithms and is even 30% higher than the NB method.
Meanwhile, the Precision, Recall, and F1 values of the proposed model
are the highest, which increases by at least 5.1% compared with other
ML algorithms. A possible reason is that the proposed RoemNet algo­
rithm adds an online fine-tuning deployment stage when training data in
the UAV communication channel modeling, making the results more
rigorous and accurate. Hence, compared with other classic ML algo­
rithms, the proposed UAV communication system model based on DL
improves accuracy.
According to Fig. 9, with the increase in the amount of transmitted
data, the data transmission delay shows an increasing trend. Moreover,
the smaller the successful transmission probability, the greater the
transmission delay. Comparison suggests that the data transmission
delay of the algorithm model (RoemNet) is the lowest. The reason is that
RoemNet preprocesses and trains the collected data is preprocessed first
so that the transmitted data are further unified, and the time delay is
small. Therefore, compared with different algorithms, the constructed
DL-based UAV communication channel model can provide better data
transmission performance and minimal delay.
5. Conclusion
To sum up, based on 5G communication, deep learning algorithms
are introduced to construct a UAV DTs communication channel model;
moreover, the COMP technology is applied to study further and simulate
the interference suppression of UAV. Finally, results demonstrate that
the constructed wireless communication channel model has strong
robustness. The accuracy rate can reach 82.39%, which provides a
reference for improving UAV system performance in the future. How­
ever, there are some weaknesses as well, such as that the UAV
communication simulation experiment is performed under ideal condi­
tions. When adjusting the control beam of UAV communication infor­
mation, because there are many other parameters involved, there is no
one-by-one analysis of other interfered parameters, and more factors
need to be considered in actual deployment. Therefore, the future 5G
network will be an ultra-dense and complicated heterogeneous network
composed of various base stations and relay products under the high and
low-frequency hybrid networks. The transmission scheme and system
performance evaluation results under the homogeneous network are
different. The applicability under the structure network needs to be
investigated, and the interference suppression scheme and mobility
enhancement of UAV will be the focus of UAV research in the future.
Author statement
Zhihan Lv: Conceptualization, Methodology, Supervision
Dongliang Chen: Software, Investigation, Writing- Original draft
preparation
Hailing Feng: Supervision
Ranran Lou: Software, Investigation, Writing- Reviewing and Editing
Huihui Wang: Conceptualization
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Computer Networks 197 (2021) 108366
Declaration of Competing Interest
None.
Acknowledgments
This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation
of China (No. 61902203) and the Key Research and Development Plan -
Major Scientific and Technological Innovation Projects of ShanDong
Province (2019JZZY020101).
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Dongliang Chen is currently pursuing the M.S degree with the
College of Computer Science and Technology, Qingdao Uni­
versity, China. Dongliang Chen’s research direction include
Deep Learning, Computer Vision, Serious Game, Cyber Secu­
rity, Reinforcement Learning, Game Analysis. He has published
10 papers in IOTJ, FGCS, TOIT, SCS, IMAVIS journals.

Zhihan Lv is IEEE Senior Member, British Computer Society

Fellow and ACM Distinguished Speaker. He is currently a
Professor of Qingdao University, China. He has been an Assis­
tant Professor at Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology,
Chinese Academy of Sciences from 2012 to 2016. He received Hailing Feng Received his PhD in computer science from the
his Ph.D. from Paris7 University and Ocean University of China University of Science and Technology of China in June 2007.
in 2012. He worked in CNRS (France) as Research Engineer, Since 2007, he worked in the school of information engineering
Umea University/KTH Royal Institute of Technology (Sweden) of Zhejiang A&F University. From 2013 to 2014, he was a
as Postdoc Research Fellow, Fundacion FIVAN (Spain) as visiting professor at Forest Products Laboratory, USDA. He is
Experienced Researcher, University College London (UK) as currently a professor in the school of information engineering.
Research Associate, University of Barcelona (Spain) as Postdoc. His main interest areas include computer vision, intelligent
He was a Marie Curie Fellow in European Union’s Seventh information processing, Internet of Things.
Framework Program LANPERCEPT. His research mainly fo­
cuses on Internet of Things, Multimedia, Virtual Reality, Serious Game, HCI, Big data. He
has contributed 300+ papers in the related fields on journals such as IEEE TII, IEEE TITS,
IEEE TFS, IEEE TSMC, IEEE TETC, IEEE TBD, IEEE/ACM TCBB, IEEE TNSE, IEEE TVT, IEEE
TCSS, IEEE JSAC, IEEE JSTSP, IEEE COMMAG, IEEE Network, IEEE IOTJ, ACM TOMM,
ACM TOIT, ACM TIST, and conferences such as ACM MM, ACM CHI, ACM Siggraph, ICCV,
IEEE Virtual Reality. He has more than 20 ESI highly cited papers and 6 ESI hot papers.He
is Editor-in-Chief of Internet of Things and Cyber-Physical Systems(KeAi), an Associate
Editor of IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation System, Computer Communi­ Ranran Lou is currently a graduate student of software engi­
cations, Scientific Reports, Plos one, IEEE Access, Neurocomputing, IET Image Processing, neering in the College of Computer Science and Technology of
PeerJ. He is the Leading Guest Editors for 40 special issues including IEEE Transactions on Qingdao University, and his research direction is Deep
Industrial Informatics, IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation Systems, IEEE Learning and Big Data. He received a bachelor’s degree in
Network, IEEE Sensors, IEEE Consumer Electronics Magazine, IEEE Communications engineering from Qingdao University in 2019. He has extensive
Standards Magazine, IEEE Journal of Biomedical and Health Informatics, Future Gener­ experience in marine data processing.
ation Computer Systems, Neurocomputing, Neural Computing and Applications. He is Co-
Chair or Program Committee member of ACM IUI2015-2021, IEEE CHASE Workshop on
BIGDATA4HEALTH 2016, 2017, IEEE/CIC WIN Workshop 2016, IIKI2016-2021,
WASA2016, 2017, IEEE PDGC2016, ACM SAC2017-WCN Track, IEEE CTS2016 Work­
shop on IoT2016, IEEE DASC2017,2020, ISAPE2017, IoTBDS2017, IEEE AIMS2017, IEEE
iThings-2017, IEEE VTC2017-Fall, IEEE INFOCOM 2020-2021 workshop, ACM MobiCom
2020 workshop, ISAIR2021, ICC 2021 workshop. He has reviewed 300 papers as a
reviewer for journals such as IEEE TMM, ACM TOMM, IEEE TII, IEEE TBD, IEEE TMC, IEEE
TLL, IEEE TETC, IEEE TC, IEEE TVCG, IEEE TITS, IEEE/ACM TCBB, IEEE TDSC, ACM
TOIT, IEEE Network, IEEE MultiMedia, IEEE IOTJ, IEEE COMMAG, and conference e.g.
Huihui Wang is an Associate Professor and the Director of
ACM MUM, ACM CHI, ACM DIS, IEEE EuroVis, ACM UIST, ACM MobileHCI, ACM CHI­
Cybersecurity program at St. Bonaventure University. Dr.
PLAY, ACM CSCW, ACM SUI, ACM ITS, IEEE VAST, IEEE VR, ACM IUI, IEEE 3DUI, ACM
Wang’s current interests are Cybersecurity of Cyber Physical
TVX, ACM Creativity & Cognition, ACM EICS, ACM IDC, IEEE ICSIPA, GI, IEEE ITSC, IEEE
Systems/Internet of Things, and the cyber/engineering edu­
Sensors, ACM ACI, ACM VRST, ACM ISS, ACM HRI. He has received more than 20 awards
cation. She has been awarded about $1.8M from the external
from China, Europe, IEEE. He has received 1.5 million US dollars funding from govern­
grant agencies including NSF, private foundations and in­
ment and industry as PI. He has been involved in many European and Chinese projects
dustry. Dr. Wang has been actively serving as TPC Chairs, re­
supported with funding of 25 million US dollars. He has given 30 invited talks for uni­
viewers of various panels, journals and conferences. She is a
versities and companies in Europe and China, e.g., Aston University, University of Goth­
senior member of IEEE, a member and the Program Chair of
enburg, University of Geneva, Linkoping University, Aarhus University, Norwegian
ASEE (2020-2021).
University of Science and Technology, Delft University of Technology, University of
Electronic Science and Technology of China, Huawei, Alibaba, Tencent. He has given 14
keynote speech for International conferences.

11