Papers for
drone fleet managers
Papers whose findings have a practical use for this group, as judged from the abstract. Open a paper to read what it means in practice.
Two robots’ exact collision-free paths solved for optimal movement
A complete analytical characterization of optimal collision-free motion for two robots
Abstract: Collision-free motion planning for multi-agent robotic systems remains an active research area because of the complexity of coordinating robot trajectories, with applications ranging from coordinated drone shows to autonomous operations on land, in the air, and on water. Importantly, the analytical difficulty of nonconvex collision-avoidance constraints has so far driven the development of exclusively numerical methods. We derive a complete analytical characterization of the optimal trajectories for two robots that start and end at rest, under double-integrator dynamics and a squared-acceleration objective. We prove that these trajectories belong to eight distinct contact families and determine which family applies for each configuration of initial and final positions. We analyze the geometrical properties of the optimal trajectories, provide a numerical algorithm for computing them, and discuss how these insights may improve the performance of existing numerical trajectory optimizers.
Federated motion uncertainty improves uav tracking across multiple operators
Federated Calibration of Motion Uncertainty for UAV Tracking in Multi-Operator ISAC Systems
Abstract: In integrated sensing and communication (ISAC) systems involving multiple operators, unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) tracking can benefit from sensing at multiple base stations, while raw sensing records, channel information, and transmit decisions remain local to each operator. The resulting problem is to obtain a reliable UAV prediction from different track estimates and use it to guide transmission without centralizing their data or control variables. To resolve this, we propose a two-timescale framework comprising slow-timescale motion-uncertainty calibration and online track fusion with predictive beamforming. Local radar innovations calibrate the uncertainty assigned by each tracker to unmodeled UAV motion, with only the resulting parameters shared across operators. During online tracking, covariance intersection (CI) combines local estimates without requiring knowledge of correlations between their estimation errors. The fused prediction then guides each operator's transmission design subject to communication QoS, power, and tracking constraints. We further establish exact rank one recovery for the communication covariances and finite interval bounds on local tracking uncertainty. Simulations show improved consistency of tracking uncertainty under substantial motion model mismatch. CI avoids overconfidence under correlated errors, while using the current fused prediction reduces RMSE by about 31% relative to transmission designed for communication alone, with less than 2% additional power. Ablation further shows that the power difference between current and outdated predictions is driven mainly by predictive covariance rather than predictive mean.
Dynamic scheduling reduces maritime task delays by optimizing multi-layer networks
Dynamic Task and Resource Scheduling Towards Space-Air-Ground-Sea Integrated Network
Abstract: In the context of 6G ubiquitous connectivity, the space-air-ground-sea integrated network (SAGSIN) emerges as a new paradigm for pervasive service provisioning. To support expanding maritime activities in infrastructure-scarce ocean areas, we propose an innovative dynamic task and resource scheduling approach for SAGSIN to deliver computing services for vessels. It integrates broad-coverage satellites, relay-capable high-altitude platform (HAP), energy-sufficient coastal base station (BS), and flexibly deployed uncrewed aerial vehicles (UAVs) to accommodate wide-area, highly mobile, and sustained maritime services. To address the challenge of task scheduling across four layers, a dynamic task offloading algorithm is developed. It steers task flows toward servers with light loads, strong computing capabilities, and high-rate links based on real-time system states to reduce task execution delay, integrating an anticipatory satellite handover strategy to mitigate post-handover congestion and improving satellite resource utilization. Considering the limited endurance of UAVs, we impose residual energy constraints to ensure task backlog handover and safe return. Furthermore, the UAV-BS bandwidth allocation, UAV trajectories, and computing resource allocation are jointly optimized to enhance the connectivity among low-altitude devices and accelerate task completion. Simulation results validate the proposed method's superior adaptability to system resource variations during task execution in complex maritime environments, achieving at least a 23% reduction in average task delay over benchmarks.