Spectrum and Operational Efficiency Optimization Using Airborne Communication Network Capacity Modeling for Cognitive Radios

The radio spectrum is one of the most important elements in current communications; nevertheless, it is a limited resource and must be used in a responsible way to host emerging technologies. These technologies include Airborne Communication Networks (ACN), which has attracted much attention of researchers and industry over the last years. The drivers of ACN are mainly to fulfill the mobile communications requirements from passengers, and support the constant growth in aeronautical communications needs. In this paper, requirements of communication channel capacity for future airborne network are studied in order to simulate an airborne network in North Atlantic Tracks (NAT), which cover up to 80% of all oceanic and aerial traffic. To this end, the main aircraft models that fly over this air space as well as the estimation of the future capacity channel of each aircraft are contemplated in order to reduce the spectrum demand and optimize the operational efficiency in the ACN. This paper also presents the use of cognitive radios for the implementation of ACN due to its flexibility for switching to other wireless protocols, integrating new standards in aircraft without substantial cost, developing monitoring tools to guarantee QoS, processing signals for more efficiently use of spectrum and ensuring the scalability and reconfigurability of system. Finally, the simulations results obtained will be used to determine the dimensions of the ACN in terms of number of frequencies and channel capacity, as well as its implementation in cognitive radio on board aircraft