Application of Optical Communication Technology for UAV Swarm

With the rapid advancement of intelligent unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) technology, UAV swarm technology is being increasingly applied with autonomous control, intelligent collaboration, and flexible deployment. It exhibits tremendous potential in emergency rescue, environmental monitoring, wireless communication and other areas. UAV swarms require stable communication links to perform tasks such as formation control, route planning, and data acquisition. To improve the high-speed, secure communication capability and environmental adaptability of UAV swarms, this paper proposes the use of optical communication technology, which offers advantages such as rapid deployment, resistance to electromagnetic interference, and strong confidentiality, to help maintain communication links under special conditions such as emergency scenarios, strong electromagnetic interference, and communication impedance. UAVs are characterized by their high maneuverability and low payload capacity, making it difficult for traditional laser communication to maintain the communication link under such dynamic conditions. This paper proposes an optical communication scheme with a specific divergence angle, ensuring transmission distance and covering a certain communication range. The research results demonstrate that the proposed optical communication platform can maintain a transmission rate of 100 Mbps within a specified angle. We propose that the future direction of UAV optical communication development lies in more efficient transmission and reception technologies, smarter coding and modulation techniques, and enhanced environmental adaptability. Finally, we constructed two scenarios for UAV swarms, including air-to-ground and air-to-air, and assessed the application potential of swarm optical communication technologies in these two scenarios.