Ad Hoc Networks : Technologies and Protocols - University of ...

8 Ad Hoc Networks
pected to be highly dynamic and unpredictable. Communication interruption
and delay are likely, and active deception and jamming are anticipated.
The Office of Naval Research (ONR) is currently investigating efficient system
solutions to address the above problems. ONR envisions unmanned systems
of Intelligent, Autonomous Networked Agents (AINS) to have a profound influence
on future naval operations allowing continuous forward yet unobtrusive
presence and the capability to influence events ashore as required. Unmanned
vehicles have proven to be valuable in gathering tactical intelligence by surveillance
of the battlefield. For example, UAVs such as Predator and Global Hawk
are rapidly becoming integral part of military surveillance and reconnaissance
operations. The goal is to expand the UAV operational capabilities to include
not only surveillance and reconnaissance, but also strike and support mission
(e.g., command, control, and communications in the battle space). This new
class of autonomous vehicles is foreseen as being intelligent, collaborative,
recoverable, and highly maneuverable in support of future naval operations.
In a complex and large scale system of unmanned agents, such as designed
to handle a battlefield scenario, a terrorist attack situation or a nuclear disaster,
there may be several missions going on simultaneously in the same theater. A
particular mission is “embedded” in a much larger “system of systems”. In such
a large scale scenario the wireless, ad hoc communications among the teams
are supported by a global network infrastructure (the “Internet in the sky”).
The global network is provisioned independently of the missions themselves,
but it can opportunistically use several of the missions’ assets (ground, sea or
airborne) to maintain multihop connectivity
Figure 1.1. Internet in the sky architecture designed as part of the ONR supported Minuteman
project at UCLA.