Communication techniques for Remotely Piloted Aircraft with Integrated Modular Avionics

The research project OMOSA (Open Modular/Open Source Avionics Architecture for Remotely Piloted Aircraft Systems — RPAS) is about implementing the principle of an Integrated Modular Avionics (IMA) for RPAS. Therefore open source hard- and software should be used. An IMA consists of a flight control unit, a navigation unit and a communication unit. To achieve a certificate to use the IMA in an RPAS, it must feature redundancy and failsafe concepts. For different application scenarios, various security aspects for the communication link need to be considered. For this purpose different communication modules like software defined radio (SDR), long range modules (LoRa) and GSM modems have been evaluated to provide a secure command and control (C2) link for the RPAS.