Satellite 5G: IoT Use Case for Rural Areas Applications

One of the key drivers for next-generation mobile communications, 5G, is the support of the Internet of Things (IoT) with billions of objects being connected to the Internet with low latency. The 5G technology will support the realization of smart cities, smart environments, and big data applications. Within the 5G framework, the terrestrial services can be augmented with the recent development of High Throughput Satellite (HTS) systems and mega-Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite constellations. In this paper, we investigate the integration of 5G technology and IoT by means of an aerial component composed of drones and satellites for a rural scenario. The prospected system can provide enhanced services, e.g., fire alarm detection, smart agriculture, animal tracking, and plant disease control. A use case of an agriculture application consisting of a number of areas whose sensor data are collected via drones is described. The proposed architecture consists of the drones connected to a satellite system to provide the necessary network control and connectivity. Subsequently, the satellite segment is connected to the terrestrial network and then to the cloud. In this study, we refer to a rural area scenario where drones are used to detect fire alarms collecting sensors data on the field, aggregating them, and then delivering messages via satellite to a control center. An analytical model has been developed to characterize the distribution of the time to detect and deliver an alarm. This study depends on many parameters; in particular, we have investigated the impact of the area size served by a drone, the maximum sensors range, and the sensor duty cycle. Keywords–5G; Satellite Networks; UAVs.