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Modeling Cellular-to-UAV Path-Loss for Suburban Environments

Article  in  IEEE Wireless Communication Letters · September 2017

DOI: 10.1109/LWC.2017.2755643

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 This is the author's version of an article that has been published in this journal. Changes were made to this version by the publisher prior to publication.
The final version of record is available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/LWC.2017.2755643
1

Modeling Cellular-to-UAV Path-Loss

for Suburban Environments
Akram Al-Hourani, Senior Member, IEEE, and Karina Gomez, Member, IEEE

Abstract—Operating unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) over cel-

lular networks would open the barriers of remote navigation
and far-flung flying by combining the benefits of UAVs and the
ubiquitous availability of cellular networks. In this paper, we
provide an initial insight on the radio propagation characteristics
of cellular-to-UAV (CtU) channel. In particular, we model the
statistical behavior of the path-loss from a cellular base station
(BS) toward a flying UAV. Where we report the value of the
path-loss as a function of the depression angle and the terrestrial
coverage beneath the UAV. The provided model is derived based
on extensive experimental data measurements conducted in a
typical suburban environment for both terrestrial (by drive test)
and aerial coverage (using a UAV). The model provides simple
and accurate prediction of CtU path-loss that can be useful for
both researchers and network operators alike.
Fig. 1. A typical Cellular-to-UAV radio channel is largely dependent on the
Index Terms—Cellular-to-UAV channel modeling, 5G net- depression angle θ between the UAV and the cellular base station.
works, path-loss, aerial communication, air-to-ground channel
modeling, Drone channel modeling.
controlling neighboring interference. However, for a flying
I. I NTRODUCTION UAV it might face a large amount of neighboring interference
as-well-as a different coverage behavior due to the down-tilted
T HE emerging utilization of unmanned aerial vehicles
(UAV) is taking an accelerating pace by harvesting the
maturity of microelectronics technology. UAVs offer agile and
antenna pattern. Thus, UAV radio propagation is expected
to behave differently than the well-known terrestrial models
and there is a paramount importance to carefully characterize
cost-effective solutions for many demanding civilian applica-
its attributes. This has led several telecommunication vendors
tions, with an expected market growth of at least 10 folds
and research institutes to start investigating and conducting
from 2016 to 2021 as per the Federal Aviation Administration
experimental campaigns on the CtU topic; examples can be
(FAA), with over than 5 million drones in the United State
found in Ericsson, Nokia, ZTE, LG, QUALCOMM.
alone. Applications of drones are numerous ranging from
package delivery, aerial photography, agriculture and pest UAV communication is also gaining attention within the
control, site inspection and surveys, to public safety services 3GPP standardization activities, the early stages of these
such as providing coverage for remote areas [1]. activities are focusing around the requirements of connec-
No matter whether the drone is fully autonomous or begin tivity services for drones, evaluation scenarios and channel
remotely piloted, it is vital for the UAV to have a reliable models, in addition to consideration of interference mitigation
communication link towards the operator. This link can be aspects [2]. The work in [3] proposes a preliminary model
used for remotely piloting the aircraft and for real-time up- for path-loss exponents and shadowing for the radio channel
date of telemetry data. In addition, it can cater for specific between airborne UAV and cellular networks. Presented results
payload needs such as live-video surveillance and wireless show that path-loss exponent decreases as the UAV climbs
relay services. From this perspective, cellular networks can higher, approximating to free-space propagation model at UAV
be seen as a potential candidate for providing the needed heights around 100 m. The authors pointed out the need for
connectivity infrastructure for UAVs; with established ubiqui- height-dependent parameters for describing the propagation
tous existence coupled with controlled quality of service and channel of UAVs.
seamless mobility. Thus, there is indeed a great interest from In this paper, we suggest a new modeling approach for
telecommunication industry and standardization bodies (such CtU communication channel, capable of capturing the mean
as 3GPP) to extend conventional terrestrial cellular services to path-loss between a UAV and its serving BS as-well-as it
aerial users in future 5G networks. characterizes the endured shadowing statistics. We base our
Several challenges exist around the utilization of current model on extensive field experiments that involve collecting
cellular networks, as they are purely designed to carter for both terrestrial and aerial coverage samples and comparing the
terrestrial users. Take an example the down-tilt of the sector two sets. The main differentiator of this paper is around the
antennas, this is a rule-of-thumb in confining cells radii for method we model the CtU channel, where we characterize the
path-loss as an excess value added on top of the already-know
A. Al-Hourani e-mail: akram.hourani@ieee.org terrestrial path-loss. This excess has a strong dependency on

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 This is the author's version of an article that has been published in this journal. Changes were made to this version by the publisher prior to publication.
The final version of record is available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/LWC.2017.2755643
2

the depression angle as proven by the experimental results.

II. C ELLULAR - TO -UAV C HANNEL BACKGROUND

Terrestrial cellular communication has been around for
decades with very mature channel models in different radio
environments and over a wide range of frequencies. These
models help both engineers and researchers alike to strate-
gically plan cellular network coverage and swiftly predict
its performance. Standardized channel models for terrestrial
communication are recommended by both 3GPP and ITU [4],
Fig. 2. An aerial photograph of the environment under study, indicating the
where it is widely accepted to use a log-distance path-loss location of the cellular tower.
model for its simplicity, given as follows,
 
d
PL(d) = 10α log + PL(do ) + Xσ propagation characteristics, such as the low penetration loss
do
and the good ability to diffract around objects. The logging
= 10α log(d) + C + Xσ , (1) phone is a typical Android phone Sony Xperia loaded with an
where PL(d) is the path-loss in dB at a given terrestrial Android-based drive test logging app. We list the parameters
distance d from the BS, while do is a selected reference of measurement setup in Table I.
point with a known path-loss, and Xσ is the shadowing
component that is usually modeled as a zero-mean Gaussian TABLE I
M EASUREMENT S ETUP PARAMETERS
random variable Xσ ∼ N (0, σ 2 ). The constant part of the
model C depends on many parameters including the operating Parameter Value
frequency and antennas gain. While the path-loss exponent α Propagation environment Typical suburban
Technology LTE
largely depends on the propagation environment including the Band 850 MHz
density, type and height of buildings and vegetation. Mobile phone and logger Android-based
Not to confuse with air-to-ground (AtG) channel models Vehicle penetration loss Lcar 5.1 dB
Study area 12 km2
[5], the presented work here focuses on cellular-to-UAV (CtU) Number of aerial samples 13,425
which is about the ability of current cellular networks to Number of terrestrial samples 9,128
cover potential remotely piloted aircrafts, as depicted in Fig. 1. Mean aerial speed 4.8 m/s
Base station height zBS 30 m (monopole tower)
While AtG, on the other hand, deals with the potential of using Nominal UAV heights zUAV {15, 30, 60, 90, 120} m
aerial platforms to deliver wireless services to ground users Sample acquisition rate 2 Hz (approx.)
[1]. It is intuitive to expect that a UAV will have better channel
conditions than a terrestrial receiver due to the enhanced
probability of achieving line-of-sight (LoS) with the tower.
A. Terrestrial Measurements
However, cellular BSs usually feature downtilted antennas (4-
8◦ ) in order to reduce the co-channel interference and to We have conducted extensive drive test measurements in
confine the cell coverage area. This downtilt will contradict all directions around the BS tower, as indicated in Fig 3.
the enhancement in the LoS condition and will eventually The samples of the coverage were collected in terms of the
cause the UAV channel to deteriorate lower than the terrestrial reference signal received power (RSRP) of the LTE signal
coverage level. using the same handset utilized for the UAV coverage and the
same serving BS. In order to exclude the effect of the vehicle’s
III. M EASUREMENT S ETUP penetration loss Lcar , we have conducted a walk-test for a
smaller area and then compared the RSRP with / without the
The selected area for the experiment is a typical suburb in car, where Lcar is calculated as the average difference between
Victoria, Australia, located to the west of Melbourne and has the RSRP of the two cases.
reasonably good locations to fly a UAV. The height of the
houses and buildings ranges between 5-12 m having a typical
vegetation density of Victorian suburbs with trees height can B. Aerial Measurements
reach up to 40 m. The terrain profile is around +/-10 m with We select to use a commercially available aerial vehicle
respect to the location of the BS tower. To have a realistic capable of handling a total payload of 450 g, providing reliable
depiction of the experiment area, an aerial photograph was and easy-to-fly platform with the ability to log all on-board
taken from the southern side of the suburb as indicated in Fig. flight sensors (IMU, compass, altimeter, GPS). See the photo
2. The site under test is a typical greenfield monopole tower of in Fig. 4 of the utilized platform. The UAV was manually
height zBS = 30 m, with a typical three-sectors configuration. controlled to perform flying maneuvers at every test site, with
The selection of the frequency band 850 MHz was based on the aim to hold a nominal flying altitude at {15, 30, 60, 90,
the availability of the particular cellular operator that is used 120} m as much as possible. The flying sites were selected in
to conduct these experiments. Generally, the bands in 700- open areas with no underlying houses to comply with CASA
900 MHz are widely used for LTE due to their favorable rules. The total number of aerial sites is 8 as indicated in Fig. 5

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 This is the author's version of an article that has been published in this journal. Changes were made to this version by the publisher prior to publication.
The final version of record is available at
1500
Base Station
Roads
1000
500
Map y-axis [m]
0
-500
-1000
-1500
-1500 -1000 -500 0 500 1000
Map x-axis [m]
Fig. 3. The terrestrial coverage of the cellular LTE BS under test, reported
in terms of the RSRP.
Fig. 4. A photograph of the utilized UAV in the experiment, showing the
mobile phone mount.
showing the 3D flight path superimposed on top of the digital
elevation map (DEM) of the terrain.
IV. C ELLULAR - TO -UAV PATH -L OSS M ODEL
In many countries, the regulated maximum allowed UAV
altitude is set to the range of 100-150 m (e.g. 120 m in Aus-
tralia and USA) that is in order to reduce the risk on manned
aircrafts. Accordingly, the flying altitude will correspond to
a depression angle in the approximate range of {−2◦ , 10◦ },
meaning that the LoS path is almost tangential to the urban
propagation environment as indicated in Fig. 1. Thus, the
essence of our suggested CtU model is that it extends typical
terrestrial coverage by adding an excess path-loss on top of the
mean terrestrial path-loss according to the following equation,
PLUAV (d, θ) = PLTer (d) + η(θ) + XUAV (θ),
where PLTer (d) is the mean terrestrial path-loss of the point
beneath the UAV given in (1), while η(θ) is the excess
aerial path-loss, and XUAV (θ) is a Gaussian random vari-
able ∼ N (0, σUAV (θ)) with an angle-dependent standard de-
viation σUAV (θ) representing the shadowing component.
Copyright (c) 2017 IEEE. Personal use is permitted. For any other purposes, permission must be obtained from the IEEE by emailing pubs-permissions@ieee.org.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/LWC.2017.2755643
3
-70
-75
-80
-85
RSRP [dBm]
-90
-95
-100
-105
Fig. 5. The flight path of the UAV, where the color gradient indicates the
-110
altitude. DEM map and roads outline were sourced from the Australian Urban
-115 Research Infrastructure Network (AURIN).
1500
The advantage of the proposed approach of angle-based
modeling over height-based modeling [3] is that it adopts
more consistent consideration of the propagation channel. To
illustrate this concept, consider the situation when the UAV is
approaching the cellular tower with a given fixed altitude, it
will gradually move from a low-LoS condition (or partial-LoS)
into a full-LoS condition, these are two distinct propagation
cases that have different path-loss exponent and different
shadowing behavior. While in the angle-based approach; for
a given depression angle the direct propagation path will
always have a consistent interaction with the underlaying
urban environment. It has been widely demonstrated in the
literature and experimentation that angle-based approaches fits
better for aerial channel modeling [1], [6], [7].
For properly understanding the excess η(θ) we first conduct
a terrestrial drive test as explained in Sec. III-A. The collected
terrestrial RSRP samples are then post-processed and catego-
rized according to their distance toward the serving BS d as
indicated in Fig. 6, after that we fit these samples to the well-
known log-distance path-loss model in (1) where we obtain
both the path-loss exponent α and the shadowing standard
deviation σTer as listed in Table II. The path-loss offset C is
not reported as it depends on the exact equivalent isotropic
radiated power (EIRP) of the BS, and it is not of an interest
in our path-loss model.
The processing of the aerial RSRP samples includes the
conversion of their geographic coordinates into local three-
dimensional Cartesian coordinates having the reference point
as the BS, accordingly both the depression angle θ and the
ground pdistance d are calculated. Note that the ground distance
d = (xUAV − xBS )2 + (yUAV − yBS )2 is the 2D distance
between the projection of the UAV and the BS. The excess
path-loss is then calculated as,
η̂(θ) = RSRPTer (d) + Lcar − RSRPUAV (θ, d), (4)
where RSRPUAV (θ, d) is the UAV RSRP sample, while
(2)
RSRPTer (d) is the corresponding interpolated terrestrial
RSRP, and Lcar is the car penetration loss, added to com-
pensate the difference between outdoor coverage and in-car
coverage. The resulting η̂(θ) samples are plotted in Fig. 7
combining the measurement sets of all the 8 flight locations.
It is important to note that samples below 5 m were excluded
 This is the author's version of an article that has been published in this journal. Changes were made to this version by the publisher prior to publication.
The final version of record is available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/LWC.2017.2755643
4

 
θ − θo
PLUAV (d, θ) = 10α log(d) + A(θ − θo ) exp − + ηo + N (0, aθ + σo ), (3)
B
| {z } | {z }
Terrestiral path-loss Aerial excess path-loss

-60 simpler linear trend modeled as follows,

Terrestrial RSRP [dBm]

σUAV (θ) = aθ + σo , (6)

-80
where a and σo are also fitting parameters given in Table II. In
order to verify the statistical validity of the collected samples
-100 Terr. Coverage Samples for every bin, we obtain the relative standard error of the mean
Execluded Samples
(RSE) as RSEη̂ (θ) = √σUAV (θ) where N (θ) is the number
Fit Model N (θ)η̂(θ)
Shadowing of samples in the bin. The calculated average RSE is < 2.8%
-120
100 1000 2000 indicating the validity the sample size.
Ground Distance [m]
TABLE II
Fig. 6. The samples of the terrestrial RSRP scattered with respect to the M ODEL PARAMETERS
propagation distance, showing the log-distance path-loss fitting model. Parameter Symbol Value
Terrestrial path-loss exponent α 3.04
20 Terrestrial shadowing standard deviation σTer 8.52
Excess path-loss scaler A -23.29
Excess Path-Loss ( ) [dB]

10 Excess path-loss offset ηo 20.70

0 Angle scaler
-10
-20
-30
-2 0 2 4 6
Depression Angle ( ) [°]
Fig. 7. The excess path-loss η of the CtU channel with respect to the
corresponding terrestrial coverage beneath the UAV.
from the model as they are pretty much obeying pure terrestrial
propagation.
We can notice in Fig. 7 the large extent of consistent
dependency on the depression angle. The trend of the excess
path-loss is very intuitive; as the depression angle increases
there will be a reduction in the obstacles between the UAV
and the tower and thus a reduction in the path-loss. However,
the path-loss then starts to increase as the effect of down-
tilted antenna pattern dominates. The path-loss continues this
trend until the aerial signal eventually deteriorates below the
corresponding terrestrial signal beneath the UAV. It can be
noticed that in most of cases CtU outperforms terrestrial
coverage. In order to understand the behavior of the excess
path-loss we bin the samples in every 1◦ and obtain the bin’s
mean and its standard deviation as indicated in the discrete
points of Fig. 7, then we fit the mean points to the following
exponential formula,
 
θ − θo
η(θ) = A(θ − θo ) exp −
B
where A, B, θo and ηo are fitting parameters given in Table II.
While the angle-dependent standard deviation shows much
Angle offset θo -3.61
B 4.14
UAV shadowing slope a -0.41
UAV Samples UAV shadowing offset σo 5.86
Bin's Mean
Bin's Std
Mean Fit
Substituting (5) and (6) into (2) we can get the proposed
Std Fit path-loss model in a single equation (3).
8 10 V. C ONCLUSION
This paper provided a premier on cellular-to-UAV channel
modeling in terms of the mean path-loss and the shadowing
statistics. The modeling principle is based on the depression
angle that heavily influences the excess in the path-loss due to
two contradicting effects; first is the enhanced LoS condition
of the UAV and second is the reduced BS antenna gain due to
the down-tilt of the antenna pattern. Future work might include
investigating denser urban environments, and experimenting
different 5G frequency bands such as millimeter-wave.
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