Modular communications and software-defined networks for aerospace applications

• Main Authors: Lyke, James, Peters, Christian, Pham, Khanh, Fronterhouse, Don, Hannon, Matt
• Format: Conference Proceeding
• Language: English
• Published: SPIE 30.04.2019
• ISBN: 9781510626959; 1510626956
• ISSN: 0277-786X
• DOI: 10.1117/12.2519918

This paper describes a modular strategy for communications in which each platform (being a satellite, airplane, missile/munition, even soldiers) carries a hub-and-spoke internal network integrating a variety of modems and other information devices. These embedded networks, referred to as “global network access terminals” (GNATs), are in fact information convergence devices that seek connection with other peers (subject to constraints, such as energy and security) to form basic “substrate networks” (a type of mobile ad hoc networks). Overlays are formed on top of these oftenunreliable substrates, permitting the virtualization of networks that can appear to be more reliable, hence a type of softwaredefined network (SDN). The concepts for this type of SDN is drawn from the rich base of SDN and network functional virtualization (NFV) concepts used in cloud computing , except that they are must be optimized for the heterogeneous and rapidly changing nature of the basic substrate network formed opportunistically by GNATs.