High Dynamic Mobile Topology-Based Clustering Algorithm for UAV Swarm Networks

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) have become one of the key technologies to achieve future data collection due to their high mobility, rapid deployment, low cost, and the ability to establish line-of-sight communication links. However, when UAV swarm perform tasks in narrow spaces, they often encounter various spatial obstacles, building shielding materials, and high-speed node movements, which result in intermittent network communication links and cannot support the smooth completion of tasks. In this paper, a high mobility and dynamic topology of the UAV swarm is particularly considered and the high dynamic mobile topology-based clustering (HDMTC) algorithm is proposed. Simulation and real flight verification results verify that the proposed HDMTC algorithm achieves higher stability of network, longer link expiration time (LET), and longer node lifetime, all of which improve the communication performance for UAV swarm networks.