Feasibility of FSO feeder links for drones exploiting COTS components

A key part of future Non-Terrestrial Networks are the low-altitude Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), which can provide ad hoc connectivity in event coverage, emergency communication, and close monitoring. They need high-capacity bidirectional feeder links because of bandwidth-hungry applications and the UAV operation itself. We design the Free Space Optics (FSO) links for 1 Gb/s and 10 Gb/s speed, assuming Commercial Off-the- Shelf (COTS) components. The key impairments that a Gaussian beam experiences under atmospheric turbulence are investigated, including on-axis scintillation, beam wandering, and pointing errors, determining the corresponding effects on link reliability. The results show the feasibility of utilizing COTS components to implement the FSO feeder links in relevant scenarios.