An Architecture for Software Defined Drone Networks

Drones or Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) are utilized in a wide range of applications, as they are considered flexible and cost-effective. Novel applications have been recently explored, such as providing communications and Internet coverage where ground infrastructure is lacking or in temporary situations. In this paper, we propose a drone-based network architecture enabled by Software Defined Networking (SDN) to provide dynamic and flexible networking capabilities, suitable for different types of drone applications and deployments, while we discuss associated challenges related to SDN in done networks.