Implementation Consideration for Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast on Unmanned Aircraft Systems

There is increasing interest by the Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) community in the technologies comprising Automatic Dependent Surveillance–Broadcast and its potential operational applications. However, there are significant weight, space, power and cost challenges to applying ADS-B to small UAS. The MITRE Corporation has been conducting research on ADS-B for many years and has recently been investigating applying ADS-B to small UAS. From this experience have emerged unique insights about the ADS-B technologies and considerations of interest to UAS and avionics implementers. This paper examines the technology, the key issues affecting weight and performance, and issues that impact UAS avionics costs.