Wireless Infrastructure Drone based on NR-U: A Perspective

The rapid growth of drone technology is creating a unique opportunity for cellular operator to realize flying infrastructure called as Wireless Infrastructure Drone (WID). WID provides wireless connectivity and has capability to stir itself to improve spectral efficiency, coverage, and quality of experience of the end users. In this paper, we present 5G NR-U based WID that can be used as a base station, relay, or data collector/disseminator. We explore the regulatory and standardization efforts for integrating drones into the cellular network. The non-standalone NR-U network architecture is designed and explained for WID. Lastly, several opportunities of NR-U for the WID are described and concluded with design challenges.