APRÈN. Portal de la producció docent del professorat de la UPC

This work develops the proposal to implement a system able to search for missing persons in a mountainous environment using a multi-robotic system (MRS) structure formed by a set of drones, whose control is centralised in an entity called middleware, which will manage all decision-making and information processing. Its main objective is to take advantage of the latest technologies in unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), communications and artificial intelligence (AI), and apply them to search and rescue (SAR) operations in high mountain environments. With these advances, the system aims to reduce deployment time and improve detection capabilities, which will increase the chances of survival of the missing person. On the other hand, is pretended to reduce the footprint of the current search procedures, opting for a more environmentally friendly approach. To meet this objective, a detailed study of the procedures, technologies and infrastructures involved in the proposed solution has been carried out. A functional architecture has been provided to coordinate multiple UAVs under a centralised control scheme assumed by the middleware. Throughout the development, aspects involved in the solution have been addressed in detail, such as: approach of the aerial platforms used together with their characterisation and requirements. Approach of the system in charge of processing the images in real time, specifying the model of the intelligence model and the compatible hardware. On the other hand, systems such as the middleware and the ground station have been detailed, including functions, architecture and components. Finally, a detailed theoretical analysis of the radio link between the squadron and the ground station has been carried out. Technical aspects such as the link budget, the modulation used as well as the expected transmission rate have been considered. Our result is a theoretical basis that can be used to implement the proposed system. On the other hand, it contains considerations on the feasibility of the solution and the compatibility with the proposed environment at first. It also mentions the most relevant challenges that will have to be faced before this idea can be realised, as well as proposals for improvements that will increase the value of the solution. Finally, has been carried out an analysis to assess the sustainability of the project, which can be very useful to ensure that the idea is implemented in the most sustainable and environmentally responsible way.

El objetivo principal de este proyecto es optimizar el sistema de comunicaciones de un hangar para la gestión de los sistemas de iluminación, seguridad y climatización del Aeropuerto de Lleida- Alguaire. Esto incluirá la integración de todas estas funciones en un sistema de gestión inteligente. Que nos permitirá monitorizar y controlar cada sistema en tiempo real, además de reducir el consumo energético y los costes operativos a largo plazo, siguiendo siempre la filosofía del aeropuerto de sostenibilidad y eficiencia. Para conseguir estos objetivos, haremos un estudio detallado de todas las partes de la instalación, desde los sistemas de iluminación hasta los mecanismos de control de accesos y climatización. Compararemos las tecnologías más actuales del mercado, para identificar y valorar cuáles se ajustan mejor a nuestras necesidades. Además, elaboraremos planos detallados de las instalaciones, junto con los cálculos específicos necesarios para cada sistema.

En el context del creixement constant del trànsit aeri, els equipatges constitueixen un factor molt important en el transport de passatgers. Aquest projecte pretén oferir una solució innovadora a algunes de les etapes logístiques del transport, identificant i seguint els equipatges durant els recorreguts que requereixin un carro porta-equipatges. Actualment, 6,9 equipatges de cada 1000 són notificats com a mal gestionats, cosa que suposa un cost per a la indústria de 2,5 mil milions de dòlars. L'any 2018, la IATA va publicar la Resolució 753, on s'estableixen nous estàndards per al seguiment dels equipatges, fomentant la implantació de la tecnologia RFID per a la seva identificació. Aquest projecte realitza un estudi sobre l'aplicació del RFID, detallant les característiques i el funcionament d'aquesta tecnologia sense fils, amb un enfocament especial en la seva compatibilitat amb l'àmbit aeronàutic. Es seleccionen els components del sistema RFID (lector, antenes i etiquetes) d'acord amb les especificacions tècniques requerides i la viabilitat econòmica. També es defineix un canal que representa l'escenari real d'un carro porta-equipatges comú. Finalment, es presenten els resultats que demostren la viabilitat de la proposta i la millor configuració per a la seva implantació.

El sector de los drones ha experimentado un crecimiento significativo, con aplicaciones en diversas áreas que buscan optimizar operaciones en zonas de difícil acceso, reducir costes y aumentar la seguridad. En este contexto, el proyecto tiene como objetivo principal el desarrollo de un sistema de evasión de colisiones entre drones utilizando comunicaciones 5G, una tecnología que ofrece ventajas como la baja latencia, alta disponibilidad y capacidad para manejar grandes volúmenes de datos. El principal objetivo de este trabajo es desarrollar un sistema que permita a los drones evitar colisiones en un espacio aéreo cada vez más congestionado, utilizando para ello la tecnología 5G. El sistema se basa en la detección de otros drones en las cercanías mediante peticiones a un servidor central y comunicaciones directas cuando los drones están muy próximos. Este enfoque busca asegurar que los drones puedan realizar maniobras evasivas de manera eficiente y segura. Para lograr este objetivo, el proyecto detalla la implementación de un algoritmo de evasión que define roles jerárquicos entre los drones en conflicto, asignando un dron maestro que mantiene su ruta y un dron esclavo que realiza las maniobras evasivas necesarias. Además, se ha desarrollado un simulador en C# y Windows Forms con una base de datos en MySQL para probar y visualizar el comportamiento del algoritmo bajo diferentes escenarios, evaluando el impacto en tiempo de vuelo, distancia recorrida, el consumo de batería, y la cantidad de maniobras de evasión ejecutadas, entre otros factores fundamentales que permiten comprender cómo estos afectan al rendimiento general del sistema. Los objetivos del proyecto han sido alcanzados con éxito. El sistema de evasión desarrollado se ha demostrado altamente funcional, mostrando una gran capacidad para reducir la probabilidad de colisiones en un entorno aéreo denso. Las comunicaciones 5G resultan ser cruciales, tanto para la detección de otros drones como para la efectividad de las maniobras evasivas. La jerarquía de prioridades ha permitido dar mayor relevancia a los servicios de emergencia, asegurando que las misiones críticas no se vean comprometidas. Además, el simulador ha permitido realizar un análisis exhaustivo del sistema, identificando configuraciones óptimas que mejoran la eficiencia de las maniobras y reducen los conflictos. Este sistema, aunque se presenta como una primera versión, tiene un gran potencial de evolución, con futuras líneas de investigación orientadas a la mejora del realismo en las simulaciones, la implementación de inteligencia artificial y la adaptación dinámica de las áreas de protección. Finalmente, se concluye que el proyecto es sostenible a largo plazo desde un punto de vista ambiental, económico y social, contribuyendo a la reducción de la contaminación y los costes operativos, y generando nuevas oportunidades laborales en el sector tecnológico.

This work aims to evaluate FBMC modulation in comparison to OFDM for 5G networks, considering the need to explore technological alternatives for 5G and beyond. Although OFDM is maintained in 5G due to its compatibility with 4G systems, FBMC is presented as a promising option to improve spectral efficiency and reduce latency. The methodology employed consists of MATLAB simulations in three different scenarios: indoor, rural and urban. In each scenario, key parameters such as BER versus SNR, latency, spectral efficiency and throughput are compared. These simulations allow us to determine which modulation is best suited to the different conditions. The results indicate that, in terms of BER vs. SNR, both FBMC and OFDM show similar performance in rural and urban environments, while in indoor environments, FBMC requires a high sampling rate and larger inter-subcarrier spacing to assume adequate BER values. On the other hand, FBMC excels in all scenarios in latency, thanks to having no cyclic prefix, as it reduces latency and makes it more suitable for applications requiring URLLC communications in 5G. FBMC also offers better spectral efficiency in all cases analyzed, which makes it an attractive alternative in environments with high user density, such as urban areas. However, it should be emphasized that FBMC involves higher complexity and higher SNR to achieve optimal performance, this is a disadvantage in terms of cost and implementation compared to OFDM. In conclusion, while OFDM remains a robust and cost-effective option for 5G deployments, FBMC excels in scenarios where latency and spectral efficiency are critical. In future work, system optimization using equalizers could be implemented to decrease the number of errors and be able to use higher order modulations. In this way we could fully explore the capabilities of FBMC in environments with high data demands.

With the exponential growth of the Internet of Things (IoT), more and more municipalities are incorporating new technologies to effectively manage their resources and improve the quality of life for their citizens. In this context, this work primarily focuses on the development of a LoRaWAN network for the municipality of Vila-seca as part of the effort to transform the municipality into a smart city. The motivation for this project stems from the expressed interest of the Vila-seca City Council in exploring LoRa technology for future projects. The main objective is to verify the functionality and viability of LoRaWAN technology in this particular context. The study encompasses the planning of the technological platform and the management of equipment procurement for its deployment. Additionally, a theoretical coverage study using software has been conducted to evaluate the network's range, as well as an analysis of potential interferences within the municipality. Detailed configurations and processes are explained to establish a functional service, along with field measurements to verify the quality of the service to be provided. Furthermore, the integration of IoT device data management with the blockchain network has been explored to enhance security and data integrity. This involves research into solutions and the implementation of all necessary elements to ensure proper functioning. At the end of the thesis, conclusions based on the obtained results are presented, along with the challenges that arose throughout the project and the solutions implemented to address them. This critical analysis of the work enables reflection on the achieved results and provides recommendations for future work in this field.

The objective of this document is to study and verify the development and improvements in Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) for difficult access environments since this matter is a critical area of research and innovation. As the use of UAS in various applications continues to expand, the need for these systems to operate in challenging environments such as mountainous terrain, dense forests, or urban areas with high-rise structures is increasing. The main motivation to start developing this project was the challenge exposed in the Xprize Rainforest Competition. The $10M XPRIZE Rainforest is a five-year competition to enhance the understanding of the rainforest ecosystem. I am part of the semifinalist team, Providence Plus, a multidisciplinary team composed by scientists from UPC, CSIC, MIT, and TUDelf. The purpose of this challenge is to obtain the maximum amount of information on biodiversity in the rainforest, using drone technology in this type of environment, with all the difficulties inherent in this environment that must be overcome and that are also the subject of analysis in this work, to propose and compare the different solutions and technologies to achieve the objectives of said challenge. As resources for competing in Xprize Challenge are limited and the final solution shall be scalable, the technologies evaluated must be cost efficient and practical. The first difficulty in this kind of environments is the signal strength and signal quality, not only for the drone commands but for the video and telemetry data. In this work, different solutions will be compared since analogic to digital technology. The second difficulty is autonomy, in terms of energetic supply. Taking into account the Rainforest environment and environmental policies, the most suitable technology available is batteries. There are several types of batteries that are suitable for drones, depending on the size, weight, and specifications of the drone. There will be a comparison between the most popular ones. Apart from that, an analysis of different propulsion configurations (ideal motors and propellers) will be carried out in order to achieve an optimal flight time without compromising the structural integrity of the drone. The third difficulty is reducing noise levels, in order to avoid disturbing the wildlife and with the goal in mind of having the best images possible, a study of different propellers will be carried out. Finally, durability and weather resistance: Rainforests are characterized by high humidity, heavy rainfall, and extreme heat. Drones used in this environment must be built to withstand these conditions and be weather-resistant. This may involve using materials that can withstand moisture, designing waterproof housing for sensitive components, and installing heat dissipation systems to prevent overheating.

In this final degree project, a problem for farmers who collect fruits from the trees is considered. We are going to focus on apples and pears harvest, although the same system could be applicable to other farming activities. The aim of this project is to find an alternative to the inefficient and excessive systems currently used during harvest time, and to set out a solution to the problem by designing a functional prototype. The prototype will be autonomous and will follow farm workers along the fields at a configured distance. It will consist of a specific hardware and software with the Machine Learning application about sensor processing to know the position of the worker constantly. Finally, the production costs will be analyzed, comparing the prototype and the current systems. A discussion about future improvements of this prototype and how it can be applicable to other farming activities is also included in the present work.

Currently, air pollution is an obvious reality in the world that poses a risk to public health. Efforts are being made to reduce emissions of polluting gases into the atmosphere and to expand warning services to protect the population from episodes of high pollution. One of the tools used to monitor the problem are the air pollution maps. In Catalonia, these maps are made by interposing the measurements of the permanent stations of the Generalitat distributed throughout the entire territory. The distribution of these stations is not homogeneous and, therefore, the resolution / quality of the map depends very much on the proximity or not to one of these stations. In the near future, these maps also take into account the data provided by Copernicus' European satellite system, which offers a resolution of 7x7 km. If we had more gas measuring equipment, installed in buildings or vehicles with polluting emissions, such as bicycle models, they could be densified at a low cost and deploy a network of sensors that could affect the resolution and reliability of the pollution maps in the most populated areas. In this project we have developed a prototype device for the measurement of air pollutants. The measurement device is lightweight, low cost, with a very low power consumption, includes a microcontroller, different sensors, a positioning system and radio communications. The obtained measurements are sent to a server that are stored in a database allowing to see and analyze the data in graphs and maps of air quality.

Visible Light Communications (VLC) is a technology that has emerged in recent years proposing some improvements over traditional radio communications. The objective of this project is to evaluate the bit error rate of different modulations schemes and the requirements of optical communications are described. It is discussed which of them is better to set VLC transmissions. For this, the work has been divided into three sections. The first section describes the communication systems in visible light, as well as the modulations schemes that could be used, more specifically, those that are based on OFDM. In the second section, the MATLAB simulations performed are detailed, representing the bit error rate graph of each of the modulations, varying an added noise. In the third section, the simulations are moved into a real case. For this, two computers and two USRPs modules are used. One of the PC will act as a transmitter and the other as a receiver. The USRPs work as analog-digital/digital-analog converters and are connected to each other by a cable that introduces attenuation. The objective of this configuration is to estimate the bit error rate, varying the noise. Finally, the system is evaluated by replacing the cable that used to connect both USRPs with a LED and a photodetector. In this way, a real practical case of a system based on visible light communications is shown, its performance is studied, and the conclusions are presented.

Nowadays, fiber optic companies are focused on deployments of FTTH in more than 200 households and with access from a nearby fiber optic point from which to begin deployment in the urban core. For this reason, populations with low housing density and a point of access to the distant fiber network will be the last to have access to high speed (FTTH). The objective of this final degree work (F.D.W) is to study and design the populations that FTTH operators leave in the end because they are less profitable. The place chosen for the study has been four populations of Aran Valley, where there are a large number of small populations and with a difficult access to get the fiber optic. The villages are: Vilac, Mont, Montcorbau and Betlan. The first step will be to rent a dark fiber that is closest to study populations, which in this case will be carried out by the telecommunications operator Movistar, which has the service FTTH in Vielha (Aran Valley). In the closest manhole to the phone station we will be given the two fibers to carry out our deployment. At this point we have two possibilities, the first is to bring the fiber cable to the four municipalities by installing a pole where we will not have a pipe, while in the second option we will carry the fiber cable piped to the point where we will locate an antenna with some Radio links in each of the populations The antennas will be located in areas where we have a direct view between the two devices. In addition, the antennas will be located within the populations in the best place, that is, high points where you have a vision with the whole population, where you can reuse these same antennas because 5G panels can be placed in the next years. Finally, we will design the populations to the optical terminal boxes (CTO's). Likewise, derived from all the phases of the project, we will make a budget with which we will compare what it would be supposed to do with the deployment of FTTH in small populations and whether it will be profitable to do radio links or installation of poles.

There has been much technological advancement in the wireless communic ation in the recent past for the intelligent transportation systems among all Dedicated Short - Range Communication or DSRC or Wireless Access for Vehicular Environment (WAVE) has very important role for the autonomous connected vehicles. It is well known fo r its support for the time sensitive safety applications. Along with safety application, the service to provide nonsafety applications is also becoming very popular, these nonsafety applications may include infotainment, electronic toll tax collection and traffic control to name a few. DSRC protocol consists of WAVE Short Messaging Protocol or WSMP which aims to provide real time safety application and it is also able to support some nonsafety related applications. In our dissertation we aim to evaluate the performance of IEEE 802.11p standard for both safety and nonsafety messages. Our sce norio for master thseis consists of fleet of vehicles that are moving with constant speed and in the same direction forming the platoon pattern. The distance between ever y two vehicles is set to be constant and it is kept 200 meters, similarly every vehicle is moving with constant speed of 20 m/sec. To develop the scenorio for Basic Safety Messages, each vehicle is able to generate BSM messages periodically and it fixed pa yload size of 200 bytes and data rate of 6 Mbits/sec. For the nonsafety messages we also compare the perfor m ance of existing protocols such as optimized link state routing OLSR protocol and Ad - hoc O n - demand Routing AODV protocol, the packet size is kept 25 6 bytes at 8 kbps. We have used the metrics such as throughput, packet delivery ratio , packet loss ratio and end to end delay for evaluaing the performance of as optimized link state routing OLSR protocol and Ad - hoc On - demand Routing AODV protocols Our si mulation results conducted in Network Simulator NS - 3 show that WSMP protocol have adequate level of packet delivery ratio and throughput with moderate level of packet loss at lower intervehicle distances and higher packet loss ratio at greater distances be tween the vehicles. On the same way, when the simulation results of as optimized link state routing OLSR protocol and Ad - hoc On - demand Routing AODV protocol are compared it is evident that AODV protocol better performs in terms of throughput, packet deliv ery ratio as well as in terms of packets loss, but AODV protocol being reactive in nature, assumes much higher end to end delay for the packet delivery.

This final grade project contains information related to the FTTH network (fiber to the home) by developing the distribution network of an area. The aim of this project is to show in detail how the designs of the optical fiber distribution network are designed in different populations, observing the limitations, looking for ways to overcome them and be able to serve all the clients of the area. For the realization of this work, I have chosen an area of Girona more specifically in the municipality of Palafrugell since it currently has no optical fiber and has good characteristics to show in detail the distribution of a fiber optic network. The preparation of this work is carried out taking into account that we are a new telephone operator, establishing a first chapter that explains in detail the design criteria trying to cover all the possible diferent situations to finish the project designing it and explaining why all things are done. The network described in this work will allow end users to obtain high performance coverage (100 Mbps speed is guaranteed in all households with fiber coverage) and optimization of the infrastructure of the new network. We will mark a balance between high performance, adequate sizing and adequate development guarantees also triying the reduction of maintenance

The Centre Tecnològic de Telecomunicacions de Catalunya (CTTC), is developing a part of a project from the European program H2020 which consists in increase the safety, sustainability, flexibility and efficiency of road transport in a city (its acronym is TIMON). The CTTC contribution is a new positioning module that uses inertial measurement units (IMUs), which bases their performance in the gyroscopes and accelerometers measurement fusion, with a global navigation satellite system (GNSS) assistance to provide a reliable navigation solution to the vehicles drivers. The goal of this project is to improve the performance of the positioning module by adding a three-axis magnetometer to the measurement set used by the positioning algorithm. This device measures the magnetic field components with a given position and using the measurements is possible to estimate their orientation with respect to the magnetic north, which is very useful for the vehicle's heading estimation. The gyroscope measures the angular rate, thus, it gives information about the change of orientation, but does not provide an absolute orientation and it is affected by bias and scale errors among other imperfections. To improve the heading estimation, in this work, the gyroscope and magnetometer data is fused by Bayesian filtering using Kalman filter. This project also includes the exploration of magnetometer calibration's techniques and algorithms to compensate the distortions in the measurements due to the ferromagnetic and magnetic fields near the device, or by the device fabrication imperfections. The main goals of this project are: create a realistic simulator of the magnetometer measurements to implement a calibration algorithm and check its performance. In second place, implement a data fusion algorithm using a Kalman filter to integrate the gyroscope and magnetometer data to estimate the vehicle's heading, and to improve the performance achieved by the original algorithm, obtaining a more accurate navigation solution. The results of this project had been partially published in the 4.3 deliverable of TIMON's project. This project is divided in six chapters. The first chapter provides an introduction to the TIMON project, the organizations involved on it, the impact that will have, the work developed in the CTTC and the goals of this project. Next chapter introduces the inertial navigation system (INS), the inertial sensors characteristics of the simulator, the different coordinate systems used along the project, the transformations and rotations between frames. The third chapter introduces the global navigation satellite system (GNSS) and the advantages of integrating INS and GNSS. The fourth introduces the Earth's magnetic field and the magnetometer, explaining how is calculated the magnetic heading and the distortions and noise that must be added in order to make realistic the simulator. This chapter gives details about the construction of the magnetic simulator and its calibration. Chapter five provides information about the Kalman filter, beginning with a brief introduction and deepening on the equations that form the algorithm. Besides, it details the algorithm's application to obtain the magnetic heading and to fuse the magnetometer and gyroscope data. Finally, in chapter six are the conclusions extracted by the obtained results. The programming language used in the project to implement the simulator and the algorithms is Matlab. In the Annex the code is attached, and also the simulations and graphics that show the results of the heading estimation with the Kalman filter and the heading estimation when the magnetometer and gyroscope data are fused.