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Electronics
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Satellite Terrestrial Networks: Technologies, Security and Applications
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Satellite Terrestrial Networks: Technologies, Security and Applications

A special issue of Electronics (ISSN 2079-9292). This special issue belongs to the section "Networks".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 15 June 2025 | Viewed by 13322

Special Issue Editor

Dr. Jiaxin Zhang

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
School of Information and Communication Engineering, Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications, Beijing 100876, China
Interests: satellite terrestrial integrated network; multi-edge computing; green communication; compute first network

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

In order to meet the continuously expanding application requirements of next-generation mobile communication in global-wide coverage, large-scale flexible access, and emergency communication, the satellite terrestrial integrated network, as one of the key technologies in future 6G, integrates satellite communication network and ground mobile network, towards deep integration in systems, technologies, and applications.

Due to significant differences in performance such as latency, reliability, throughput, and security in different communication systems, there are still many problems and challenges involved in the research of satellite terrestrial integrated networks in terms of architecture, key technologies, experimental platforms, technical standards, security, and future applications.

This Special Issue focuses on the technology, security, and applications of key satellite terrestrial networks in the next-generation communication system. We hope that the launch of this topic can introduce the latest research results of satellite terrestrial networks from different perspectives, to provide technical approaches and standard development references, inspiration, and reference for related fields of research and application, and jointly promote the 6G research and development process.

In this Special Issue, original research articles and reviews are welcome. Research areas may include, but are not limited to, the following:

  • Network Architecture of Satellite Terrestrial Networks;
  • Beam Hopping Management and Interference Coordination Technology in Satellite Terrestrial Networks;
  • Resource perception and intelligent scheduling technology in Satellite Terrestrial Networks;
  • Physical Layer Security Access Technology in Satellite Terrestrial Networks;
  • Edge computing and Intelligent Processing in Satellite Terrestrial Networks;
  • Networking Theory and Routing Algorithm in Satellite Terrestrial Networks;
  • Prospects for the Application in Satellite Terrestrial Networks;
  • Coordination of Computing, Caching, and Perception in Satellite Terrestrial Networks;
  • Secure Transmission and Privacy Protection in Satellite Terrestrial Networks;
  • Spectrum sensing and spectrum sharing technology in Satellite Terrestrial Networks.

Dr. Jiaxin Zhang
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Electronics is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • satellite terrestrial networks
  • resource management
  • secure transmission and privacy protection
  • edge computing and intelligent processing
  • networking theory and routing algorithm
  • beam hopping management

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Published Papers (9 papers)

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Research

24 pages, 2644 KiB  
Article
A Machine Learning Evaluation of the Impact of Bit-Depth for the Detection and Classification of Wireless Interferences in Global Navigation Satellite Systems
by Gianmarco Baldini and Fausto Bonavitacola
Electronics 2025, 14(6), 1147; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics14061147 - 14 Mar 2025
Viewed by 429
Abstract
The performance of the services provided by Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSSs) can be seriously degraded by the presence of wireless interferences, and Machine Learning (ML) has been applied to address this problem using the digital artifacts generated by the GNSS receiver. While [...] Read more.
The performance of the services provided by Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSSs) can be seriously degraded by the presence of wireless interferences, and Machine Learning (ML) has been applied to address this problem using the digital artifacts generated by the GNSS receiver. While such an application is not novel in the literature, the analysis of the impact of the bit-depth at which the GNSS signal is recorded has not received significant attention. The type and power level of the wireless interference are also important factors to investigate in this context. This paper addresses this gap by performing an extensive analysis of the impact of these factors on a data set of GNSS signals subject to three different types of wireless interferences with ML and DL algorithms. The analysis is a combination of a pre-processing phase where the Carrier-to-Noise Ratio (CNR) values of different satellites are evaluated, the extraction of relevant features for ML, and the application of a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) with a multi-head attention layer. The results show that the proposed approach is able to detect the presence of interference with great accuracy (e.g., 99%) but the type of interference and bit-depth can decrease the performance. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Satellite Terrestrial Networks: Technologies, Security and Applications)
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27 pages, 1559 KiB  
Article
Joint Task Offloading and Resource Scheduling in Low Earth Orbit Satellite Edge Computing Networks
by Jinhong Li, Rong Chai, Kangan Gui and Chengchao Liang
Electronics 2025, 14(5), 1016; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics14051016 - 3 Mar 2025
Viewed by 704
Abstract
In view of the future of the Internet of Things (IoT), the number of edge devices and the amount of sensing data and communication data are expected to increase exponentially. With the emergence of new computing-intensive tasks and delay-sensitive application scenarios, terminal devices [...] Read more.
In view of the future of the Internet of Things (IoT), the number of edge devices and the amount of sensing data and communication data are expected to increase exponentially. With the emergence of new computing-intensive tasks and delay-sensitive application scenarios, terminal devices need to offload new business computing tasks to the cloud for processing. This paper proposes a joint transmission and offloading task scheduling strategy for the edge computing-enabled low Earth orbit satellite networks, aiming to minimize system costs. The proposed system model incorporates both data service transmission and computational task scheduling, which is framed as a long-term cost function minimization problem with constraints. The simulation results demonstrate that the proposed strategy can significantly reduce the average system cost, queue length, energy consumption, and task completion rate, compared to baseline strategies, thus highlighting the strategy’s effectiveness and efficiency. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Satellite Terrestrial Networks: Technologies, Security and Applications)
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22 pages, 8720 KiB  
Article
Structure Design and Reliable Acquisition of Burst Spread Spectrum Signals Without Physical Layer Synchronization Overhead
by Shenfu Pan, Leyu Yin, Yunhua Tan and Yan Wang
Electronics 2024, 13(23), 4586; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics13234586 - 21 Nov 2024
Viewed by 600
Abstract
In order to improve the concealment and security of a point-to-point transparent forwarding satellite communication system, a signal structure based on aperiodic long code spread spectrum is designed in this paper. This structure can achieve reliable signal acquisition without special physical layer synchronization [...] Read more.
In order to improve the concealment and security of a point-to-point transparent forwarding satellite communication system, a signal structure based on aperiodic long code spread spectrum is designed in this paper. This structure can achieve reliable signal acquisition without special physical layer synchronization overhead, which can effectively shorten signal transmission time and improve the concealment of communication. In addition, the performance of burst spread spectrum signal acquisition is analyzed in detail by establishing a mathematical model, and the influencing factors and design criteria of the matching filter length for aperiodic long code acquisition are determined. On this basis, a matched filter acquisition method based on high-power clock multiplexing and an adaptive decision threshold design method based on an auxiliary channel are proposed. The above methods effectively reduce hardware complexity and resource consumption caused by long code acquisition, and realize reliable acquisition under the condition of low SNR. The simulation results show that under the condition of Eb/N0 = 3 dB, the transmission efficiency for a 128-symbol burst frame can be increased by 50%, thereby significantly reducing the burst communication time. Furthermore, the acquisition success probability can reach 99.99%. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Satellite Terrestrial Networks: Technologies, Security and Applications)
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16 pages, 1815 KiB  
Article
A Power Control and Intervention Algorithm for Co-Existing IMT Base Stations and Satellite Services
by Min Jia, Shiyao Meng, Hui Wang, Zhouhao Tang and Ziliang Jin
Electronics 2024, 13(20), 4108; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics13204108 - 18 Oct 2024
Viewed by 948
Abstract
IMT-2020 (International Mobile Telecommunications-2020) is the prevailing mobile communication technology at the moment, significantly affecting societal progress. Nevertheless, the roll-out of the IMT-2020 system has introduced numerous interferences to existing services. The coexistence with fixed satellite services has become a topical issue currently [...] Read more.
IMT-2020 (International Mobile Telecommunications-2020) is the prevailing mobile communication technology at the moment, significantly affecting societal progress. Nevertheless, the roll-out of the IMT-2020 system has introduced numerous interferences to existing services. The coexistence with fixed satellite services has become a topical issue currently under consideration. This paper discusses the compatibility and interference issues between IMT-2020 and the 14 GHz FSS (fixed-satellite service) uplink, as well as the spectrum access issue solved by artificial intelligence methods. The study shows that the interference from IMT-2020 macro-base stations to FSS space stations exceeds the ITU standard by approximately 10 dB. To control the interference, a partition-based power control algorithm is proposed, which divides ground base stations into multiple areas and virtualizes each area’s base stations into a single large base station then applies power control to maximize the total transmission power of the base stations within the area. Furthermore, three intra-partition power control algorithms are introduced: average power allocation, power allocation based on channel gain, andna power allocation method based on the maximum intra-partition sum rate. Additionally, under the assumption that dynamic satellite nodes are available in the system for ground user access, a spectrum access algorithm utilizing deep reinforcement learning is designed. Simulation results confirm the effectiveness of the proposed scheme, which can reduce the interference from the IMT-2020 system to the FSS service below the threshold, ensuring harmonious coexistence of the two services. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Satellite Terrestrial Networks: Technologies, Security and Applications)
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16 pages, 2345 KiB  
Article
Performance Evaluation of Routing Algorithm in Satellite Self-Organizing Network on OMNeT++ Platform
by Guoquan Wang, Jiaxin Zhang, Yilong Zhang, Chang Liu and Zhaoyang Chang
Electronics 2024, 13(19), 3963; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics13193963 - 9 Oct 2024
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1206
Abstract
Self-organizing networks of small satellites have gradually gained attention in recent years. However, self-organizing networks of small satellites have high topological change frequency, large transmission delay, and complex communication environments, which require appropriate networking and routing methods. Therefore, this paper, considering the characteristics [...] Read more.
Self-organizing networks of small satellites have gradually gained attention in recent years. However, self-organizing networks of small satellites have high topological change frequency, large transmission delay, and complex communication environments, which require appropriate networking and routing methods. Therefore, this paper, considering the characteristics of satellite networks, proposes the shortest queue length-cluster-based routing protocol (SQL-CBRP) and has built a satellite self-organizing network simulation platform based on OMNeT++. In this platform, functions such as the initial establishment of satellite self-organizing networks and cluster maintenance have been implemented. The platform was used to verify the latency and packet loss rate of SQL-CBRP and to compare it with Dijkstra and Greedy Perimeter Stateless Routing (GPSR). The results show that under high load conditions, the delay of SQL-CBRP is reduced by up to 4.1%, and the packet loss rate is reduced by up to 7.1% compared to GPSR. When the communication load is imbalanced among clusters, the delay of SQL-CBRP is reduced by up to 12.7%, and the packet loss rate is reduced by up to 16.7% compared to GPSR. Therefore, SQL-CBRP performs better in networks with high loads and imbalance loads. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Satellite Terrestrial Networks: Technologies, Security and Applications)
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20 pages, 15437 KiB  
Article
Deep Reinforcement Learning-Based Multipath Routing for LEO Megaconstellation Networks
by Chi Han, Wei Xiong and Ronghuan Yu
Electronics 2024, 13(15), 3054; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics13153054 - 1 Aug 2024
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 2264
Abstract
The expansion of megaconstellation networks (MCNs) represents a promising solution for achieving global Internet coverage. To meet the growing demand for satellite services, multipath routing allows the simultaneous establishment of multiple transmission paths, enabling the transmission of flows in parallel. Nevertheless, the mobility [...] Read more.
The expansion of megaconstellation networks (MCNs) represents a promising solution for achieving global Internet coverage. To meet the growing demand for satellite services, multipath routing allows the simultaneous establishment of multiple transmission paths, enabling the transmission of flows in parallel. Nevertheless, the mobility of satellites and time-varying link states presents a challenge for the discovery of optimal paths and traffic scheduling in multipath routing. Given the inflexibility of traditional static deep reinforcement learning (DRL)-based routing algorithms in dealing with time-varying constellation topologies, DRL-based multipath routing (DMR) enabled by a graph neural network (GNN) is proposed as a means of enhancing the transmission performance of MCNs. DMR decouples the stochastic optimization problem of multipath routing under traffic and bandwidth constraints into two subproblems: multipath routing discovery and multipath traffic scheduling. Firstly, the minimum hop count-based multipath route discovery algorithm (MHMRD) is proposed for the computation of multiple available paths between all source and destination nodes. Secondly, the GNN-based multipath traffic scheduling scheme (GMTS) is proposed as a means of dynamically scheduling the traffic on each available path for each data stream, based on the state information of ISLs and traffic demand. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed scheme can be scaled to constellations with different configurations without the necessity for repeated training and enhance the throughput, completion ratio, and delay by 42.64%, 17.39%, and 3.66% in comparison with the shortest path first algorithm (SPF), respectively. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Satellite Terrestrial Networks: Technologies, Security and Applications)
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16 pages, 4075 KiB  
Article
Optimal Beamwidth for Maximizing Uplink Coverage Probability in Quasi Earth-Fixed LEO Satellite Communication System
by Chun-Tai Liu and Jen-Yi Pan
Electronics 2024, 13(7), 1349; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics13071349 - 3 Apr 2024
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1696
Abstract
Satellite communication is proposed to fulfill the ubiquitous coverage for next-generation wireless networks. Considering the propagation delay and path loss, low-earth orbit (LEO) satellites are widely adopted. However, since the beam boresight directions become close in quasi-earth-fixed cells (QEFC) scenarios at low elevation [...] Read more.
Satellite communication is proposed to fulfill the ubiquitous coverage for next-generation wireless networks. Considering the propagation delay and path loss, low-earth orbit (LEO) satellites are widely adopted. However, since the beam boresight directions become close in quasi-earth-fixed cells (QEFC) scenarios at low elevation angles, the interference increases and causes low communication quality. This paper introduces the optimal beamwidth maximizing uplink coverage probability scheme for quasi-earth-fixed cells in LEO satellite communication systems. The proposed scheme dynamically adjusts the beamwidth to achieve max uplink coverage probability at different elevation angles. The simulation results show that the proposed scheme matches the exhaustive search method in different scenarios and target signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratios. Furthermore, the proposed scheme significantly mitigates interference and improves the uplink coverage probability. Compared with the 3GPP setting, the proposed scheme improves the uplink coverage probability by 0.93 at time 100 s, and compared with the three-color frequency reuse, the proposed scheme improves the uplink coverage probability by 0.195 at time 100 s. The dynamic beamwidth and boresight direction adjustments enable the satellite to maintain seamless and reliable communication services across a wide range of operating conditions, ultimately realizing the goal of ubiquitous communications in the QEFC LEO satellite system. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Satellite Terrestrial Networks: Technologies, Security and Applications)
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21 pages, 6588 KiB  
Article
A Capacity Enhancement Method for Frequency-Hopping Anti-Jamming Communication Systems
by Ziting Yu, Zhisong Hao, Wang Yao and Min Jia
Electronics 2023, 12(21), 4457; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics12214457 - 30 Oct 2023
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 2294
Abstract
In this paper, we study the enhancement of channel transmission information by expanding the transmission channel in the frequency-hopping rate dimension in a communication system. This is achieved using the frequency-hopping spread spectrum (FHSS) without increasing communication resources, such as power and bandwidth. [...] Read more.
In this paper, we study the enhancement of channel transmission information by expanding the transmission channel in the frequency-hopping rate dimension in a communication system. This is achieved using the frequency-hopping spread spectrum (FHSS) without increasing communication resources, such as power and bandwidth. The anti-jamming capability of the original information is maintained during this process. The spectral characteristics of the extended signal for frequency-hopping (FH) transmission are investigated, a demodulation method based on carrier reconstruction is proposed, the bit error rate performance is simulated, and the capacity enhancement and anti-jamming ability of the extended signal for FH transmission are analyzed. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Satellite Terrestrial Networks: Technologies, Security and Applications)
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15 pages, 2106 KiB  
Article
ComEdge: Cloud-Native Platform for Integrated Computing and Communication in Satellite–Terrestrial Network
by Haoyang Shi, Xing Zhang, Peixuan Wu, Jingkai Chen and Yufei Zhang
Electronics 2023, 12(20), 4252; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics12204252 - 14 Oct 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1803
Abstract
Leveraging technological advancements such as containers, microservices, and service mesh, cloud-native edge computing (CNEC) has become extensively discussed and applied in both academia and industry. The integration of mobile edge computing and communication is crucial for the future communication architecture in order to [...] Read more.
Leveraging technological advancements such as containers, microservices, and service mesh, cloud-native edge computing (CNEC) has become extensively discussed and applied in both academia and industry. The integration of mobile edge computing and communication is crucial for the future communication architecture in order to fully utilize distributed and fragmented communication resources and computing power. The potential for cloud-native integration can help merge mobile edge computing and communication, enhancing network flexibility and resource utilization. This paper investigates the implementation plan for extending cloud-native capabilities to integrated computing and communication (INCCOM) in the satellite–terrestrial network. We construct an experimental verification platform called ComEdge in a real-world setting. Subsequently, we analyze the architecture, functional characteristics, and deployment of the platform in a real-world environment. Furthermore, we explore the solution of deep reinforcement learning in the deployment of cloud-native core network and conduct a preliminary verification of the platform’s potential to enable artificial intelligence in a real production environment, which will provide guidance to both academic and industry sectors. Finally, we conduct an analysis on the challenges and opportunities encountered by the cloud-native INCCOM network system. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Satellite Terrestrial Networks: Technologies, Security and Applications)
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