Minimizing Age of Information: Adaptive Spectrum Sharing in Ultra-Reliable and Low-Latency eVTOL Communications

The freshness of information related to status updates is crucial in time-critical applications like disaster response and search and rescue operations. We can enhance network connectivity by using electric vertical take-off and landing vehicles (eVTOLs) operating in the affected region as portable wireless repeaters as part of the operation. In this work, we study the spectrum allocation in ultra-reliable low latency communication (URLLC) networks assisted by eVTOLs while minimizing the age of information (AoI). The optimal spectrum allocation for eVTOL-assisted networks is a challenging problem that depends on various dynamic factors, such as bit error rate (BER), data rate, power consumption, and the flight trajectory of the eVTOLs. Therefore, we propose a dynamic approach that can efficiently allocate spectrum among the eVTOLs to minimize the total AoI between the source and the destination, as well as the individual AoI of each eVTOL acting as a relay node. Simulations exhibit that the proposed algorithm can outperform the classical approaches in terms of AoI by improving the AoI by 57.42% over the classical fairness approach and 43.43% over the classical optimal relay selection approach. We also find an improvement in data rate by 8.89% and 6.76%, respectively, along with a marginal improvement in the BER. Our approach offers an efficient solution for next-generation AoI-aware spectrum management in eVTOL-assisted networks.