Multi-UAV Route Planning for Data Collection from Heterogeneous IoT Devices

IoT devices are widely adopted in various scenarios to realize real-time data collection. However, it is challenging to efficiently collect the sensing data when IoT devices are physically distributed in remote areas. This paper proposes to use Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) to realize efficient data collection from these IoT devices. Specifically, the heterogeneity of IoT devices in terms of data generation rates is considered, which is modelled as different time windows and service time requirements into the UAV routing problem. Besides, a multi-UAV multi-trip route planning model is proposed and a Tabu-Search based solution algorithm is developed. Finally, an experimental case study is conducted that verifies the effectiveness and performance of the proposed method.