Vulnerability Assessment and Topology Reconstruction of Task Chains in UAV Networks

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The paper deals with methods of solving situations in a group of unmanned aerial vehicles, when one of the vulnerable nodes has ceased to perform its function, in order to perform topological reconstruction.

The authors distinguish two types of topological attributes in the solution - communication (e. g., node degree and node's connectivity significance) and functional (importance within the entire task chain).

Based on this classification, they propose two algorithms - MENVAL (multi-metric node vulnerability assessment) algorithm and NITRA (node importance-based topology reconstruction algorithm).

The system modelling then distinguishes among UAV nodes, communication links, and task chains.

They define a number of parameters based on fairly simple relationships, such as node degrees and shortest paths, which they use in their reconstruction algorithms.

Simulations for a 5*5 km area with 25 UAVs, uniformly distributed there, document the effectiveness of the proposed approach, e.g., Fig. 9 demonstrates that the determination of the remaining task integrity

by the NITRA algorithm is almost always better than the competing MCMA algorithm described in the literature, when a vulnerable node is randomly removed.

However, some parts of the text could be explained in more detail, supplemented or modified.

1. It is not stated how the weights in Eq. (9) are to be determined, only that their sum is to be equal to 1.

2. The same applies to the weighting coefficients in Eq. (23).

3. There is no information where the computing system working with the node data is located in a real situation.    

4. Page 10, in equations (11) and (12), the X symbol on the left side should probably also be included, otherwise the same symbol on the left side would be used for the 4 different X values on the right side.

5. Page 10, equation (16): the comma should not be at subscript level, 2, 3 should be dropped because $|V^S|$ could be less than 3 and 2.

 

Formal comments:

Page 4, line 151: "it's" - "it is" would be more appropriate in a professional text 

p. 12, l. 405, 411, 413: "we've" - "we have"

p. 5, l. 150-151: the Perception-Collection Edge and Perception-Control Edge connection types have the same designation $E^S$. Shouldn't they be distinguished?

p. 7, l. 255: "energy consumption of s while maximizing" - "s"?

p. 16, l. 516: "indicating a 17" - ?

p. 12, l. 399, 405: the meaning of the abbreviation MCMA (Minimum Cascade Movement Algorithm) should be given in the first occurrence on line 399

 

Typo:

p. 4, l. 150: "Promblem" - "Problem"

 

Format

In the equation on page 5, the symbols "i" and "j" should be in italics

p. 8, l. 296: "node i" - "i" should be in italics

p. 9, l. 311: "as $c$" - :the symbol "$c$" in equations (7) and (8) should be in capital letters 

p. 9, l. 334: X and N should be in italics

p. 9, l. 361: "For Links" - "For links"

p. 10, in equation (15) and other links are labeled differently from the notation on p. 5, lines 207-208.

p. 16, l. 493: "According to this Table ," - "According to Table 6,"

 

Often there are missing spaces in the text, most often when referring to literature, sometimes there is an excess space. For example, on page 1, this applies to the following phrases (but there are other occurrences further on in the test) 

p. 1, l. 8: 'mechanism(VUTRM)' - 'mechanism (VUTRM)' (insertion of a space)

p. 1, l. 11: "algorithm(NITRA)" - : "algorithm (NITRA)"

p. 1, l. 22: "locations[2]" - "locations [2]"

p. 1, l. 24: "links by ." - "links by."

p. 1, l. 30: "chains[3]" - "chains [3]"

p. 1, l. 36: "moments[4]" - "moments[4]"

Similarly:

p. 5, l. 189: "paper,We" - "paper. We"

p. 12, l. 430: "Figure 6.Assuming" - "Figure 6. Assuming"

p. 16, l. 487: "NITRA ." - "NITRA."

 

 

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Please, refer to the attached file.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Comments on the Quality of English Language

Small typos should be removed. Please, refer to the attached file.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

dear authors, I think your work is missing lot of details that needs to be implemented in order to accept the paper:

1) i think your approach can be interesting but needs to be valdated with real (not simulation) experimental tests. Do you plan that tests and can you include them in the paper?

2) How do you validate your numerical model? how are you sure that is representing in a proper what happens in reality? You probably are not considering disturbances, non-ideal behaviour of drones ecc..

3) Line 46 - you said: "However, existing research papers, there are few studies that analyze the vulnerability of nodes based on their functional attributes". You should report these research in the introduction

on their functional attributes.

4) Figure 5 - please keep the text inside boxes

5) chapter 3 - error in the title

6) Line 430 - space after point

7) table 2 - include a space after number before measurement unit

8) conclusion shoud be supported by results in a quantitative way.

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear authors, I continue to think that experimental validation are required.

Author Response

I'm very sorry, but completing the deployment of UAVs from theory to reality in a short time is extremely challenging. The economic burden of using the number of UAVs required by this method is beyond what an average student can afford. I am very eager to deploy our proposed method in a real UAV swarm, but we have found in many references that the choice and initial research of many UAV methods are not conducted in the real world. Instead, they are simulated in software, and then further explored by subsequent researchers for potential real-world deployment. This is also the significance of simulation software.

Additionally, in the simulation software parameters, we have referenced the channel fading model and experimental parameters such as the UAVs' flight speed, antenna height, transmission power, and quantity from the literature. We have tried to match the parameters of real UAVs as closely as possible. As for interference, it mainly affects the communication range of UAVs, leading to changes in the topology (since the topology in this paper is randomly generated, interference does not significantly impact the analysis of network vulnerability).

Once again, I apologize. We have done our best under the current conditions and hope you can understand.

Round 3

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear authors, I understand your point.