ISAC Assisted Beam Tracking for Cellular-Connected UAV

This paper proposes an integrated sensing and communication (ISAC)-assisted beam tracking framework for unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). Addressing the challenges of high mobility and 3D non-linear trajectories in UAV communications, the framework leverages the echoes from communication signals to achieve pilot-free beam tracking. Specifically, this paper proposes (1) a piecewise linearization method to model UAV complex trajectories and (2) an EKF-based beam tracking algorithm with high accuracy. Simulation results demonstrate robust performance of the proposed algorithm across various complex trajectories for UAVs. Index Terms-Unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), beam tracking, extended Kalman, ISAC.