SANIS-HITSZ/LAESim

What it solves

LAESim provides a unified simulation environment for coordinating multiple types of vehicles—including drones, ground vehicles, ships, and satellites—across air, space, land, and sea domains. It bridges the gap between high-fidelity visual simulation, realistic orbital mechanics for satellites, and complex network communication constraints, allowing researchers to test multi-agent coordination and navigation in a single integrated workflow.

How it works

Built as an extension of Microsoft AirSim and Unreal Engine 4.27, LAESim integrates several specialized modules:

• Hybrid Vehicle Simulation: Supports diverse vehicle types (SimpleFlight, PhysXCar, SimpleBoat, SimpleSatellite) within the same scene.
• SceneMap: Converts satellite or task images into collidable 3D maps in Unreal Engine, mapping pixel coordinates to GPS and metric coordinates.
• Space Mission Bridge: Uses TLE/SGP4, CSV, or Orekit to calculate real satellite orbits and visibility windows, while UE handles the visual representation.
• Network Backend: Offers switchable communication modes, from ideal communication to high-fidelity ns-3 simulations for Wi-Fi ad hoc and satellite-to-ground/satellite-to-satellite links with realistic propagation delays and link budgets.
• RadioMapNav: Utilizes Sionna RT to generate offline channel maps (RSS/SINR) for communication-constrained path planning.

Who it’s for

It is designed for researchers and engineers working on multi-vehicle coordination, aerospace network simulation, satellite-ground communication, and autonomous navigation under communication constraints.

Highlights

• Cross-Domain Coordination: Simultaneous simulation of drones, cars, boats, and satellites.
• Integrated Network Simulation: Integration with ns-3 for realistic packet-level network behavior and link budget analysis.
• Image-to-Map Conversion: Ability to turn 2D images into 3D collidable environments with GPS registration.
• Realistic Space Tasks: Support for TLE/SGP4 and Orekit for accurate orbital analysis and coverage windows.
• Communication-Aware Navigation: Tools for generating radio maps and planning paths based on signal quality (SINR).