Driven by an emerging use of flying platforms such as unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), drones and unmanned balloons in future network applications and the challenges that the 6G networks exhibit, the focus of this tutorial is to demonstrate the evolution of the flying platforms as a novel architectural enabler for radio access network (RAN) and their integration with the future cellular access and backhaul/fronthaul networks. These platforms are networked, flying and a potential way to offer high data rate, high reliability and ultra-low latent access and backhaul/fronthaul to future wireless networks. Such large scale deployable platforms and frameworks will guarantee the global information and communication requirements in future smart and resilient cities and solve the ubiquitous and global connectivity problems in many challenging network environments, e.g., coverage or capacity enhancements for remote or sparsely populated areas, social gathering, and disaster affected scenarios, etc. This tutorial will provide balanced coverage on recent trends, challenges and future research and development on the integration of flying platforms with the future wireless access and backhaul networks.

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Mohamed-Slim Alouini (S'94, M'98, SM'03, F'09) was born in Tunis, Tunisia. He received the Ph.D. degree in Electrical Engineering from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), Pasadena, CA, USA, in 1998. He served as a faculty member in the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, USA, then in the Texas A&M University at Qatar, Education City, Doha, Qatar before joining King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Thuwal, Makkah Province, Saudi Arabia as a Professor of Electrical Engineering in 2009. Prof. Alouini is a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), a member of the Thomson ISI Web of Knowledge list of Highly Cited Researchers and of the Elsevier/Shanghai Ranking list of Most Cited Researchers, and an IEEE Distinguished Lecturer of the IEEE Communications Society. He is a recipient of the Recognition Award of the IEEE ComSoc Wireless Technical Committee in 2016 and a co-recipient of best paper awards in ten IEEE conferences (including ICC, GLOBECOM, VTC, PIMRC, and DySPAN). His current research interests include the modeling, design, and performance analysis of wireless communication systems.

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Muhammad Zeeshan Shakir (Senior Member, IEEE) received the B.E. degree in electrical engineering from the NED University of Engineering and Technology, Karachi, and the M.Sc. degree in communications, control, and DSP and the Ph.D. degree in electronic and electrical engineering from the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, U.K. He is currently an Associate Professor with the School of Engineering and Computing, University of West Scotland (UWS), Paisley. Before joining UWS in fall 2016, he has worked as a Senior Researcher with the Department of Systems and Computer Engineering, Carleton University, Canada. He has been serving as an active member of several IEEE ComSoc Technical Committees. He has been serving as the Chair of the IEEE ComSoc Emerging Technologies Technical Committee on back haul/fronthaul communications and networking. He has served as a Lead Guest Editor/Guest Editor for the IEEE Communications Magazine, the IEEE Wireless Communications, and the IEEE Access. He is also an Associate Technical Editor of the IEEE Communications Magazine.