Successive Approximation Technique Research Articles

Aerial intelligent reflecting surface for secure wireless networks: Secrecy capacity and optimal trajectory strategy

This work investigates the potential of the aerial intelligent reflecting surface (AIRS) in secure communication, where an intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) carried by an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) is utilized to help the communication between the ground nodes. Specifically, we formulate the joint design of the AIRS's deployment and the phase shift to maximize the secrecy rate. To solve the non-convex objective, we develop an alternating optimization (AO) approach, where the phase shift optimization is solved by the Riemannian manifold optimization (RMO) method, while the deployment optimization is handled by the successive convex approximation (SCA) technique. Furthermore, to reduce the computational complexity of the RMO method, an element-wise block coordinate descent (EBCD) based method is employed. Simulation results verify the effect of AIRS in improving the communication security, as well as the importance of designing the deployment and phase shift properly.

A semi-analytical theory for water waves interacting with a submerged/suspended circular cylinder patch

Semi-analytical solutions are proposed to investigate the effects of a submerged/suspended circular patch on water waves scattering. The patch is simplified to periodic cylindrical lattices with a strong contrast between the cylinder spacing and the typical wavelength. The homogenization theory is employed to derive the effective equations on the macro-scale (wavelength), in which the constitutive coefficients are obtained by numerically solving the micro-scale (cylinder spacing) problem in a unit cell. To simulate the turbulence in the circular cylinder patch, a bulk eddy viscosity model is applied through balancing the time-averaged energy over a wave period. Eigenfunction expansions method is used to solve the macro-scale problem, where a complex frequency dispersion relation is solved by the multiple successive approximation technique. Comparisons between the laboratory measurements and the waves/submerged circular patch model results show acceptable agreements for small amplitude waves. The waves/suspended circular patch model is not checked experimentally due to the lack of data. However, this suspended patch model is shown to reproduce the results of wave/emergent circle forest problem. A comprehensive comparison between the submerged, suspended and emergent circular patches on wave scattering is also presented.

Spectrum Allocation With Adaptive Sub-Band Bandwidth for Terahertz Communication Systems

We study spectrum allocation for terahertz (THz) band communication (THzCom) systems, while considering the frequency and distance-dependent nature of THz channels. Different from existing studies, we explore multi-band-based spectrum allocation with adaptive sub-band bandwidth (ASB) by allowing the spectrum of interest to be divided into sub-bands with unequal bandwidths. Also, we investigate the impact of sub-band assignment on multi-connectivity (MC) enabled THzCom systems, where users associate and communicate with multiple access points simultaneously. We formulate resource allocation problems, with the primary focus on spectrum allocation, to determine sub-band assignment, sub-band bandwidth, and optimal transmit power. Thereafter, we propose reasonable approximations and transformations, and develop iterative algorithms based on the successive convex approximation technique to analytically solve the formulated problems. Aided by numerical results, we show that by enabling and optimizing ASB, significantly higher throughput can be achieved as compared to adopting equal sub-band bandwidth, and this throughput gain is most profound when the power budget constraint is more stringent. We also show that our sub-band assignment strategy in MC-enabled THzCom systems outperforms the state-of-the-art sub-band assignment strategies and the performance gain is most profound when the spectrum with the lowest average molecular absorption coefficient is selected during spectrum allocation.

Robust trajectory and communication design for angle-constrained multi-UAV communications in the presence of jammers

This paper studies a multi-unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) enabled wireless communication system, where multiple UAVs are employed to communicate with a group of ground terminals (GTs) in the presence of potential jammers. We aim to maximize the throughput overall GTs by jointly optimizing the UAVs' trajectory, the GTs' scheduling and power allocation. Unlike most prior studies, we consider the UAVs' turning and climbing angle constraints, the UAVs' three-dimensional (3D) trajectory constraints, minimum UAV-to-UAV (U2U) distance constraint, and the GTs' transmit power requirements. However, the formulated problem is a mixed-integer non-convex problem and is intractable to work it out with conventional optimization methods. To tackle this difficulty, we propose an efficient robust iterative algorithm to decompose the original problem be three sub-problems and acquire the suboptimal solution via utilizing the block coordinate descent (BCD) method, successive convex approximation (SCA) technique, and S-procedure. Extensive simulation results show that our proposed robust iterative algorithm offers a substantial gain in the system performance compared with the benchmark algorithms.

Data Rate Maximization in RIS-Assisted D2D Communication with Transceiver Hardware Impairments

We maximize the transmit rate of device-to-device (D2D) in a reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) assisted D2D communication system by satisfying the unit-modulus constraints of reflectin elements, the transmit power limit of base station (BS) and the transmitter in a D2D pair. Since it is a non-convex optimization problem, the block coordinate descent (BCD) technique is adopted to decouple this problem into three subproblems. Then, the non-convex subproblems are approximated into convex problems by using successive convex approximation (SCA) and penalty convex-concave procedure (CCP) techniques. Finally, the optimal solution of original problem is obtained by iteratively optimizing the subproblems. Simulation results reveal the validity of the algorithm that we proposed to solve the optimization problem and illustrate the effectiveness of RIS to improve the transmit rate of the D2D pair even with hardware impairments.

Sample-Based and Feature-Based Federated Learning for Unconstrained and Constrained Nonconvex Optimization via Mini-batch SSCA

Federated learning (FL) has become a hot research area in enabling the collaborative training of machine learning models among multiple clients that hold sensitive local data. Nevertheless, unconstrained federated optimization has been studied mainly using stochastic gradient descent (SGD), which may converge slowly, and constrained federated optimization, which is more challenging, has not been investigated so far. This paper investigates sample-based and feature-based federated optimization, respectively, and considers both unconstrained and constrained nonconvex problems for each of them. First, we propose FL algorithms using stochastic successive convex approximation (SSCA) and mini-batch techniques. These algorithms can adequately exploit the structures of the objective and constraint functions and incrementally utilize samples. We show that the proposed FL algorithms converge to stationary points and Karush-Kuhn-Tucker (KKT) points of the respective unconstrained and constrained nonconvex problems, respectively. Next, we provide algorithm examples with appealing computational complexity and communication load per communication round. We show that the proposed algorithm examples for unconstrained federated optimization are identical to FL algorithms via momentum SGD and provide an analytical connection between SSCA and momentum SGD. Finally, numerical experiments demonstrate the inherent advantages of the proposed algorithms in convergence speeds, communication and computation costs, and model specifications.

Joint Optimization of Trajectory and Communication in Multi-UAV Assisted Backscatter Communication Networks

This paper investigates a multiple unmanned aerial vehicle (multi-UAV) assisted backscatter communication network (BCN), where multiple UAVs are employed to transmit RF carriers to as well as collect data from multiple backscatter sensor nodes (BSNs) deployed on the ground. We formulate an optimization problem to maximize the max-min rate of the BCN by jointly optimizing three blocks of variables, i.e., the UAVs’ trajectories, the UAVs’ transmission power and the BSNs’ scheduling. The BSNs’ sequential energy constraints are innovatively considered in our work. However, the formulated optimization problem is difficult to be solved due to its non-convexity and combinatorial nature. To this end, we use the block coordinate descent (BCD) method and successive convex approximation (SCA) technique. Numerical results show the impact of the BSNs’ sequential energy constraint on the designed UAV trajectories and verify the gain of the proposed design in the max-min rate as compared to a benchmark scheme with UAV trajectory not optimized.

Fresh, Fair and Energy-Efficient Content Provision in a Private and Cache-Enabled UAV Network

In this paper, we investigate a private and cache-enabled unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) network for content provision. Aiming at delivering fresh, fair, and energy-efficient content files to terrestrial users, we formulate a joint UAV caching, UAV trajectory, and UAV transmit power optimization problem. This problem is confirmed to be a sequential decision problem with mixed-integer non-convex constraints, which is intractable directly. To this end, we propose a novel algorithm based on the techniques of subproblem decomposition and convex approximation. Particularly, we first propose to decompose the sequential decision problem into multiple repeated optimization subproblems via a Lyapunov technique. Next, an iterative optimization scheme incorporating a successive convex approximation (SCA) technique is explored to tackle the challenging mixed-integer non-convex subproblems. Besides, we analyze the convergence and computational complexity of the proposed algorithm and derive the theoretical value of the expected peak age of information (PAoI) to estimate the content freshness. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed algorithm can achieve the expected PAoI close to the theoretical value and is more 22.11% and 70.51% energy-efficient and fairer than benchmark algorithms.

GREEN: A Global Energy Efficiency Maximization Strategy for Multi-UAV Enabled Communication Systems

In the scenario of limited energy supply, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) enabled communication systems must make efficient use of energy in order to provide long-term service. In this paper, we propose a global energy efficiency maximization (GREEN) strategy for multi-UAV enabled communication systems. In such systems, a group of UAVs communicates with their associated ground terminals (GTs) by using a UAV-enabled interference channel (UAV-IC). In particular, we optimize the UAVs' trajectory control by jointly considering both the communication throughput and the total energy consumption of the whole system. We aim to maximize the global energy efficiency (GEE) of a task for multi-UAV communications, in which the problem is challenging to optimally solve due to its non-convex nature and strongly coupled variables. To tackle this problem, first, we investigate and propose a global energy-efficient optimization problem based on the fly-hover-communicate protocol. Second, we extend our proposed solution from the single UAV-enabled system to multiple UAV-GT pairs cases. In addition, we consider the general scenario in which the UAVs also communicate while flying. Based on the successive convex approximation technique and the path discretization method, the GREEN strategy is designed for optimizing UAV trajectories in this scenario. The simulation results show that the proposed strategy can achieve significantly higher GEE than the benchmark schemes for multi-UAV enabled communications.

Optimal Resource Allocation for Multi-User OFDMA-URLLC MEC Systems

In this paper, we study resource allocation algorithm design for multi-user orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA) ultra-reliable low latency communication (URLLC) in mobile edge computing (MEC) systems. To meet the stringent end-to-end delay and reliability requirements of URLLC MEC systems, we propose joint uplink-downlink resource allocation and finite blocklength transmission. Furthermore, we employ a partial time overlap between the uplink and downlink frames to minimize the end-to-end delay, which introduces a new time causality constraint. The proposed resource allocation algorithm is formulated as an optimization problem for minimization of the total weighted power consumption of the network under a constraint on the number of URLLC user bits computed within the maximum allowable computation time, i.e., the end-to-end delay of a computation task. Despite the non-convexity of the formulated optimization problem, we develop a globally optimal solution using a branch-and-bound approach based on discrete monotonic optimization theory. The branch-and-bound algorithm minimizes an upper bound on the total power consumption until convergence to the globally optimal value. Furthermore, to strike a balance between computational complexity and performance, we propose two efficient suboptimal algorithms based on successive convex approximation and second-order cone techniques. Our simulation results reveal that the proposed resource allocation algorithm design facilitates URLLC in MEC systems, and yields significant power savings compared to three baseline schemes. Moreover, our simulation results show that the proposed suboptimal algorithms offer different trade-offs between performance and complexity and attain a close-to-optimal performance at comparatively low complexity.

Performance Analysis and Optimization of a UAV-Enabled Two-Way Relaying Network Under FSMH, NC, and PNC Schemes

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) have played an important role in wireless communications due to the advantages, such as highly controllable mobility in 3-D space, swift deployment, Line-of-Sight (LoS) aerial–ground links, and so on. In this article, we consider a UAV-enabled two-way relaying system, where the UAV relay assists the information exchange between two ground users (GUs) under three different schemes, i.e., four-slot multihopping (FSMH) without network coding (NC), three-slot NC, and two-slot physical NC (PNC). First, the capacity region of each scheme in this relaying system is analyzed. Then, we maximize the system average sum rate by jointly optimizing the time resource allocation, transmission powers of the transceivers, and the UAV trajectory subject to the constraints on UAV mobility and information causality under each scheme. To solve those problems, we propose an iterative algorithm by applying the successive convex approximation and block coordinate descent techniques. Specifically, the time resource allocation, transmission powers, and the UAV trajectory are alternatively optimized in each iteration. In addition, the nonconvex trajectory optimization problem is solved by successively solving an approximate convex optimization problem. To gain more insights, we also investigate the performance of those three schemes with symmetric and asymmetric traffic, respectively, by introducing a new traffic pattern constraint. Numerical results show that the proposed relaying schemes with moving relay can achieve great throughput gains as compared to the conventional scheme with static relay. The three relay schemes also show great performance heterogeneity under different traffic patterns.

Latency and Reliability Aware Edge Computation Offloading via an Intelligent Reflecting Surface

Despite the advantages of multi-access edge computing in enabling latency-sensitive services and extending the limited computing capabilities of network devices, access communication issues are still often causing the quality of the wireless channels to be severely degraded, preventing the edge resources from being efficiently utilized. Through the deployment of low-cost passive reflecting elements, the recent studies of intelligent reflecting surfaces (IRSs) in wireless networks have shown a great potential for enhancing the quality of the wireless channels and the transmission rates. In this work, motivated by the recent findings, we study the use of an IRS-aided edge computing system for enabling low latency and high reliability computation offloading in the context of a single-user network. Specifically, we optimize the phase shift of the IRS elements along with the device’s transmit power and offloading decision, with the objective of minimizing the device’s energy consumption. Due to the non-convexity of the problem, we propose a customized sub-optimal solution based on the alternating optimization approach, utilizing novel successive convex approximation techniques. Numerical analysis demonstrates the energy reduction and saving in network resources provided by the optimized use of the IRS, especially for offloading services with higher reliability.

Energy Consumption Minimization Scheme for NOMA-Based Mobile Edge Computation Networks Underlaying UAV

An unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)-assisted mobile edge computing (MEC) networks fulfil the on-demand computation services for the mobile terminals (MTs) with its high mobility and easy deployment. Thus, reduction in the latency is observed but the energy efficiency is still a major issue in this network, as both the UAV and MTs have limited energy storage batteries. Also, to support the massive connectivity, and to handle the data traffic generated by the MTs in an uplink scenario, using nonorthogonal multiple access (NOMA) is accomodated. The NOMA-based MEC provides flexible computing services to MTs. In this article, our goal is to minimize the total energy consumption of the NOMA-based MEC networks underlaying UAV with time, computation capacity, and UAV trajectory. The formulated model is a nonlinear programming problem; for the solution, it is divided into two subproblems: joint time allocation and task computation capacity, and UAV trajectory optimization. To solve the joint time allocation and computation task capacity, we proposed an iterative algorithm with low complexity, where closed-form solutions are obtained in each step. Next, to optimize the trajectory of the UAV, we used the successive convex approximation technique. Numerical results demonstrated that the proposed scheme achieves better results as compared to the orthogonal multiple access and equal resource allocation schemes.

Over-the-Air Computation via Reconfigurable Intelligent Surface

Over-the-air computation (AirComp) is a disruptive technique for fast wireless data aggregation in Internet of Things (IoT) networks via exploiting the waveform superposition property of multiple-access channels. However, the performance of AirComp is bottlenecked by the worst channel condition among all links between the IoT devices and the access point. In this paper, a reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) assisted AirComp system is proposed to boost the received signal power and thus mitigate the performance bottleneck by reconfiguring the propagation channels. With an objective to minimize the AirComp distortion, we propose a joint design of AirComp transceivers and RIS phase-shifts, which however turns out to be a highly intractable non-convex programming problem. To this end, we develop a novel alternating minimization framework in conjunction with the successive convex approximation technique, which is proved to converge monotonically. To reduce the computational complexity, we transform the subproblem in each alternation as a smooth convex-concave saddle point problem, which is then tackled by proposing a Mirror-Prox method that only involves a sequence of closed-form updates. Simulations show that the computation time of the proposed algorithm can be two orders of magnitude smaller than that of the state-of-the-art algorithms, while achieving a similar distortion performance.

UAV-Assisted MEC Networks With Aerial and Ground Cooperation

With the high altitude and flexible mobility, unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) assisted mobile edge computing (MEC) is becoming a promising technology to cope with the computation-intensive and latency-critical task in prospective Internet of Things. In this paper, we propose a novel MEC system with several ground servers at access points and one aerial server carried by UAV. To balance the vital metrics of the MEC system, computation bits and energy consumption, we aim to maximize the weighted computation efficiency of the system, subject to the constraints on communication and computation resources, minimum computation requirement and UAV’s mobility. To this end, a joint optimization problem with the goal of weighted computation efficiency maximization is formulated. First, we analyze the problem and transform it into an equivalent tractable form. Then, we solve the challenging non-convex problem by jointly optimizing the computation task assignment, time slot partition, transmission bandwidth and CPU frequency allocation, transmit power allocation, and UAV’s trajectory, based on the Dinkelbach’s method, Lagrange duality and successive convex approximation technique. Furthermore, we propose an alternative computation efficiency maximization algorithm, followed by the convergence and complexity analysis. Finally, numerical simulations show that our proposed algorithm significantly improves the computation efficiency compared to benchmark schemes. It is also validated that the proposed algorithm effectively obtains a good tradeoff between the computation task bits and energy consumption of the system.

Joint computation and power allocation for NOMA enabled MEC networks in the finite blocklength regime

This paper investigates the reliable computation offloading in non-orthogonal multiple access enabled mobile edge computing networks, where the short-packet technique is adopted to meet the stringent latency requirements of delay-sensitive computing services. To characterize the reliability of computation offloading with finite blocklength coding, a novel analytical framework is developed to approximate the average overall block error probability (AOBEP) by using a double-case linearization. With the derived approximate expression for AOBEP, the joint optimization of computation workload and transmit power is further investigated, in order to minimize the AOBEP under the computation/communication delay constraints. To tackle the non-convexity of the formulated problem, the formulated problem is first decomposed into the computation workload problem and the transmit power allocation problem. For the computing workload problem, a closed-form solution is derived. Then, by applying the derived workload allocation, the power allocation is transformed into the convex form through some approximations and solved by the successive convex approximation technique. Finally, simulation results are provided to demonstrate the reliability enhancement of computation offloading and reveal the relationship between the workload/power allocation and the communication/computation delay.

User Grouping and Reflective Beamforming for IRS-Aided URLLC

This letter studies an intelligent reflecting surface (IRS)-aided downlink ultra-reliable and low-latency communication (URLLC) system, in which an IRS is dedicatedly deployed to assist a base station (BS) to send individual short-packet messages to multiple users. To enhance the URLLC performance, the users are divided into different groups and the messages for users in each group are encoded into a single codeword. By considering the time division multiple access (TDMA) protocol among different groups, our objective is to minimize the total latency for all users subject to their individual reliability requirements, via jointly optimizing the user grouping and blocklength allocation at the BS together with the reflective beamforming at the IRS. We solve the latency minimization problem via the alternating optimization, in which the blocklengths and the reflective beamforming are optimized by using the techniques of successive convex approximation (SCA) and semi-definite relaxation (SDR), while the user grouping is updated by K-means and greedy-based methods. Numerical results show that the proposed designs can significantly reduce the communication latency, as compared to various benchmark schemes, which unveil the importance of user grouping and reflective beamforming optimization for exploiting the joint encoding gain and enhancing the worst-case user performance.

Robust 3D-Trajectory and Time Switching Optimization for Dual-UAV-Enabled Secure Communications

This paper investigates a dual-unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)-enabled secure communication system, in which, a UAV moves around to send confidential messages to a mobile user while another cooperative UAV transmits artificial noise signals to confuse malicious eavesdroppers. Both UAVs have energy constraints and the location information of eavesdroppers is imperfect. We consider a worst-case secrecy rate maximization problem of the mobile user over all time slots. This optimization problem is solved by jointly designing the three-dimensional (3D) trajectory of UAVs and the time allocation (recharging and service or jamming) under practical constraints including maximum UAV speed, UAV collision avoidance, UAV positioning error, and UAV energy harvesting. Specifically, we adopt a more practical UAV-ground channel model with both large-scale and small-scale fading components. Due to the non-convex feasible region constructed by the complicated constraints, directly finding the optimal solution of the original problem is intractable. To address this issue, we decouple the original optimization problem into three subproblems and develop an iterative algorithm to find its suboptimal solution by using the block coordinate descent technique. To solve each subproblem, certain advanced optimization tools, such as integer relaxation, S-procedure, and successive convex approximation techniques, are utilized. Numerical simulation results are provided to corroborate the theoretical derivations and to evaluate the performance of the proposed algorithm. Additionally, the numerical results assist to draw new insights on the 3D UAV trajectory by comparing the performance with conventional two-dimensional (2D) schemes.

Proactive UAV Network Slicing for URLLC and Mobile Broadband Service Multiplexing

The unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) network that is convinced as a significant component of 5G and emerging 6G wireless networks is desired to accommodate multiple types of service requirements simultaneously. However, how to converge different types of services onto a common UAV network without deploying an individual network solution for each type of service is challenging. We tackle this challenge in this paper through slicing the UAV network, i.e., creating logical UAV networks customized for specific requirements. To this end, we formulate the UAV network slicing problem as a sequential decision problem to provide mobile broadband (MBB) services for ground mobile users while satisfying ultra-reliable and low-latency requirements of UAV control and non-payload signal delivery. This problem, however, is difficult to be directly solved mainly due to the sequence-dependent characteristic and the lack of accurate location information of mobile users and accurate and tractable channel gain models in practice. To overcome these difficulties, we propose a novel solution approach based on learning and optimization methods. Particularly, we develop a distributed learning method to predict mobile users’ locations, where partial user location information stored on each UAV is utilized to train user location prediction networks. To achieve accurate channel gain models, we design deep neural networks (DNNs) that are trained by signal measurements at each UAV. To cope with the challenging sequence-dependent characteristic of the problem, we develop a Lyapunov-based optimization framework with provable performance guarantees to decompose the original problem into a sequence of separate optimization subproblems based on the learned results. Finally, an iterative optimization scheme joint with a successive convex approximation technique is exploited to solve these subproblems. Simulation results demonstrate the accuracy of the learning methods as well as the effectiveness of the Lyapunov-based optimization framework.

Intelligent Reflecting Surface Enhanced Multi-UAV NOMA Networks

Intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) enhanced multi-unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) networks are investigated. A new transmission framework is proposed, where multiple UAV-mounted base stations employ NOMA to serve multiple groups of ground users with the aid of an IRS. The three-dimensional (3D) placement and transmit power of UAVs, the reflection matrix of the IRS, and the NOMA decoding orders among users are jointly optimized for maximization of the sum rate of considered networks. To tackle the formulated mixed-integer non-convex optimization problem with coupled variables, a block coordinate descent (BCD)-based iterative algorithm is developed. Specifically, the original problem is decomposed into three subproblems, which are alternatingly solved by exploiting the penalty method and the successive convex approximation technique. The proposed BCD-based algorithm is demonstrated to be able to obtain a stationary point of the original problem with polynomial time complexity. Numerical results show that: 1) the proposed NOMA-IRS scheme for multi-UAV networks achieves a higher sum rate compared to the benchmark schemes, i.e., orthogonal multiple access (OMA)-IRS and NOMA without IRS; 2) the use of IRS is capable of providing performance gain for multi-UAV networks by both enhancing channel qualities of UAVs to their served users and mitigating the inter-UAV interference; and 3) optimizing the UAV placement can make the sum rate gain brought by NOMA more distinct due to the flexible decoding order design.