Quantum-Secure Photonic-Neuromorphic Edge Intelligence for Autonomous Environmental Sensing and Climate-Resilient Smart Cities

Abstract

Abstract: Climate-resilient smart cities require sensing infrastructures that can detect weak, rapidly evolving environmental signals, infer actionable risk locally, and remain trustworthy under both cyber disruption and emerging quantum threats. This paper develops a model-based architecture for Quantum-Secure Photonic-Neuromorphic Edge Intelligence (Q-SPNEI), integrating heterogeneous environmental sensor meshes, photonic pre-processing, neuromorphic event-driven inference, post-quantum cryptographic assurance, edge-to-cloud orchestration and urban digital-twin feedback. The study synthesizes supplied literature on resilient edge computing, secure smart-city architectures, post-quantum cryptography, photonic signal processing, neuromorphic computing, mobile sensing, hyperspectral Earth observation and climate-risk modelling. A multi-layer mathematical framework is formulated through state-space dynamics, graph-based sensor fusion, spiking-neural inference, cryptographic trust penalties, constrained multi-objective optimization and a risk-adjusted resilience score. Because no empirical dataset is supplied, the analysis uses explicitly illustrative normalized values from 0 to 10 to demonstrate calculation, sensitivity and interpretation. The illustrative Q-SPNEI composite score is 8.64/10, with security, event-driven intelligence and sensing fidelity providing the largest contributions under the chosen weights. The paper identifies a technical gap between high-throughput environmental sensing and secure autonomous edge action: current strands of literature generally address edge resilience, quantum-safe security, photonic acceleration, neuromorphic processing or urban sensing separately rather than as a unified sensing-to-response loop. The proposed framework therefore contributes an integrated architecture, reproducible modelling logic, implementation pathway, validation plan and patent-oriented claim concepts for climate-resilient urban intelligence. Empirical deployment, device benchmarking and jurisdiction-specific patent examination remain necessary before real-world or legal conclusions can be made. Keywords: post-quantum cryptography; photonic computing; neuromorphic computing; edge intelligence; environmental sensing; smart cities; climate resilience; event-driven AI; sensor fusion; digital twins; cyber-physical systems; quantum-safe networks; hyperspectral sensing; autonomous response; resilient infrastructure.