2026· IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications· Vol 25, pp. 22032-22046· 0 citations· 49 references
Computer Science
Abstract
Over-the-Air Computation (AirComp) Federated Learning (FL) is actively studied as a communication-efficient technique for distributed Artificial Intelligence (AI) model training. To mitigate the impact of wireless channels on the aggregated global model while addressing client energy sustainability, recent efforts have explored integrating Reconfigurable Intelligent Surfaces (RIS) and Simultaneous Wireless Information and Power Transfer (SWIPT) into AirComp FL. In this context, literature has mainly focused on radio resource allocation for optimized SWIPT and RIS-assisted Downlink (DL) model broadcasting and Uplink (UL) AirComp model aggregation. Nevertheless, existing works largely treat the communication design of AirComp FL in isolation, neglecting the tight coupling between radio and compute resource allocation. In this paper, we address this gap by modeling the radio-compute dependency in AirComp FL and optimizing harvested energy to sustain client-side local training and model transmissions. To this end, we jointly optimize the RIS configuration, SWIPT power-splitting ratio, DL transmission time, and local computing frequency to minimize the total communication and computation overhead in latency and energy. The original non-convex problem is decomposed into two independent subproblems, which are solved iteratively via a combination of low-rank optimization and min-max convex reformulation techniques. Numerical evaluations confirm that integrating RIS and SWIPT into AirComp FL leads to higher accuracy, and reduced latency and energy overheads across the FL pipeline.
Federated learning (FL) over wireless networks suffers from significant training latency and degraded convergence due to unreliable wireless transmission, especially under blocked propagation environments. Although reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RISs) can improve communication reliability, existing wireless FL studies rarely characterize the trade-off between learning convergence and communication delay under modulation-dependent transmission errors. In this paper, we consider a wireless FL system operating under RIS-assisted blocked-link propagation scenarios, and focus on adaptive modulation and sub-channel allocation for convergence-latency aware communication design. By characterizing the effect of symbol errors on uploaded local gradients, we derive a convergence-related upper bound that reveals the impact of symbol error rate (SER) on FL loss decay. Based on this result, we formulate a joint convergence-latency optimization problem, which is cast as a mixed-integer nonlinear programming (MINLP) problem, and solve it using a low-complexity hybrid alternating optimization framework. Extensive experiments on MNIST, CIFAR-10, and Speech Commands show that the proposed scheme consistently achieves faster convergence and higher test accuracy than existing adaptive communication schemes, especially in complex tasks and challenging wireless scenarios.
Liwei Wang, Wen Chen, Jun Li et al.· arXiv.org· 0 citations
Reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS)-assisted wireless-powered communication networks (WPCNs) introduce a new degree of freedom: the same passive beamforming array can concentrate the downlink energy toward harvesting devices and simultaneously shape the uplink interference environment. In this paper, we study a system where the base station (BS) waveform serves the dual role of wireless energy transfer (WET) and passive target sensing. Using the position error bound (PEB) derived from the equivalent Fisher information matrix (EFIM) as the sensing quality metric, we formulate a joint resource allocation problem that maximizes weighted uplink sum-rate subject to a PEB constraint, energy-causality, block-time sharing, and unit-modulus RIS phase constraints. Focusing on the practically important WET-only sensing case, we show that the problem separates into four tractable subproblems and propose a block coordinate descent (BCD) algorithm: (i) closed-form water-filling for WIT time-power allocation, (ii) semidefinite relaxation (SDR) with Dinkelbach iterations for per-slot WIT-RIS beamforming, (iii) golden-section search for the optimal WET duration, and (iv) a convex SDP for WET-RIS optimization under a PEB constraint. The BCD iterates converge monotonically. Simulations confirm a fundamental rate–sensing tradeoff and demonstrate significant gains from joint RIS-assisted optimization.
Yongjie Li, Jing Shen, Jizhao Lu et al.· 2026 8th International Confe...· 0 citations
Communication bottlenecks remain a primary obstacle to the large-scale deployment of federated learning (FL). This article proposes a comprehensive framework for building communication-efficient FL, founded on three fundamental pillars: model compression, client selection, and resource allocation. We first survey state-of-the-art techniques for each pillar, specifically elucidating how quantization, pruning, and low-rank approximation reduce payloads; how intelligent client schedulers exploit heterogeneity; and how emerging communication paradigms such as Integrated Sensing and Communication (ISAC) and Over-the-Air Computation (AirComp) redefine bandwidth and energy utilization. Subsequently, these insights are unified through a task-oriented design philosophy that couples strategy selection with cross-layer, multi-objective optimization. To validate the proposed framework, we present an autonomous driving case study with two complementary experiments: a task-oriented client scheduling strategy that improves object detection accuracy under the same communication time budget, and a joint quantization-bandwidth optimization that further reduces total training time under dynamic networks. Together, the experiments demonstrate the advantages of holistic task-oriented design for real-world FL deployment.
Fu-Qiang Pan, Yan Liu, Er-Wu Liu et al.· 0 citations
To mitigate the scalability bottleneck in the radio access network (RAN) in federated edge learning (FEEL), over-the-air federated learning (AirFL) exploits waveform superposition over multiple-access channels (MACs) for analog model aggregation. However, coherent AirFL typically relies on stringent PHY-layer conditions such as accurate channel state information (CSI), tight time/frequency synchronization, and frequent transceiver calibration for signal alignment. However, these requirements, if not impossible to be met, incur substantial communication and computation overhead. In this paper, we propose a non-coherent AirFL (NCAirFL) protocol over a broadband single-antenna MAC, leveraging binary dithering, unbiased non-coherent detection, and long-term error feedback to waive the need for instantaneous CSI. For NCAirFL with general smooth non-convex objectives and a constant learning rate, we establish a convergence bound achieving the convergence rate in the same order of $\mathcal{O}(1/\sqrt{T})$ as communication-ideal FedAvg, where $T$ is the total number of communication rounds. To further improve communication efficiency under data and wireless resource heterogeneity, we also derive a lower bound on the expected single-round objective decrease in the global loss conditioned on device scheduling, building upon which a surrogate objective function is obtained for jointly optimal device selection and power control. Experimental results on MNIST and CIFAR-10 corroborate that NCAirFL achieves learning performance close to FedAvg in practical settings, with the proposed device scheduling policy substantially accelerating convergence.
Haifeng Wen, Nicol\`o Michelusi, Osvaldo Simeone et al.· 0 citations
This paper investigates over-the-air (OTA) computation enabled online federated learning (FL) in low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellite networks. Specifically, we consider a dual-layer OTA aggregation architecture, where ground devices upload analog model updates to serving satellites via uplink OTA aggregation, and satellites forward the aggregated signals to a data processing center through the second round OTA aggregation. Then, we formulate a long-term data-utilization maximization problem in which devices continuously collect new data and untrained samples gradually lose freshness. The problem is subject to the satellite beam budget, transmit-power limit, and global mean squared error (MSE) constraint that governs end-to-end aggregation distortion. This yields a coupled mixed-integer nonlinear programming (MINLP) problem, involving tightly coupled discrete beam-hopping decisions and continuous power control. Due to the combinatorial action space and nonconvex constraints, the problem is NP-hard and computationally intractable. Furthermore, the time-varying satellite topology and dynamic data generation render it a sequential decision-making problem, necessitating adaptive online scheduling. To address these issues, we cast the problem as a Markov decision process and develop a proximal policy optimization (PPO)-based deep reinforcement learning framework that jointly optimizes adaptive beam hopping and power control, using an MSE-aware reward to balance data utilization and aggregation accuracy. Numerical simulation results verify that the proposed algorithm consistently outperforms other benchmark schemes, achieving superior long-term data utilization and faster FL convergence while satisfying the MSE requirement.
Zhen-Dong Li, Shao-Jie Wang, Zhou Su et al.· 0 citations
Over-the-air FL with EH MDs under heterogeneous data distributions under heterogeneous data distributions is studied, and the proposed unified framework improves fairness or personalization, depending on the operating mode, while reducing communication overhead.
F. Bagci, Busra Tegin, Mohammad Kazemi et al.· 0 citations
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