Mobile Edge Computing for Multi-Services Digital Twin-Enabled IoT Heterogeneous Networks

A scheme for edge computing-enabled offloading in a digital twin (DT) enabled heterogeneous network (HetNet) of multi-services IoT devices (IDs) is proposed. This scheme optimizes the association and handover of IDs, offloading ratio, and resource allocation considering the number of IDs, deadline requirements, and resource capacities. The objective is to enhance future generation networks by considering the ID movement, diverse ID requests, and network heterogeneity. We formulate the problem as Joint ID assOciatIon, offloadiNg ratio, Wireless bandwidth and computIng reSource allocation, and digital twin placEment (JOINWISE), aiming to minimize the task completion time of all IDs while considering ID movement. Since JOINWISE is a mixed-integer nonlinear problem, we decompose it into two sub-problems: the ID Association (IDA) problem and the offloading Ratio, DT plAcement, bandwiDth and computIng resource allOcation (RADIO) problem. IDA can be solved by mapping it to a multi-dimensional multiple knapsacks problem. Due to the non-convexity, high dimension of decision variables, and dynamic HetNet environment of RADIO, we propose a deep deterministic policy gradient (DDPG) based reinforcement learning method to iteratively solve the two sub-problems. Simulation results have confirmed the effectiveness of our proposed scheme in tackling the JOINWISE problem.