A Cloud-Edge Framework for Energy-Efficient Event-Driven Control: An Integration of Online Supervised Learning, Spiking Neural Networks and Local Plasticity Rules

TL;DR

This paper introduces a cloud-edge framework using Spiking Neural Networks with local plasticity rules for energy-efficient, event-driven control, significantly reducing energy use and tracking error in complex control tasks.

Contribution

It presents a novel integration of SNNs with biologically plausible learning for control systems, enhancing efficiency and robustness in cloud-edge architectures.

Findings

Achieved 96% reduction in normalized tracking error.

Utilized only about 111 nJ per operation, 0.3% of conventional energy.

Reduced energy consumption with moderate increases during obstacle scenarios.

Abstract

This paper presents a novel cloud-edge framework for addressing computational and energy constraints in complex control systems. Our approach centers around a learning-based controller using Spiking Neural Networks (SNN) on physical plants. By integrating a biologically plausible learning method with local plasticity rules, we harness the efficiency, scalability, and low latency of SNNs. This design replicates control signals from a cloud-based controller directly on the plant, reducing the need for constant plant-cloud communication. The plant updates weights only when errors surpass predefined thresholds, ensuring efficiency and robustness in various conditions. Applied to linear workbench systems and satellite rendezvous scenarios, including obstacle avoidance, our architecture dramatically lowers normalized tracking error by 96% with increased network size. The event-driven nature of SNNs minimizes energy consumption, utilizing only about 111 nJ (0.3% of conventional computing requirements). The results demonstrate the system's adjustment to changing work environments and its efficient use of computational and energy resources, with a moderate increase in energy consumption of 27.2% and 37% for static and dynamic obstacles, respectively, compared to non-obstacle scenarios.