Training Latency Minimization for Model-Splitting Allowed Federated Edge Learning

Abstract: To alleviate the shortage of computing power faced by clients in training deep neural networks (DNNs) using federated learning (FL), we leverage the edge computing and split learning to propose a model-splitting allowed FL (SFL) framework, with the aim to minimize the training latency without loss of test accuracy. Under the synchronized global update setting, the latency to complete a round of global training is determined by the maximum latency for the clients to complete a local training session. Therefore, the training latency minimization problem (TLMP) is modelled as a minimizing-maximum problem. To solve this mixed integer nonlinear programming problem, we first propose a regression method to fit the quantitative-relationship between the cut-layer and other parameters of an AI-model, and thus, transform the TLMP into a continuous problem. Considering that the two subproblems involved in the TLMP, namely, the cut-layer selection problem for the clients and the computing resource allocation problem for the parameter-server are relative independence, an alternate-optimization-based algorithm with polynomial time complexity is developed to obtain a high-quality solution to the TLMP. Extensive experiments are performed on a popular DNN-model EfficientNetV2 using dataset MNIST, and the results verify the validity and improved performance of the proposed SFL framework.