A Survey on UAV-Enabled Edge Computing: Resource Management Perspective

Edge computing facilitates low-latency services at the network’s edge by distributing computation, communication, and storage resources within the geographic proximity of mobile and Internet-of-Things devices. The recent advancement in Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) technologies has opened new opportunities for edge computing in military operations, disaster response, or remote areas where traditional terrestrial networks are limited or unavailable. In such environments, UAVs can be deployed as aerial edge servers or relays to facilitate edge computing services. This form of computing is also known as UAV-enabled Edge Computing (UEC), which offers several unique benefits such as mobility, line-of-sight, flexibility, computational capability, and cost-efficiency. However, the resources on UAVs, edge servers, and Internet-of-Things devices are typically very limited in the context of UEC. Efficient resource management is therefore a critical research challenge in UEC. In this article, we present a survey on the existing research in UEC from the resource management perspective. We identify a conceptual architecture, different types of collaborations, wireless communication models, research directions, key techniques, and performance indicators for resource management in UEC. We also present a taxonomy of resource management in UEC. Finally, we identify and discuss some open research challenges that can stimulate future research directions for resource management in UEC.