English

Tackling Non-IIDness in HAPS-Aided Federated Learning

Networking and Internet Architecture 2026-04-03 v4 Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition Machine Learning

Abstract

High-altitude platform stations (HAPS) enable large-scale federated learning (FL) in non-terrestrial networks (NTN) by providing wide-area coverage and predominantly line-of-sight (LoS) connectivity to many ground users. However, practical deployments face heterogeneous and non-independently and identically distributed (non-IID) client data, which degrades accuracy and slows convergence. We propose a weighted attribute-based client selection strategy that leverages server-side indicators: historical traffic behavior, instantaneous channel quality, computational capability, and prior-round learning contribution. At each round, the HAPS computes a composite score and selects the top clients, while adapting attribute weights online based on their correlation with validation-loss improvement. We further provide theoretical justification that traffic-derived uniformity can serve as a proxy for latent data heterogeneity, enabling selection of client subsets with reduced expected non-IIDness. Simulations demonstrate improved test accuracy, faster convergence, and lower training loss compared with random, resource-only, and single-attribute baselines.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2401.05308,
  title  = {Tackling Non-IIDness in HAPS-Aided Federated Learning},
  author = {Amin Farajzadeh and Animesh Yadav and Halim Yanikomeroglu},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2401.05308},
  year   = {2026}
}

Comments

Submitted to IEEE for possible publication

R2 v1 2026-06-28T14:13:25.793Z