A Dynamic Task Scheduling Strategy for Multi-Access Edge Computing in IRS-Aided Vehicular Networks

Multi-access Edge Computing (MEC) has played an important role in realizing intelligent beyond 5G (B5G) vehicular networks. The computation tasks of intelligent applications can be offloaded to and processed by near-end-user MEC servers to meet strict latency requirements. However, the latency of provided services is dependent on MEC processor scheduling and millimeter wave (mmWave) transmission conditions for the urban B5G vehicular networks. To alleviate the mmWave signal attenuation caused by buildings, Intelligent Reflecting Surface (IRS) has been regarded as efficient and prospective infrastructure. In this article, we study the IRS-aided MEC-served vehicular networks and analyze the relationship between computation resource allocation and offloading policy at an intersection. Considering the vehicle mobility patterns, transmission conditions, and task sizes, we optimize the task scheduling by improving the allocation of limited processors and IRS resource. Moreover, the mutual interference among concurrent transmissions is taken into account. Assuming the moving directions available, a dynamic task scheduling algorithm is proposed which considers both the communications and computations. The simulation results illustrate that our proposal outperforms benchmark methods in terms of task offloading rate, computing rate, and finish rate for the IRS-aided MEC-served vehicular networks.