A Novel Multi-Objective Sequential Resource Allocation Optimization for UAV-Assisted VLC.

aerial vehicle (UAV)-assisted visible light communication (VLC) constitutes a promising approach for providing illumination and communication simultaneously. In this paper, we consider the problem of joint UAV deployment, cell association, and power allocation, to meet the illumination and data rate demands of a set of users in a geographical area. Towards this goal, we develop SOUVLC, a multi-objective sequentially optimized UAV-assisted VLC framework that aims at minimizing the required number of UAVs first and minimizing the total transmitted power second. SOUVLC mitigates inter-cell interference and accounts for illumination interference. We derive a mixed-integer linear formulation of SOUVLC, numerically evaluate it under different user demands and distributions, and demonstrate its superiority over several benchmarks.