Background. The deployment of high- and ultra-high-density Internet of Things (IoT) systems poses a number of technical and organizational challenges. One promising approach to addressing these challenges is the integration of advanced network and data processing technologies, in particular Software-Defined Networking (SDN) and Multi-Access Edge Computing (MEC). This paper aims to explore the process of integrating SDN and MEC technologies into support infrastructures for high- and ultra-high-density IoT. Results. The study proposes an architecture for an integrated IoT–SDN–MEC system comprising both terrestrial and aerial segments. A mathematical model has been developed for this architecture, enabling the evaluation of energy consumption in fog-layer devices as well as the estimation of task execution delays. In addition, a traffic offloading scheme for the integrated IoT–MEC–SDN system is presented. The research formulates the problem of optimizing energy consumption and task processing delays in the aerial segment. To address this problem, the Grey Wolf Optimizer (GWO) algorithm is employed, providing efficient near-optimal solutions. Conclusion. Simulation results demonstrate that incorporating fog-layer resources within the aerial segment of the integrated IoT–MEC–SDN system significantly reduces both average energy consumption and average task processing delays in high- and ultra-high-density IoT environments. Future research will focus on determining the optimal structural configuration of the aerial segment.
Shefer et al. (Sun,) studied this question.