Bare‐Bones particle Swarm optimization‐based quantization for fast and energy efficient convolutional neural networks

Abstract

Neural network quantization is a critical method for reducing memory usage and computational complexity in deep learning models, making them more suitable for deployment on resource‐constrained devices. In this article, we propose a method called BBPSO‐Quantizer, which utilizes an enhanced Bare‐Bones Particle Swarm Optimization algorithm, to address the challenging problem of mixed precision quantization of convolutional neural networks (CNNs). Our proposed algorithm leverages a new population initialization, a robust screening process, and a local search strategy to improve the search performance and guide the population towards a feasible region. Additionally, Deb's constraint handling method is incorporated to ensure that the optimized solutions satisfy the functional constraints. The effectiveness of our BBPSO‐Quantizer is evaluated on various state‐of‐the‐art CNN architectures, including VGG, DenseNet, ResNet, and MobileNetV2, using CIFAR‐10, CIFAR‐100, and Tiny ImageNet datasets. Comparative results demonstrate that our method delivers an excellent tradeoff between accuracy and computational efficiency.