International Journal of Science, Engineering and TechnologyAuthors: Sasikanth Reddy Mandati
Abstract: The rapid expansion of Internet of Things (IoT) deployments in wireless environments has intensified the demand for efficient, scalable, and low-latency computing architectures. While cloud computing has traditionally served as the primary platform for IoT data storage and large-scale analytics, its centralized nature introduces challenges related to latency, bandwidth consumption, reliability, and privacy, particularly for real-time and mission-critical applications. To overcome these limitations, edge and fog computing paradigms have emerged as complementary approaches that extend cloud capabilities closer to data sources. This review paper presents a comprehensive and unified system-level analysis of cloud, fog, and IoT architectures in wireless environments. Beginning with fundamental cloud computing concepts, the paper systematically examines wireless communication technologies, edge and fog computing paradigms, and their integration into layered cloud fog IoT architectures. Key performance metrics such as latency, bandwidth utilization, energy efficiency, scalability, and fault tolerance are analyzed to highlight the trade-offs among different architectural approaches. In addition, the paper discusses critical security and privacy challenges arising from distributed and heterogeneous deployments, along with existing mitigation strategies. Furthermore, this survey reviews representative application domains including smart cities, healthcare, industrial IoT, and intelligent transportation systems, illustrating how unified architectures enable context-aware, real-time, and reliable services. A comparative analysis of existing solutions is provided to identify research gaps, design limitations, and best practices. Finally, the paper outlines open challenges and future research directions, emphasizing emerging trends such as AI-driven fog orchestration, next-generation wireless networks, and sustainable computing. This unified perspective aims to serve as a valuable reference for researchers and practitioners designing next-generation wireless IoT systems.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.18000339
