# ELASTIC: Efficient Once For All Iterative Search for Object Detection on Microcontrollers

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2503.21999 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.21999/

## Key facts

- Cited by 3 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 21 of its 31 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 27 Mar 2025.

## Builds on (most cited first, 21 of 21)

- [Feature Pyramid Networks for Object Detection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1612.03144/) (2016)
- [MobileNets: Efficient Convolutional Neural Networks for Mobile Vision Applications](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1704.04861/) (2017)
- [SSD: Single Shot MultiBox Detector](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1512.02325/) (2015)
- [YOLOv3: An Incremental Improvement](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1804.02767/) (2018)
- [Neural Architecture Search with Reinforcement Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1611.01578/) (2016)
- [Regularized Evolution for Image Classifier Architecture Search](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1802.01548/) (2018)
- [Once-for-All: Train One Network and Specialize it for Efficient Deployment](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1908.09791/) (2019)
- [NAS-FPN: Learning Scalable Feature Pyramid Architecture for Object Detection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1904.07392/) (2019)
- [MCUNet: Tiny Deep Learning on IoT Devices](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2007.10319/) (2020)
- [MCUNetV2: Memory-Efficient Patch-based Inference for Tiny Deep Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2110.15352/) (2021)
- [LightTrack: Finding Lightweight Neural Networks for Object Tracking via One-Shot Architecture Search](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2104.14545/) (2021)
- [DetNAS: Backbone Search for Object Detection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1903.10979/) (2019)
- [DORY: Automatic End-to-End Deployment of Real-World DNNs on Low-Cost IoT MCUs](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2008.07127/) (2020)
- [MobileDets: Searching for Object Detection Architectures for Mobile Accelerators](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2004.14525/) (2020)
- [NAS-FCOS: Fast Neural Architecture Search for Object Detection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1906.04423/) (2019)
- [Hit-Detector: Hierarchical Trinity Architecture Search for Object Detection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2003.11818/) (2020)
- [TinyissimoYOLO: A Quantized, Low-Memory Footprint, TinyML Object Detection Network for Low Power Microcontrollers](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2306.00001/) (2023)
- [Flexible and Fully Quantized Ultra-Lightweight TinyissimoYOLO for Ultra-Low-Power Edge Systems](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2307.05999/) (2023)
- [MCUFormer: Deploying Vision Transformers on Microcontrollers with Limited Memory](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2310.16898/) (2023)
- [BED: A Real-Time Object Detection System for Edge Devices](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2202.07503/) (2022)
- [DetOFA: Efficient Training of Once-for-All Networks for Object Detection Using Path Filter](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.13121/) (2023)

## Built on by (most cited first, 3 of 3)

- [TrashDet: Iterative Neural Architecture Search for Efficient Waste Detection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2512.20746/) (2025)
- [XiYOLO: Energy-Aware Object Detection via Iterative Architecture Search and Scaling](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2605.06927/) (2026)
- [ENAS: An Efficient Hardware-Aware Neural Architecture Search Framework for TinyML on Resource-Constrained Microcontrollers](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2609.30272/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Deploying high-performance object detectors on TinyML platforms poses significant challenges due to tight hardware constraints and the modular complexity of modern detection pipelines. Neural Architecture Search (NAS) offers a path toward automation, but existing methods either restrict optimization to individual modules, sacrificing cross-module synergy, or require global searches that are computationally intractable. We propose ELASTIC (Efficient Once for AlL IterAtive Search for ObjecT DetectIon on MiCrocontrollers), a unified, hardware-aware NAS framework that alternates optimization across modules (e.g., backbone, neck, and head) in a cyclic fashion. ELASTIC introduces a novel Population Passthrough mechanism in evolutionary search that retains high-quality candidates between search stages, yielding faster convergence, up to an 8% final mAP gain, and eliminates search instability observed without population passthrough. In a controlled comparison, empirical results show ELASTIC achieves +4.75% higher mAP and 2x faster convergence than progressive NAS strategies on SVHN, and delivers a +9.09% mAP improvement on PascalVOC given the same search budget. ELASTIC achieves 72.3% mAP on PascalVOC, outperforming MCUNET by 20.9% and TinyissimoYOLO by 16.3%. When deployed on MAX78000/MAX78002 microcontrollers, ELASTICderived models outperform Analog Devices' TinySSD baselines, reducing energy by up to 71.6%, lowering latency by up to 2.4x, and improving mAP by up to 6.99 percentage points across multiple datasets. The experimental videos and codes are available on the project website (https://nail-uh.github.io/elastic.github.io/).