Design and analysis of efficient QCA reversible adders

Quantum-dot cellular automata (QCA) as an emerging nanotechnology are envisioned to overcome the scaling and the heat dissipation issues of the current CMOS technology. In a QCA structure, information destruction plays an essential role in the overall heat dissipation, and in turn in the power consumption of the system. Therefore, reversible logic, which significantly controls the information flow of the system, is deemed suitable to achieve ultra-low-power structures. In order to benefit from the opportunities QCA and reversible logic provide, in this paper, we first review and implement prior reversible full-adder art in QCA. We then propose a novel reversible design based on three- and five-input majority gates, and a robust one-layer crossover scheme. The new full-adder significantly advances previous designs in terms of the optimization metrics, namely cell count, area, and delay. The proposed efficient full-adder is then used to design reversible ripple-carry adders (RCAs) with different sizes (i.e., 4, 8, and 16 bits). It is demonstrated that the new RCAs lead to 33% less garbage outputs, which can be essential in terms of lowering power consumption. This along with the achieved improvements in area, complexity, and delay introduces an ultra-efficient reversible QCA adder that can be beneficial in developing future computer arithmetic circuits and architecture

INTRODUCING AN OPTIMAL QCA CROSSBAR SWITCH FOR BASELINE NETWORK

Crossbar switch is the basic component in multi-stage interconnection networks. Therefore, this study was conducted to investigate performance of a crossbar switch with two multiplexers. The presented crossbar switch was simulated using quantum-dot cellular automata (QCA) technology and QCA Designer software, and was studied and optimized in terms of cell number, occupied area, number of clocks, and energy consumption. Using the provided crossbar switch, the baseline network was designed to be optimal in terms of cell number and occupied area. Also, the number of input states was investigated and simulated to verify accuracy of the baseline network. The proposed crossbar switch uses 62 QCA cells and the occupied area by the switch is equal to 0.06µm2 and its latency equals 4 clock zones, which is more efficient than the other designs. In this paper, using the presented crossbar switch, the baseline network was designed with 1713 cells, and occupied area of 2.89µm2

Design and simulation of a new QCA-based low-power universal gate

Quantum-dot Cellular Automata (QCA) is recognized in electronics for its low power consumption and high-density capabilities, emerging as a potential substitute for CMOS technology. GDI (Gate Diffusion Input) technology is featured as an innovative approach for enhancing power efficiency and spatial optimization in digital circuits. This study introduces an advanced four-input Improved Gate Diffusion Input (IGDI) design specifically for QCA technology as a universal gate. A key feature of the proposed 10-cell block is the absence of cross-wiring, which significantly enhances the circuit’s operational efficiency. Its universal cell nature allows for the carrying out of various logical gates by merely altering input values, without necessitating any structural redesign. The proposed design showcases notable advancements over prior models, including a reduced cell count by 17%, a 29% decrease in total energy usage, and a 44% reduction in average energy loss. This innovative IGDI design efficiently executes 21 combinational and various sequential functions. Simulations in 18 nm technology, accompanied by energy consumption analyses, demonstrate this design’s superior performance compared to existing models in key areas such as multiplexers, comparators, and memory circuits, alongside a significant reduction in cell count

THEORY, DESIGN, AND SIMULATION OF LINA: A PATH FORWARD FOR QCA-TYPE NANOELECTRONICS

The past 50 years have seen exponential advances in digital integrated circuit technologies which has facilitated an explosion of uses and functionality. Although this rate (generally referred to as "Moore's Law") cannot be sustained indefinitely, significant advances will remain possible even after current technologies reach fundamental limits. However if these further advances are to be realized, nanoelectronics designs must be developed that provide significant improvements over, the currently-utilized, complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) transistor based integrated circuits. One promising nanoelectronics paradigm to fulfill this function is Quantum-dot Cellular Automata (QCA). QCA provides the possibility of THz switching, molecular scaling, and provides particular applicability for advanced logical constructs such as reversible logic and systolic arrays within the paradigm. These attributes make QCA an exciting prospect; however, current fabrication technology does not exist which allows for the fabrication of reliable electronic QCA circuits which operate at room-temperature. Furthermore, a plausible path to fabrication of circuitry on the very large scale integration (VLSI) level with QCA does not currently exist. This has caused doubts to the viability of the paradigm and questions to its future as a suitable nanoelectronic replacement to CMOS. In order to resolve these issues, research was conducted into a new design which could utilize key attributes of QCA while also providing a means for near-term fabrication of reliable room-temperature circuits and a path forward for VLSI circuits.The result of this research, presented in this dissertation, is the Lattice-based Integrated-signal Nanocellular Automata (LINA) nanoelectronics paradigm. LINA designs are based on QCA and provide the same basic functionality as traditional QCA. LINA also retains the key attributes of THz switching, scalability to the molecular level, and ability to utilize advanced logical constructs which are crucial to the QCA proposals. However, LINA designs also provide significant improvements over traditional QCA. For example, the continuous correction of faults, due to LINA's integrated-signal approach, provides reliability improvements to enable room-temperature operation with cells which are potentially up to 20nm and fault tolerance to layout, patterning, stray-charge, and stuck-at-faults. In terms of fabrication, LINA's lattice-based structure allows precise relative placement through the use of self-assembly techniques seen in current nanoparticle research. LINA also allows for large enough wire and logic structures to enable use of widely available photo-lithographical patterning technologies. These aspects of the LINA designs, along with power, timing, and clocking results, have been verified through the use of new and/or modified simulation tools specifically developed for this purpose. To summarize, the LINA designs and results, presented in this dissertation, provide a path to realization of QCA-type VLSI nanoelectronic circuitry. Furthermore, they offer a renewed viability of the paradigm to replace CMOS and advance computing technologies beyond the next decade

Implementation of multi-CLB designs using quantum-dot cellular automata

CMOS scaling is currently facing a technological barrier. Novel technologies are being proposed to keep up with the need for computation power and speed. One of the proposed ideas is the quantum-dot cellular automata (QCA) technology. QCA uses quantum mechanical effects in the device at the molecular scale. QCA systems have the potential for low power, high density, and regularity. This thesis studies QCA devices and uses those devices to build a simple field programmable gate array (FPGA). The FPGA is a combination of multiple configure logical blocks (CLBs) tiled together. Most previous work on this area has focused on fixed logic and programmable interconnect. In contrast, the work at the Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) has designed and simulated a configurable logic block (CLB) based on look-up tables (LUTs). This thesis presents a simple FPGA that consists of multiple copies of the CLB created by the RIT group. The FPGA is configured to emulate a ripple-carry adder and a bit-serial multiplier. The latency and throughput of both functions are analyzed. We employ a multilevel approach to design specification and simulation. QCADesigner software is used for layout and simulation of an individual CLB. For the FPGA, the high-level HDLQ Verilog library is used. This hybrid approach provides a high degree of confidence in reasonable simulation time

On the design of reversible QDCA systems.

This work is the first to describe how to go about designing a reversible QDCA system. The design space is substantial, and there are many questions that a designer needs to answer before beginning to design. This document begins to explicate the tradeoffs and assumptions that need to be made and offers a range of approaches as starting points and examples. This design guide is an effective tool for aiding designers in creating the best quality QDCA implementation for a system

Fault and Defect Tolerant Computer Architectures: Reliable Computing With Unreliable Devices

This research addresses design of a reliable computer from unreliable device technologies. A system architecture is developed for a fault and defect tolerant (FDT) computer. Trade-offs between different techniques are studied and yield and hardware cost models are developed. Fault and defect tolerant designs are created for the processor and the cache memory. Simulation results for the content-addressable memory (CAM)-based cache show 90% yield with device failure probabilities of 3 x 10(-6), three orders of magnitude better than non fault tolerant caches of the same size. The entire processor achieves 70% yield with device failure probabilities exceeding 10(-6). The required hardware redundancy is approximately 15 times that of a non-fault tolerant design. While larger than current FT designs, this architecture allows the use of devices much more likely to fail than silicon CMOS. As part of model development, an improved model is derived for NAND Multiplexing. The model is the first accurate model for small and medium amounts of redundancy. Previous models are extended to account for dependence between the inputs and produce more accurate results