NoCs:a Short History of Success and a Long Future

The broad application of NoCs in IC design has been enabled by NoC synthesis tools that evolved from university prototypes to full commercial synthesis flows. NoC embodiments are ubiquitously present in circuits and systems. As systems evolve to include new components and features, NoCs will play even a more important role as the smart connect that can enable heterogeneity. Thus this field will both evolve in diversity of implementations as well in the search of both higher performance and lower power solutions

A new-generation class of parallel architectures and their performance evaluation

The development of computers with hundreds or thousands of processors and capability for very high performance is absolutely essential for many computation problems, such as weather modeling, fluid dynamics, and aerodynamics. Several interconnection networks have been proposed for parallel computers. Nevertheless, the majority of them are plagued by rather poor topological properties that result in large memory latencies for DSM (Distributed Shared-Memory) computers. On the other hand, scalable networks with very good topological properties are often impossible to build because of their prohibitively high VLSI (e.g., wiring) complexity. Such a network is the generalized hypercube (GH). The GH supports full-connectivity of its nodes in each dimension and is characterized by outstanding topological properties. In addition, low-dimensional GHs have very large bisection widths. We propose in this dissertation a new class of processor interconnections, namely HOWs (Highly Overlapping Windows), that are more generic than the GH, are highly scalable, and have comparable performance. We analyze the communications capabilities of 2-D HOW systems and demonstrate that in practical cases HOW systems perform much better than binary hypercubes for important communications patterns. These properties are in addition to the good scalability and low hardware complexity of HOW systems. We present algorithms for one-to-one, one-to-all broadcasting, all-to-all broadcasting, one-to-all personalized, and all-to-all personalized communications on HOW systems. These algorithms are developed and evaluated for several communication models. In addition, we develop techniques for the efficient embedding of popular topologies, such as the ring, the torus, and the hypercube, into 1-D and 2-D HOW systems. The objective is to show that 2-D HOW systems are not only scalable and easy to implement, but they also result in good embedding of several classical topologies

Network-on-Chip

Addresses the Challenges Associated with System-on-Chip Integration Network-on-Chip: The Next Generation of System-on-Chip Integration examines the current issues restricting chip-on-chip communication efficiency, and explores Network-on-chip (NoC), a promising alternative that equips designers with the capability to produce a scalable, reusable, and high-performance communication backbone by allowing for the integration of a large number of cores on a single system-on-chip (SoC). This book provides a basic overview of topics associated with NoC-based design: communication infrastructure design, communication methodology, evaluation framework, and mapping of applications onto NoC. It details the design and evaluation of different proposed NoC structures, low-power techniques, signal integrity and reliability issues, application mapping, testing, and future trends. Utilizing examples of chips that have been implemented in industry and academia, this text presents the full architectural design of components verified through implementation in industrial CAD tools. It describes NoC research and developments, incorporates theoretical proofs strengthening the analysis procedures, and includes algorithms used in NoC design and synthesis. In addition, it considers other upcoming NoC issues, such as low-power NoC design, signal integrity issues, NoC testing, reconfiguration, synthesis, and 3-D NoC design. This text comprises 12 chapters and covers: The evolution of NoC from SoC—its research and developmental challenges NoC protocols, elaborating flow control, available network topologies, routing mechanisms, fault tolerance, quality-of-service support, and the design of network interfaces The router design strategies followed in NoCs The evaluation mechanism of NoC architectures The application mapping strategies followed in NoCs Low-power design techniques specifically followed in NoCs The signal integrity and reliability issues of NoC The details of NoC testing strategies reported so far The problem of synthesizing application-specific NoCs Reconfigurable NoC design issues Direction of future research and development in the field of NoC Network-on-Chip: The Next Generation of System-on-Chip Integration covers the basic topics, technology, and future trends relevant to NoC-based design, and can be used by engineers, students, and researchers and other industry professionals interested in computer architecture, embedded systems, and parallel/distributed systems

Network-on-Chip

Limitations of bus-based interconnections related to scalability, latency, bandwidth, and power consumption for supporting the related huge number of on-chip resources result in a communication bottleneck. These challenges can be efficiently addressed with the implementation of a network-on-chip (NoC) system. This book gives a detailed analysis of various on-chip communication architectures and covers different areas of NoCs such as potentials, architecture, technical challenges, optimization, design explorations, and research directions. In addition, it discusses current and future trends that could make an impactful and meaningful contribution to the research and design of on-chip communications and NoC systems

All optical multicasting in wavelength routing mesh networks with power considerations: design and operation

Wavelength routing Wavelength Division Multiplexing (WDM) are optical networks that support all-optical services. They have become the most appealing candidate for wide area backbone networks. Their huge available bandwidth provides the solution for the exponential growth in trayc demands that is due to the increase in the number of users and the surge of more bandwidth intensive network applications and services. A sizable fraction of these applications and services are of multi-point nature. Therefore, supporting multicast service in this network environment is very critical and unique. The all-optical support of various services has advantages, which includes achieving the signal transparency to its content. Nevertheless, the all-optical operational support comes with an associated cost and new issues that make this problem very challenging. In this thesis, we investigate the power-related issues for supporting multicast service in the optical domain, referred to as All-Optical Multicasting (AOM). Our study treats these issues from two networking contexts, namely, Network Provisioning and Connection Provisioning. We propose a number of optimal and heuristic solutions with a unique objective function for each context. In this regard, the objective function for the network provisioning problem is to reduce the network cost, while the solutions for the connection provisioning problem aim to reduce the connection blocking ratio. The optimal formulations are inherently non-linear. However, we introduce novel methods for linearizing them and formulate the problems as Mixed Integer Linear Programs. Also, the design of the heuristic solutions takes into account various optimization factors which results in efficient heuristics that can produce fast solutions that are relatively close to their optimal counterparts, as shown in the numerical results we present

Applications of satellite technology to broadband ISDN networks

Two satellite architectures for delivering broadband integrated services digital network (B-ISDN) service are evaluated. The first is assumed integral to an existing terrestrial network, and provides complementary services such as interconnects to remote nodes as well as high-rate multicast and broadcast service. The interconnects are at a 155 Mbs rate and are shown as being met with a nonregenerative multibeam satellite having 10-1.5 degree spots. The second satellite architecture focuses on providing private B-ISDN networks as well as acting as a gateway to the public network. This is conceived as being provided by a regenerative multibeam satellite with on-board ATM (asynchronous transfer mode) processing payload. With up to 800 Mbs offered, higher satellite EIRP is required. This is accomplished with 12-0.4 degree hopping beams, covering a total of 110 dwell positions. It is estimated the space segment capital cost for architecture one would be about $190M whereas the second architecture would be about$250M. The net user cost is given for a variety of scenarios, but the cost for 155 Mbs services is shown to be about $15-22/minute for 25 percent system utilization

Augmented reality device for first response scenarios

A prototype of a wearable computer system is proposed and implemented using commercial off-shelf components. The system is designed to allow the user to access location-specific information about an environment, and to provide capability for user tracking. Areas of applicability include primarily first response scenarios, with possible applications in maintenance or construction of buildings and other structures. Necessary preparation of the target environment prior to system\u27s deployment is limited to noninvasive labeling using optical fiducial markers. The system relies on computational vision methods for registration of labels and user position. With the system the user has access to on-demand information relevant to a particular real-world location. Team collaboration is assisted by user tracking and real-time visualizations of team member positions within the environment. The user interface and display methods are inspired by Augmented Reality1 (AR) techniques, incorporating a video-see-through Head Mounted Display (HMD) and fingerbending sensor glove.*. 1Augmented reality (AR) is a field of computer research which deals with the combination of real world and computer generated data. At present, most AR research is concerned with the use of live video imagery which is digitally processed and augmented by the addition of computer generated graphics. Advanced research includes the use of motion tracking data, fiducial marker recognition using machine vision, and the construction of controlled environments containing any number of sensors and actuators. (Source: Wikipedia) *This dissertation is a compound document (contains both a paper copy and a CD as part of the dissertation). The CD requires the following system requirements: Adobe Acrobat; Microsoft Office; Windows MediaPlayer or RealPlayer

Geolocation-centric Information Platform for Resilient Spatio-temporal Content Management

In IoT era, the growth of data variety is driven by cross-domain data fusion. In this paper, we advocate that “local production for local consumption (LPLC) paradigm” can be an innovative approach in cross-domain data fusion, and propose a new framework, geolocation-centric information platform (GCIP) that can produce and deliver diverse spatio-temporal content (STC). In the GCIP, (1) infrastructure-based geographic hierarchy edge network and (2) adhoc-based STC retention system are interplayed to provide both of geolocation-awareness and resiliency. Then, we discussed the concepts and the technical challenges of the GCIP. Finally, we implemented a proof-of-concepts of GCIP and demonstrated its efficacy through practical experiments on campus IPv6 network and simulation experiments