44,239 research outputs found
The Brain on Low Power Architectures - Efficient Simulation of Cortical Slow Waves and Asynchronous States
Efficient brain simulation is a scientific grand challenge, a
parallel/distributed coding challenge and a source of requirements and
suggestions for future computing architectures. Indeed, the human brain
includes about 10^15 synapses and 10^11 neurons activated at a mean rate of
several Hz. Full brain simulation poses Exascale challenges even if simulated
at the highest abstraction level. The WaveScalES experiment in the Human Brain
Project (HBP) has the goal of matching experimental measures and simulations of
slow waves during deep-sleep and anesthesia and the transition to other brain
states. The focus is the development of dedicated large-scale
parallel/distributed simulation technologies. The ExaNeSt project designs an
ARM-based, low-power HPC architecture scalable to million of cores, developing
a dedicated scalable interconnect system, and SWA/AW simulations are included
among the driving benchmarks. At the joint between both projects is the INFN
proprietary Distributed and Plastic Spiking Neural Networks (DPSNN) simulation
engine. DPSNN can be configured to stress either the networking or the
computation features available on the execution platforms. The simulation
stresses the networking component when the neural net - composed by a
relatively low number of neurons, each one projecting thousands of synapses -
is distributed over a large number of hardware cores. When growing the number
of neurons per core, the computation starts to be the dominating component for
short range connections. This paper reports about preliminary performance
results obtained on an ARM-based HPC prototype developed in the framework of
the ExaNeSt project. Furthermore, a comparison is given of instantaneous power,
total energy consumption, execution time and energetic cost per synaptic event
of SWA/AW DPSNN simulations when executed on either ARM- or Intel-based server
platforms
An Advanced Simulation Framework of an Integrated Vehicle-Powertrain Eco-Operation System for Electric Buses
vities of transit buses traveling along arterial roads and city streets consist of frequent stops and idling events at many predictable occasions, e.g., loading/unloading passengers at bus stops, approaching traffic signals or stop signs, and going through recurrent traffic congestion, etc. Besides designing transit buses with electric powertrain systems that can save a noticeable amount of energy thanks to regenerative breaking, this urban traffic environment also unfolds a number of opportunities to further improve their energy efficiency via vehicle connectivity and autonomy. Therefore, this paper proposes a complete and novel simulation framework of integrated vehicle/powertrain eco-operation system for electric buses (Eco-bus) by co-optimizing the vehicle dynamics and powertrain (VD&PT) controls. A comprehensive evaluation of the proposed system on mobility benefits and energy savings has been conducted over various traffic conditions. Simulation results are presented to showcase the superiority of the proposed simulation framework of the Eco-bus compared to the conventional bus, particularly in terms of mobility and energy efficiency aspects
Exploring Task Mappings on Heterogeneous MPSoCs using a Bias-Elitist Genetic Algorithm
Exploration of task mappings plays a crucial role in achieving high
performance in heterogeneous multi-processor system-on-chip (MPSoC) platforms.
The problem of optimally mapping a set of tasks onto a set of given
heterogeneous processors for maximal throughput has been known, in general, to
be NP-complete. The problem is further exacerbated when multiple applications
(i.e., bigger task sets) and the communication between tasks are also
considered. Previous research has shown that Genetic Algorithms (GA) typically
are a good choice to solve this problem when the solution space is relatively
small. However, when the size of the problem space increases, classic genetic
algorithms still suffer from the problem of long evolution times. To address
this problem, this paper proposes a novel bias-elitist genetic algorithm that
is guided by domain-specific heuristics to speed up the evolution process.
Experimental results reveal that our proposed algorithm is able to handle large
scale task mapping problems and produces high-quality mapping solutions in only
a short time period.Comment: 9 pages, 11 figures, uses algorithm2e.st
LEGaTO: first steps towards energy-efficient toolset for heterogeneous computing
LEGaTO is a three-year EU H2020 project which started in December 2017. The LEGaTO project will leverage task-based programming models to provide a software ecosystem for Made-in-Europe heterogeneous hardware composed of CPUs, GPUs, FPGAs and dataflow engines. The aim is to attain one order of magnitude energy savings from the edge to the converged cloud/HPC.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft
Smart Grid Technologies in Europe: An Overview
The old electricity network infrastructure has proven to be inadequate, with respect to modern challenges such as alternative energy sources, electricity demand and energy saving policies. Moreover, Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) seem to have reached an adequate level of reliability and flexibility in order to support a new concept of electricity networkāthe smart grid. In this work, we will analyse the state-of-the-art of smart grids, in their technical, management, security, and optimization aspects. We will also provide a brief overview of the regulatory aspects involved in the development of a smart grid, mainly from the viewpoint of the European Unio
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