Three Highly Parallel Computer Architectures and Their Suitability for Three Representative Artificial Intelligence Problems

Virtually all current Artificial Intelligence (AI) applications are designed to run on sequential (von Neumann) computer architectures. As a result, current systems do not scale up. As knowledge is added to these systems, a point is reached where their performance quickly degrades. The performance of a von Neumann machine is limited by the bandwidth between memory and processor (the von Neumann bottleneck). The bottleneck is avoided by distributing the processing power across the memory of the computer. In this scheme the memory becomes the processor (a smart memory ). This paper highlights the relationship between three representative AI application domains, namely knowledge representation, rule-based expert systems, and vision, and their parallel hardware realizations. Three machines, covering a wide range of fundamental properties of parallel processors, namely module granularity, concurrency control, and communication geometry, are reviewed: the Connection Machine (a fine-grained SIMD hypercube), DADO (a medium-grained MIMD/SIMD/MSIMD tree-machine), and the Butterfly (a coarse-grained MIMD Butterflyswitch machine)

NASA patent abstracts bibliography: A continuing bibliography. Section 1: Abstracts (supplement 38)

Abstracts are provided for 132 patents and patent applications entered into the NASA scientific and technical information system during the period July 1990 through December 1990. Each entry consists of a citation, an abstract, and in most cases, a key illustration selected from the patent or patent application

A parallel progressive radiosity algorithm based on patch data circulation

Cataloged from PDF version of article.Current research on radiosity has concentrated on increasing the accuracy and the speed of the solution. Although algorithmic and meshing techniques decrease the execution time, still excessive computational power is required for complex scenes. Hence, parallelism can be exploited for speeding up the method further. This paper aims at providing a thorough examination of parallelism in the basic progressive refinement radiosity, and investigates its parallelization on distributed-memory parallel architectures. A synchronous scheme, based on static task assignment, is proposed to achieve better coherence for shooting patch selections. An efficient global circulation scheme is proposed for the parallel light distribution computations, which reduces the total volume of concurrent communication by an asymptotical factor. The proposed parallel algorithm is implemented on an Intel's iPSC/2 hypercube multicomputer. Load balance qualities of the proposed static assignment schemes are evaluated experimentally. The effect of coherence in the parallel light distribution computations on the shooting patch selection sequence is also investigated. Theoretical and experimental evaluation is also presented to verify that the proposed parallelization scheme yields equally good performance on multicomputers implementing the simplest (e.g. ring) as well as the richest (e.g. hypercube) interconnection topologies. This paper also proposes and presents a parallel load re-balancing scheme which enhances our basic parallel radiosity algorithm to be usable in the parallelization of radiosity methods adopting adaptive subdivision and meshing techniques. (C) 1996 Elsevier Science Lt

Efficient processor management strategies for multicomputer systems

Multicomputers are cost-effective alternatives to the conventional supercomputers. Contemporary processor management schemes tend to underutilize the processors and leave many of the processors in the system idle while jobs are waiting for execution;Instead of designing faster processors or interconnection networks, a substantial performance improvement can be obtained by implementing better processor management strategies. This dissertation studies the performance issues related to the processor management schemes and proposes several ways to enhance the multicomputer systems by means of processor management. The proposed schemes incorporate the concepts of size-reduction, non-contiguous allocation, as well as job migration. Job scheduling using a bypass-queue is also studied. All the proposed schemes are proven effective in improving the system performance via extensive simulations. Each proposed scheme has different implementation cost and constraints. In order to take advantage of these schemes, judicious selection of system parameters is important and is discussed

Center for Aeronautics and Space Information Sciences

This report summarizes the research done during 1991/92 under the Center for Aeronautics and Space Information Science (CASIS) program. The topics covered are computer architecture, networking, and neural nets

Parallel simulation techniques for telecommunication network modelling

In this thesis, we consider the application of parallel simulation to the performance modelling of telecommunication networks. A largely automated approach was first explored using a parallelizing compiler to speed up the simulation of simple models of circuit-switched networks. This yielded reasonable results for relatively little effort compared with other approaches. However, more complex simulation models of packet- and cell-based telecommunication networks, requiring the use of discrete event techniques, need an alternative approach. A critical review of parallel discrete event simulation indicated that a distributed model components approach using conservative or optimistic synchronization would be worth exploring. Experiments were therefore conducted using simulation models of queuing networks and Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) networks to explore the potential speed-up possible using this approach. Specifically, it is shown that these techniques can be used successfully to speed-up the execution of useful telecommunication network simulations. A detailed investigation has demonstrated that conservative synchronization performs very well for applications with good look ahead properties and sufficient message traffic density and, given such properties, will significantly outperform optimistic synchronization. Optimistic synchronization, however, gives reasonable speed-up for models with a wider range of such properties and can be optimized for speed-up and memory usage at run time. Thus, it is confirmed as being more generally applicable particularly as model development is somewhat easier than for conservative synchronization. This has to be balanced against the more difficult task of developing and debugging an optimistic synchronization kernel and the application models

Phase-Change Meta-Devices for Tuneable Bandpass Filtering in the Infrared

Tuneable light filters, especially those which are compact and fast to tune, are essential in a wide range of technologies, especially for multispectral imaging applications. However, state-of-the-art approaches to create such filters all possess drawbacks, with many wavelength regions poorly served. This thesis attempts to address this problem by combining metasurfaces which support extraordinary optical transmission (ultra-thin band-pass filters) with chalcogenide phase-change materials (adding dynamic tuneability). The optical properties of phase-change materials are very different in their amorphous and crystalline states and switching between such states can be rapidly controlled via thermal excitations. In this work nine different phase-change materials, including alloys of GeTe, GeSbTe, GeSbSeTe and GaLaS, were optically and elementally characterised and assessed for their application-specific suitability. The resulting materials data was used to computationally design and evaluate a range of tuneable infrared filter device designs both optically and thermally. These filters exhibit high transmission (≈80% at best) with large spectral tuning ranges of approximately +50% relative to their shortest wavelength; this range is sufficient to cover entire atmospheric transmission windows. This is the first such combination of phase-change materials and extraordinary optical transmission for application from the visible through to long-wave infrared (14 μm) regions of the spectrum. A rigorous computational study was conducted to produce comprehensive design guidelines for such filters, and confirm the viability of in-situ electrical switching. Several filter devices were experimentally fabricated, and the viability for a number of applications, including tuneable filtering, chemical sensing and infrared displays, was investigated and confirmed computationally.Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC

Linearization techniques to suppress optical nonlinearity

This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University.This thesis is shown the implementation of the linearization techniques such as feedforward and pre-distortion feedback linearization to suppress the optical components nonlinearities caused by the fibre and semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA). The simulation verified these two linearization techniques for single tone direct modulation, two tone indirect modulation and ultra wideband input to the optical fibre. These techniques uses the amplified spontaneously emission (ASE) noise reduction in two loops of SOA by a feed-forward and predistortion linearizer and is shown more than 6dB improvement. Also it investigates linearization for the SOA amplifier to cancel out the third order harmonics or inter-modulation distortion (IMD) or four waves mixing. In this project, more than 20 dB reductions is seen in the spectral re-growth caused by the SOA. Amplifier non-linearity becomes more severe with two strong input channels leading to inter-channel distortion which can completely mask a third adjacent channel. The simulations detailed above were performed utilizing optimum settings for the variable gain, phase and delay components in the error correction loop of the feed forward and Predistortion systems and hence represent the ideal situation of a perfect feed-forward and Predistortion system. Therefore it should be consider that complexity of circuit will increase due to amplitude, phase and delay mismatches in practical design. Also it has describe the compatibility of Software Defined Radio with Hybrid Fibre Radio with simulation model of wired optical networks to be used for future research investigation, based on the star and ring topologies for different modulation schemes, and providing the performance for these configurations

Molecular and cellular factors control signal transduction via switchable allosteric modulator proteins (SAMPs)

Background: Rap proteins from Bacilli directly target response regulators of bacterial two-component systems and modulate their activity. Their effects are controlled by binding of signaling peptides to an allosteric site. Hence Raps exemplify a class of monomeric signaling receptors, which we call switchable allosteric modulator proteins (SAMPs). These proteins have potential applications in diverse biomedical and biotechnical settings, but a quantitative understanding of the impact of molecular and cellular factors on signal transduction is lacking. Here we introduce mathematical models that elucidate how signals are propagated though the network upon receptor stimulation and control the level of active response regulator. Results: Based on a systematic parameter analysis of the models, we show that key features of the dose-response behavior at steady state are controlled either by the molecular properties of the modulator or the signaling context. In particular, we find that the biochemical activity (i.e. non-enzymatic vs. enzymatic) and allosteric properties of the modulator control the response amplitude. The Hill coefficient and the EC50 are controlled in addition by the relative ligand affinities. By tuning receptor properties, either graded or more switch-like (memory-less) response functions can be fashioned. Furthermore, we show that other contextual factors (e.g. relative concentrations of network components and kinase activity) have a substantial impact on the response, and we predict that there exists a modulator concentration which is optimal for response amplitude. Conclusion: We discuss data on Rap-Phr systems in B. subtilis to show how our models can contribute to an integrated view of SAMP signaling by combining biochemical, structural and physiological insights. Our results also suggest that SAMPs could be evolved or engineered to implement diverse response behaviors. However—without additional regulatory controls—they can generate rather variable cellular outputs