Special Sessions

1. Control techniques for adaptive computing systems

Organizers: Edith Beigné, Suzanne Lesecq, Anca Molnos (CEA, France)

Abstract

Today mobile systems face strong constraints, especially regarding power consumption and thermal aspects while their performances are still increasing. To answer these new challenges, designers of circuits (analog, digital and mixed-signal, but also RF, MEMS) implement their circuits with some “adaptivity” features. For instance, part of the circuit will automatically adapt its parameters in order to reach the most effective functioning point from a performance versus consumption point of view. Dynamic Voltage and Frequency Scaling techniques can be seen as adaptive approaches that provide to the circuit just enough energy to perform the task it has to do, no more! However, advanced technologies, e.g. FDSOI ones, enlarge the design and functioning space with new parameters to be fixed either at design-time or at run-time. Other teams try to implement event-based approaches in order to make the circuit working only when mandatory. However, these adaptive capabilities may have counterproductive effects if their design does not take into account (among others) stability and robustness issues. Techniques from the control community may help to answers these issues. The special session will provide an overview of such control techniques applied to adaptive systems, especially, but not limited to, regarding resource management, adaptable middleware, automatic control methods for energy/power reduction, seamless reconfiguration of algorithms and computing systems.

Papers

“Advanced power management in FD-SOI circuits”,

Diego Puschini, Jorge Rodas, Yeter Akgul, Pascal Benoit

“Network of self-synchronized oscillators for global clocking in MPSOCs”,

Dimitri Galayko

“Adaptive Computing in Real-Time Applications”,

Benedikt Janßen, Michael Hubner

“Autofocus performance realization using automatic control approach: from theory to prototype”,

M. Zarudniev, A. Tonda, S. Bolis, F. Jacquet, A. Pouydebasques

“Power management at sensor level with battery capacity estimation”,

O. Mokrenko, M.-I. Vergara-Gallego, C. Albea-Sanchez, S. Lesecq

2. On-chip measurements for characterization, testing, and calibration of analog front-ends and mmW devices

Organizers: Jean-Daniel Arnould ; Haralampos-G. Stratigopoulos (IMEP-LAHC & TIMA Labs, France)

Abstract

The purpose of the special session is to discuss state-of-the-art on-chip measurement methods in the context of characterization of mmW devices and testing and calibration of analog, mixed-signal, and RF integrated circuits. The need for low-overhead, non-intrusive, and reliable on-chip measurement methods is dictated by (a) the heterogeneity and complexity of modern mixed analog-digital systems-on-chip and systems-in-package that offer very limited controllability and observability from the output pins in order to perform testing; (b) the increased process variations in advance technology nodes (e.g. 65nm and beyond) that make post-manufacturing calibration of outmost importance in order to correct yield loss; (c) safety-critical and mission-critical systems that need to be equipped with on-chip self-calibration mechanisms for detecting early reliability hazards and applying self-corrective actions (e.g. fault tolerance, self-repair, etc.); and (d) the numerous modern applications of high-frequency devices (e.g. RF, mmW) whose accurate characterization and post-silicon verification requires to rely on on-chip test structures, since extracting signals off-chip for processing seriously degrades the measurement accuracy. This special session will gather together worldwide experts on the above research fields to share with the conference attendees the most recent and state-of-the-art solutions proposed to date.

Papers

“Self-healing of RF circuits using built-in non-intrusive sensors“

Martin Andraud, Haralampos-G. Stratigopoulos, and Emmanuel Simeu,

 “150 GHz load pull measurements on BiCMOS 55nm SiGe:C HBT using in situ tuner “

Alice Bossuet, Thomas Quemerais2, Estelle Lauga-Larroze, Jean-Michel Fournier, Christophe Gaquière

“Integrated Test Concepts for In-Situ Millimeter-Wave Device Characterization “

D. Kissinger, J. Nehring, A. Oborovski, K. Borutta, I. Nasr, B. Lämmle, and R. Weigel

“Embedded Instruments for Dependability of Analogue and Mixed-Signal IPs”

Jinbo Wan and Hans G. Kerkhoff

“Substrate coupling effect in BiCMOS technology for millimeter wave application”

Sebastien Fregonese, Rosario D’Esposito, Cristell Maneux, Thomas Zimmer

“Calibration and characterization techniques for on-wafer device characterization.“

L. Galatro and M. Spirito

3. Approximate computing

Organizers: Prof. Amara Amara (ISEP, Paris), Prof. Andreas Burg (EPFL, Lausanne)

Abstract

Motivation: CMOS technology is approaching its physical limits which manifests itself in diminishing returns from scaling in terms of speed and power consumption. Furthermore, reliability issues and uncertainties require more and more overhead for protection and larger guardbands to always ensure 100% reliable operation. Topic: Approximate computing is a brand new design paradigm that has recently emerged as a potential solution to i) provide further improvements in speed and energy efficiency beyond scaling and ii) to deal with variability and reliability issues in advanced process nodes. While approximate computing comprises a wide range of techniques and ideas, it generally refers to the principle of relaxing the accuracy requirement on computations based on circuit-level considerations. Due to its highly vertical nature, the topic is extremely interdisciplinary and appears in a wide range of research communities, ranging from devices to VLSI circuits and architectures, to design automation/CAD, all the way to signal processing. Need for a special session at NEWCAS: In particular, in the design automation community, approximate computing and the issues related to reliability and variability have emerged over the last 3-4 years as one of the most prominent topics. Design automation conferences usually have corresponding tracks that discuss related design methodologies. However, we believe that there is also a very important circuit and systems component that is a very good match with the target audience of the NEWCAS conference. To highlight and discuss this component, we propose this special session for NEWCAS 2015 with a number of contributions from well-known experts in the field.

Papers

“Approximate Error Correction in Tightly-Coupled Parallel Computing Units“

Abbas Rahimi, Luca Benini, Rajesh K. Gupta

“Approximate Computing with Unreliable Dynamic Memories Units”

Georgios Karakonstantis, Shrikanth Ghanapathy, Adam Teman, Andreas Burg

“Energy Efficient Digital Design through Inexact and Approximate Arithmetic Circuits”

Jeremy Schlachter, Vincent Camus, Christian Enz

“Near-Threshold Computing for Very Wide Frequency Scaling: Approximate Adders to Rescue Performance”

Sergio Bampi, L. B. Soares, A. L. R. Rosa

“Magnetic Tunnel Junction Based Pass Transistor Logics for Stochastic Computation”

Lirida Alves de Barros Naviner, Hao Cai, You Wang, Weisheng Zhao

4. Circuits and systems for medical applications

Organizers: Dr. Guillaume Charvet (CEA, France) 

Abstract

Recent advances in the field of integrated circuits design and systems have been open new opportunities for the design of innovative medical devices.  This special session focuses on the design of medical devices based on innovative circuits and the targeted medical applications. The design of medical devices needs to respect a lot of constraints such as ultra-low power, miniaturization, safety and reliability. Moreover, in order to go to clinical trials, the medical device needs to satisfy all the regulatory requirements.  Taking into account all these constraints at the earliest in the design of a medical device is essential.  Likewise, this special session aims to provide a vision of the future needs of technological bricks and the associated constraints, in order to design the future generations of medical devices. 

Papers

“A wireless fully implantable ECoG recording medical device WIMAGINE®: from the design of an integrated circuit toward a clinical trial”

G. Charvet, C. Mestais, F. Sauter-Starace, M. Foerster, A. Lambert, C. Chabrol, S. Robinet, R. D’Errico, V. Josselin, N. Torres-Martinez, T. Costecalde, D. Ratel, A.L. Benabid

“Advanced Active Implantable Medical Devices how to get the best trade off between research needs and clinical usability”

D. Guiraud

"Low-Power Radar Techniques for Remote Sensing and Detection of Vital Signs"

Lydia Chioukh, Dominic Deslandes, and Ke Wu