Graduation Year

2007

Document Type

Thesis

Degree

M.S.Cp.E.

Degree Granting Department

Computer Science and Engineering

Major Professor

Nagarajan Ranganathan, Ph.D.

Co-Major Professor

Co-Major Professor: Hao Zheng, Ph.D.

Committee Member

Srinivas Katkoori, Ph.D.

Keywords

Simulation, Power, Handshaking, Modeling, CPN Tools

Abstract

This thesis introduces a new methodology for energy estimation in asynchronous circuits. Unlike existing probabilistic methods, this is the first simulative work for energy estimation in all types of asynchronous circuits.

The new simulative methodology is based on Petri net modeling. A real delay model is incorporated to capture both gate delays and interconnect delays. The switching activity at each gate is captured to measure the average dynamic energy consumed per request/acknowledge handshaking pair. The new type of Petri net is called Hierarchical Colored Asynchronous Hardware Petri net (HCAHPN). The HCAHPN is able to capture the temporal and spatial correlations of signals within a circuit, while preserving gate logic behavior and timing information.

While Petri nets have been previously used for simulating combinational and sequential circuits, this is the first work that uses Petri nets for simulating asynchronous circuits. While different asynchronous design styles make various assumptions on the gate and wire delays present with the circuit, the physical implementations of these circuits always have gate and interconnect delays. Unlike previous methods, the proposed methodology is independent of the asynchronous design style used and it can be adapted for all types of asynchronous circuits that use handshaking communication.

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