Time is money : integrated circuit and system design towards low latency for real-time applications

The past two decades have seen the emergence of and the enormous growth in wireless and internet capabilities, enabled by the relentless scaling of the VLSI chip technology according to Moore’s law . Ever wider bandwidths and throughputs were needed to accommodate the society’s craving for sharing and processing ever more data (speech, pictures, video, sensor data, etc.), while keeping energy consumption under control. In contrast, the next wave of computing beyond the Internet of Things will be characterized by the emergence of smart real-time closed-loop systems from sensing to action (or from user to thing) and back: tactile internet, real-time centrally managed autonomous cars, real-time virtual reality, remotely controlled robots, etc. To enable such applications, not wider bandwidths are the prime issue, but low latency , i.e. a guaranteed short time between stimulus and response. Hence, “time is money”. This requires profoundly different electronic solutions and architectures. This fundamental strategic research project will address and aims to solve basic questions to overcome major prevalent bottlenecks (mainly at the physical layer) in the quest for low-latency integrated circuit and system design. In this way the project will contribute to enabling the envisaged smart interactive world and its many projected future applications.

Keywords:low-latency integrated circuits/systems, real-time electronic systems, adaptive - embedded learning

Disciplines:Nanotechnology, Design theories and methods, Sensors, biosensors and smart sensors, Other electrical and electronic engineering