In this paper, we investigate a low-power architecture for designs modeled as an Extended Finite State Machine (EFSM). It is based on the general dynamic power management concept, in which the redundant computation can be dynamically disabled to reduce the overall power dissipation. The contribution of this paper is mainly a systematic procedure to identify almost maximal amount of redundant computation in a design given as an EFSM. There are two levels of redundant computation to be exploited--one is based on the machine state information, while the other is based on the transition information. After the extraction of the redundant computation, a low-power architecture using input gating is proposed to synthesize the final circuit. We tested the technique on a design computing a number's modulo inverse. Experimental results show that 31% power reduction can be achieved at the costs of 2% timing penalty and 16% area overhead.

We have developed manganese-based lithium secondary battery technology as a part of a 10-year national project in Japan for The Development of Dispersed-Type Battery Energy Storage Technology. The cell chemistry we developed consisted of a modified graphite anode material containing dispersed Ag particles, and a partially substituted LiMn2O4 cathode with Li in the Mn sites. These materials showed a significant improvement in a cell's cycle life performance. The 250 Wh class single cell with the cell chemistry mentioned above showed energy densities of 131 Wh/kg and 295 Wh/dm3. The 2 kWh class module battery including 8 cells connected in series and a battery management system delivered energy densities of 122 Wh/kg and 255 Wh/dm3 that exceeded the final target of 120 Wh/kg and 240 Wh/dm3 for the project. Most of the target items for the battery performance were accomplished and proved. Thus the basis for practical application was developed, however, some areas concerning the further durability under various circumstances and conditions still remain to be accomplished. Continuous development for mass production and cost reduction is also expected for this technology in order to contribute to industry and society.

In this paper, the bit error rate (BER) and the outage probability are presented for a maximal ratio combining (MRC) two-dimensional (2D)-RAKE receiver operating in a correlated frequency-selective Nakagami-m fading environment with multiple access interference. A simple approximated probability distribution function of the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR) is derived for the receiver with multiple correlated antennas and RAKE branches in arbitrary fading environments. The combined effects of spatial and temporal diversity order, average received signal-to-noise ratio, the number of multiple access interference, angular spread, antennae spacing and multi-path Nakagami-m fading environment on the system performance are illustrated. Numerical results indicate that the performance of the 2D-RAKE receiver depends highly on the operating environment and antenna array configuration. The performance can be improved by increasing the spatio-temporal diversity gains and antenna spacing.

The problem of signal restoration in the presence of observation space noise has been tackled extensively. However, restoration of degraded signals in the presence of signal space noise leads to considerable complexity because it becomes difficult to distinguish between the original signal and the noise. In this paper, a partial projection filter has been devised for the restoration of signals degraded by both the signal space and the observation space noises. A closed form of the proposed filter has been derived and its performance has been verified experimentally.

In multicarrier code division multiple access (MC-CDMA) systems, the orthogonality among the spreading codes is destroyed because the channels exhibit frequency-selective fading and the despreading stage performs gain control; that is, inter-code interference (ICI) can significantly degrade system performance. This paper proposes an optimum spreading code assignment method that reflects our analysis of ICI for up and downlink MC-CDMA cellular systems over correlated frequency-selective Rayleigh fading channels. At first, we derive theoretical expressions for the desired-to-undesired signal power ratio (DUR) as a quantitative representation of ICI; computer simulation results demonstrate the validity of the analytical results. Next, based on the ICI imbalance among code pairs, we assign specific spreading codes to users to minimize ICI (in short, to maximize the multiplexing performance); our proposed method considers the quality of service (QoS) policy of users or operators. We show that the proposed method yields better performance, in terms of DUR, than the conventional methods. The proposed method can maximize the multiplexing performance of a MC-CDMA cellular system once the channel model, spreading sequence, and combining strategy have been set. Three combining strategies are examined at the despreading stage for the uplink, equal gain combining (EGC), orthogonality restoring combining (ORC), and maximum ratio combining (MRC), while two are considered for the downlink, EGC and MRC.

Test data volume and power consumption for scan-based designs are two major concerns in system-on-a-chip testing. However, test set compaction by filling the don't-cares will invariably increase the scan-in power dissipation for scan testing, then the goals of test data reduction and low-power scan testing appear to be conflicted. Therefore, in this paper we present a selective scan chain reconfiguration method for test data compression and scan-in power reduction. The proposed method analyzes the compatibility of the internal scan cells for a given test set and then divides the scan cells into compatible classes. After the scan chain reconfiguration a dictionary is built to indicate the run-length of each compatible class and only the scan-in data for each class should be transferred from the ATE to the CUT so as to reduce test data volume. Experimental results for the larger ISCAS'89 benchmarks show that the proposed approach overcomes the limitations of traditional run-length coding techniques, and leads to highly reduced test data volume with significant power savings during scan testing in all cases.

This paper presents a novel current driving method for the synchronous rectifier (SR) in a Flyback topology. Compared to the previous proposed Current Driven Synchronous Rectifier (CDSR), the proposed CDSR features simple structure, low power loss and good performance. The proposed SR driving method is implemented in a 64 W Flyback converter with universal input, and efficiency as high as 92.5% is achieved at low input (90 V ac) and full load condition.

As audio and video applications have proliferated on the Internet, transcoding proxy caching has been considered as an important technique for improving network performance, especially for mobile networks. Due to several new emerging factors in the transcoding proxy, existing methods for proxy placement for web caching cannot be simply applied to solve the problem of proxy placement for transcoding proxy caching. This paper addresses the problem of proxy placement for coordinated en-route transcoding proxy caching for tree networks. We propose a model for this problem by including the new emerging factors in the transcoding proxy and present optimal solutions for this problem with/without constraints on the number of transcoding proxies using dynamic programming. Finally, we implement our algorithm and evaluate our model on various performance metrics through extensive simulation experiments. The implementation results show that our model outperforms the existing model for transcoding proxy placement for linear topology, as well as the random proxy placement model. The average improvements of our model over the other models are about 7.2 percent and 21.4 percent in terms of all the performance metrics considered.

With the growing design complexity of contemporary embedded systems, real-time operating systems (RTOSs) have become one of important components of such complex embedded systems. This paper presents an RTOS-centric hardware/software cosimulator which we have developed for embedded system design. One of the most remarkable features in our cosimulator is that it has a complete simulation model of an RTOS which is widely used in industry, so that application tasks including RTOS service calls are natively executed on a host computer. Our cosimulator also features cosimulation with functional simulation models of hardware written in C/C++ and cosimulation with HDL simulators. A case study with a JPEG decoder application demonstrates the effectiveness of our cosimulator.

In cellular systems, a code division multiple access (CDMA) technology with array antennas can significantly reduce interferences by taking advantage of the combination of spreading spectrum and spatial filtering. We investigate performance of cellular CDMA systems through adopting two types of array antennas, switched beam forming (SBF) and tracking beam forming (TBF) in the base station. Through Monte-Carlo simulations, we evaluate average bit-error-rate (BER) and outage probability of the systems under log-normal shadowing channels with multi-cell environment. When we consider 2 beams and 4 beams per sector for the SBF method, it is observed that the TBF method gives at least 10% and 30% capacity improvement over the SBF method in aspects of 10-3 BER and 1% outage probability, respectively.

This paper presents a method for improving the performance of syntactic analysis by using accurate temporal expression processing. Temporal expression causes parsing errors due to its syntactic duality, but its resolution is not trivial since the syntactic role of temporal expression is understandable in the context. In our work, syntactic functions of temporal words are decisively identified based on local contexts of individual temporal words acquired from a large corpus, which are represented by a finite state method. Experimental results show how the proposed method, incorporated with parsing, improves the accuracy and efficiency of the syntactic analysis.

In wide-area wireless access systems such as satellite communications systems and stratospheric platform systems, electric power supplies for radio communications are realized using solar photovoltaic cells and/or fuel cells. However, the on-board weight limits restrict the number of cells that can be equipped. In addition, the transmission power of such systems is limited taking account of issues and regulations on sharing the same frequency band with other systems. Hence, both the frequency band and electric power is limited, which are crucial radio resources for those systems. Although radio channel allocation methods taking account of the frequency constraint only or the power constraint only have been proposed, radio channel allocation methods taking account of both constraints simultaneously have been insufficiently studied. This paper proposes a radio channel allocation method that provides global optimum allocation results by utilizing the linear programming method. The proposed method has features such that the method first allocates radio channels in proportion to the traffic demand distributed over the service coverage area and then maximizes the total radio channels allocated to systems. Numerical results are presented for a stratospheric platform system that covers an area of Japan, as an example, to demonstrate that the proposed method optimally allocates radio channels taking account of both constraints while efficiently allocating excess resources. In addition, whether a system reaches either the frequency or power limit can be estimated, by investigating the radio channel allocation results. Furthermore, enhanced linear programming models based on a method aiming at practical use of the radio channel allocation results in operation are also introduced. The enhanced model is demonstrated to work effectively to avoid unbalanced radio channel allocations over geographical areas. The proposed method and linear programming models are useful not only for making pre-plans but also for determining the amount of necessary frequency and power resources in designing systems.

Many P2P lookup services based on distributed hash tables (DHT) have appeared recently. These schemes are built upon overlay networks and ignore distance to the target resources. As a result, P2P lookups often suffer from unnecessarily long routes in the underlay network, which we call overlay dilation. This paper proposes a new scheme for resource routing, called hybrid hierarchical overlay routing, dubbed Hyho. We introduce distance-weighted Bloom filters (dwBFs) as a concise representation of routing information for scattered resources in overlay networks. To further reduce the size of Bloom filters, so that they are linear in the number of distinct resources, Hyho splits overlay networks in accordance with DHT, where each subnetwork has a smaller set of resources and spans the entire network thinly. As a result, Hyho constructs a hierarchical overlay network and routes requests accordingly. Simulation results show that Hyho can reduce overlay dilation to one half that yielded by the Chord lookup service.

In recent years, interruption of services large-scale business sites and Root Name Servers caused by Denial-of-Service (DoS) attacks or Distributed DoS (DDoS) attacks has become an issue. Techniques for specifying attackers are, thus important. On the other hand, since information on attackers' source IP addresses are generally spoofed, tracing techniques are required for DoS attacks. In this paper, we predict network traffic volume at observation points on the network, and detect DoS attacks by carefully examining the difference between predicted traffic volume and actual traffic volume. Moreover, we assume that the duration time of an attack is the same at every observation point the attack traffic passes, and propose a tracing method that uses attack duration time as a parameter. We show that our proposed method is effective in tracing DDoS attacks.

In this paper, we term multimedia streaming application traffic "stream flows" and the other usual application traffic "non-stream flows." Many problems occur when both flows are aggregated on a shared link because the different TCP and UDP behaviors cause negative interactions. One way to solve these problems is to isolate stream and non-stream flows to different classes. However, it is difficult to determine the bandwidth allocation for each class and dynamic bandwidth allocation schemes are hard to implement on large scale networks. We therefore propose a dynamic class assignment method that maintains the QoS and that has a higher scalability than dynamic bandwidth allocation schemes. It is workable on Diffserv AF PHB. The outline is as follows. We classify non-stream flows into four classes and dynamically assign stream flows to the classes, taking the conditions and characteristics of the classes into consideration. On assigning classes to stream flows, we map them to a higher drop precedence than non-stream flows not to degrade the QoS of them, based on the assumption that occasional packets being dropped do not create serious problems for them. In this paper, we first discuss our classification of non-stream flows, and present the characteristics of non-stream flows in each class. We then discuss our drop precedence mapping. After this, we propose an algorithm for our method of dynamic class assignment and provide some simulation results where it could provide constant qualities with stream and non-stream flows, adapting to changing traffic.

Nonminimum phase systems are difficult to be controlled with a conventional PID-type controller because of their inherent characteristics of undershooting. A neuro-controller combined with a PID-type controller has been shown to improve the control performance of the nonminimum phase systems while maintaining stability. In this paper, we apply a multiobjective evolutionary optimization method for training the neuro-controller to reduce the undershooting of the nonminimum phase system. The computer simulation shows that the proposed multiobjective approach is very effective and suitable because it can minimize the control error as well as reduce undershooting and chattering. This method can be applied to many industrial nonminimum phase problems with ease.

Feedforward neural networks have been successfully developed and applied in many areas because of their universal approximation capability. However, there still remains the problem of determining a suitable network structure for the given task. In this paper, we propose a novel self-organizing neural network which automatically adjusts its structure according to the task. Utilizing both the constructive and the pruning procedures, the proposed algorithm finds a near-optimal network which is compact and shows good generalization performance. One of its important features is reliability, which means the randomness of neural networks is effectively reduced. The resultant networks can have suitable numbers of hidden neurons and hidden layers according to the complexity of the given task. The simulation results for the well-known function regression problems show that our method successfully organizes near-optimal networks.

Recently, a new light-weight version of the secure electronic transaction protocol was proposed. The protocol can achieve two goals. One goal is that the security level is the same as the SET protocol. The other goal is to reduce the computational time in message generation and verification, and reduce the communication overhead. However, the protocol has a weakness, which is that non-repudiation is acquired, but confidentiality is lost. In this paper, we point out the weakness of the protocol. We also propose an improvement to the protocol to overcome this weakness.

Imaging techniques for robots are important and meaningful in the near future. Pulse radar systems have a great potential for shape estimation and locationing of targets. They have an advantage that they can be used even in critical situations where optical techniques cannot be used. It is thus required to develop high-resolution imaging algorithms for pulse radar systems. High-resolution imaging algorithms utilize the carrier phase of received signals. However, their estimation accuracy suffers degradation due to phase rotation of the received signal because the phase depends on the shape of the target. In this paper, we propose a phase compensation algorithm for high-resolution pulse radar systems. The proposed algorithm works well with SEABED algorithm, which is a non-parametric algorithm of estimating target shapes based on a reversible transform. The theory is presented first and numerical simulation results follow. We show the estimation accuracy is remarkably improved without sacrificing the resolution using the proposed algorithm.

Some conventional beamformers require the direction of the desired signal. The performance of such beamformers can substantially be degraded even in the presence of small error on the directional information. In this letter, we propose a prefilter-type beamforming scheme robust to directional error by employing a simple compensator. The performance of the proposed scheme is verified by computer simulation.