Asynchronous Circuit Design

Asynchronous circuits operate without a global clock signal - the flow of data is controlled by local handshaking between modules and registers. This gives asynchronous circuits some unique characteristics that can be exploited to advantages (higher speed, lower power consumption, modularity and robustness).
The research addresses methods and techniques for designing efficient circuits, and in particular circuits with low power consumption. The experimental part of this work is based on industrial applications and involves design and fabrication of various prototype IC's. From 2001 the activities have focused on high-level synthesis of asynchronous circuits and on network-on-chip.
The activity represents a long term effort and it is funded through a number of sources including the ACiD working group (IST-1999-29119), the Thomas B. Thrige Foundation and a donation from Nokia.