ANR Project : ANR-15-CE25-0007
https://anr.fr/Projet-ANR-15-CE25-0007
The coming decade will see the generalization of dematerialized computation and communication according to which computations and data will be « mobile » and served transparently to users. This will result from the convergence of current numerical technologies, including embedded systems via Internet of Things (IoT), high-performance computing (HPC) and cloud computing, towards pervasive large-scale distributed virtualized systems. This trend will have a heavy impact on the way to address scientific problems (e.g., high energy physics, chemistry, material science), industrial sectors (e.g., automotive, aeronautics, energy, complex system optimization) and societal challenges (e.g., climatology, medicine, energy, social networking, smart cities management). This upcoming mutation of the computing ecosystem will come with a number of major technological challenges amongst which one can underline security, reliability and energy-efficiency. The CONTINUUM project mainly focuses on the last challenge by investigating a low power multicore design solution to answer the energy-efficiency demand in foreseen future systems. It explores a design continuum for compute nodes, which seamlessly goes from software to technology levels via hardware architecture. Power saving opportunities exist at each of these levels, but real measurable gains will come from the synergistic focus on all these levels as considered in this project. Then, a cross-disciplinary collaboration is promoted between computer science and microelectronics, to achieve two main breakthroughs: i) combination of state-of-the-art heterogeneous adaptive embedded multicore architectures with emerging communication and memory technologies and, ii) power-aware dynamic compilation techniques that suitably match such a platform. Involved partners are two very renown academic institutions carrying out cutting-edge research on compilation (Inria Rennes – Bretagne Atlantique), integrated system architectures and technologies (LIRMM / CNRS-UM), and a low power core technology leader company (Cortus S.A.S.).