Os circuitos integrados recentes baseados em tecnologias nanoeletrônicas estão significativamente mais vulneráveis a falhas transientes. Os erros gerados são assim também mais críticos do que eram antes. Esta tese apresenta uma nova virtude em termos de confiabilidade dos circuitos assíncronos quase-insensíveis aos atrasos (QDI): a sua grande habilidade natural para mitigar falhas transientes de longa duração, que são severas em circuitos síncronos modernos. Uma metodologia para avaliar comparativamente os efeitos de falhas transientes tanto em circuitos síncronos como em circuitos assíncronos QDI é apresentada. Além disso, um método para obter a habilidade de mitigação de falhas transientes dos elementos de memória de circuitos QDI (ou seja, os C-elements) é também proposto. Por fim, técnicas de mitigação são sugeridas para aumentar ainda mais a atenuação de falhas transientes por parte dos Celements e, por consequência, também a robustez dos sistemas assíncronos QDI. / Recent deep-submicron technology-based ICs are significantly more vulnerable to transient faults. The arisen errors are thus also more critical than they have ever been before. This thesis presents a further novel benefit of the Quasi-Delay Insensitive (QDI) asynchronous circuits in terms of reliability: their strong natural ability to mitigate longduration transient faults that are severe in modern synchronous circuits. A methodology to evaluate comparatively the transient-fault effects on synchronous and QDI asynchronous circuits is presented. Furthermore, a method to obtain the transient-fault mitigation ability of the QDI circuits’ memory elements (i.e., the C-elements) is also proposed. Finally, mitigation techniques are suggested to increase even more the Celements’ transient-fault attenuation, and thus also the QDI asynchronous systems’ robustness.

Os circuitos integrados recentes baseados em tecnologias nanoeletrônicas estão significativamente mais vulneráveis a falhas transientes. Os erros gerados são assim também mais críticos do que eram antes. Esta tese apresenta uma nova virtude em termos de confiabilidade dos circuitos assíncronos quase-insensíveis aos atrasos (QDI): a sua grande habilidade natural para mitigar falhas transientes de longa duração, que são severas em circuitos síncronos modernos. Uma metodologia para avaliar comparativamente os efeitos de falhas transientes tanto em circuitos síncronos como em circuitos assíncronos QDI é apresentada. Além disso, um método para obter a habilidade de mitigação de falhas transientes dos elementos de memória de circuitos QDI (ou seja, os C-elements) é também proposto. Por fim, técnicas de mitigação são sugeridas para aumentar ainda mais a atenuação de falhas transientes por parte dos Celements e, por consequência, também a robustez dos sistemas assíncronos QDI. / Recent deep-submicron technology-based ICs are significantly more vulnerable to transient faults. The arisen errors are thus also more critical than they have ever been before. This thesis presents a further novel benefit of the Quasi-Delay Insensitive (QDI) asynchronous circuits in terms of reliability: their strong natural ability to mitigate longduration transient faults that are severe in modern synchronous circuits. A methodology to evaluate comparatively the transient-fault effects on synchronous and QDI asynchronous circuits is presented. Furthermore, a method to obtain the transient-fault mitigation ability of the QDI circuits’ memory elements (i.e., the C-elements) is also proposed. Finally, mitigation techniques are suggested to increase even more the Celements’ transient-fault attenuation, and thus also the QDI asynchronous systems’ robustness.

This master thesis deals with the realization of a simulator based on asynchronous cellular automata simulating delay insensitive circuits. In connection with nanotechnology, cellular automata have several interesting properties, such as self-replication, regular structure and high parallelism that make them very useful as models for some types of nanocomputers. This text describes the relationship between cellular automata and nanotechnology. Emphasis is given to the possibility of using asynchronous timing mode. Asynchronous cellular arrays based on asynchronous cellular automata could prove to be a suitable architecture for future nanocomputer, which was the reason for implementation of this simulator. The simulator's functionality was verified by experiments.

Les systèmes intégrés sont souvent des systèmes hétérogènes avec des contraintes fortes de consommation électrique. Ils embarquent aujourd'hui des actionneurs, des capteurs et des unités pour le traitement du signal. Afin de limiter l'énergie consommée, ils peuvent tirer profit des techniques évènementielles que sont l'échantillonnage non uniforme et l'électronique asynchrone. En effet, elles permettent de réduire drastiquement la quantité de données échantillonnées pour de nombreuses classes de signaux et de diminuer l'activité. Pour aider les concepteurs à développer rapidement des plateformes exploitant ces deux techniques évènementielles, nous avons élaboré un flot de conception nommé ALPS. Il propose un environnement permettant de déterminer et de simuler au niveau algorithmique le schéma d'échantillonnage et les traitements associés afin de sélectionner les plus efficients en fonction de l'application ciblée. ALPS génère directement le convertisseur analogique/numérique à partir des paramètres d'échantillonnage choisis. L'élaboration de la partie de traitement s'appuie quant à elle sur un outil de synthèse de haut niveau synchrone et une méthode de désynchronisation exploitant des protocoles asynchrones spécifiques, capables d'optimiser la surface et la consommation du circuit. Enfin, des simulations au niveau porteslogiques permettent d'analyser et de valider l'énergie consommée avant de poursuivre par un flot classique de placement et routage. Les évaluations conduites montrent une réduction d'un facteur 3 à 8 de la consommation des circuits automatiquement générés. Le flot ALPS permet à un concepteur non-spécialiste de se concentrer sur l'optimisation de l'échantillonnage et de l'algorithme en fonction de l'application et de potentiellement réduire d'un ou plusieurs ordres de grandeur la consommation du circuit. / Integrated systems are mainly heterogeneous systems with strong powerconsumption constraints. They embed actuators, sensors and signalprocessing units. To limit the energy consumption, they can exploitevent-based techniques, namely non-uniform sampling and asynchronouscircuits. Indeed, they allow cutting drastically the amount of sampleddata for many types of signals and reducing the system activity. To helpdesigners in quickly developing platforms that exploit those event-basedtechniques, we elaborated a design framework called ALPS. It proposes anenvironment to determine and simulate at algorithmic level the samplingscheme and the associated processing in order to select the mostefficient ones depending on the targetted application. ALPS generatesdirectly the analog-to-digital converter based on the chosen samplingparameters. The elaboration of the processing unit uses a synchronoushigh-level synthesis tool and a desynchronization method that exploitsspecific asynchronous protocols to optimize the circuit area and powerconsumption. Finally, gate-level simulations allow analyzing andvalidating the energy consumption before continuing with a standardplacement and routing flow. The conducted evaluations show a reductionfactor of 3 to 8 of the consumption of the automatically generatedcirctuis. The flow ALPS allow non-specialists to concentrate on theoptimization of the sampling and the processing in function of theirapplication and to reduice the circuit power consumptions by one toseveral orders of magnitude.

Avec l'avènement des systèmes intégrés complexes, la vérification par assertions(Assertion Based Verification ou ABV) s'est imposée comme une solution pour la vérification semi-formelle des circuits. L'ABV permet de valider qu'un circuit satisfait ou non une propriété(ou assertion). Des travaux antérieurs ont montré qu'il était possible de synthétiser ces propriétés sous la forme de moniteurs matériels. Ces derniers peuvent ainsi être embarqués à demeure sur un circuit afin qu'ils assurent une tâche de monitoring. Avec un objectif de surveillance et de sûreté, l'utilisation de tels moniteurs est un plus. Néanmoins, ces derniers sont aussi sensibles que les circuits surveillés à une dégradation environnementale(tension, température, vieillissement, …). Afin de réduire le risque de dysfonctionnement des moniteurs, initialement conçus comme des circuits synchrones, une variante asynchrone(quasi-insensible aux délais) est proposée dans cette thèse. Ces travaux s'inscrivent dans le cadre du projet ANR SFINCS(Thalès, Dolphin Integration, TIMA) et ont mené à la définition d'une méthode de synthèse de moniteurs asynchrones matériels tirant parti de la robustesse et de la modularité des implémentations asynchrones. Les études menées se focalisent en premier lieu sur la conception d'une bibliothèque de moniteurs élémentaires asynchrones et sur une méthode d'interconnexion ad hoc permettant de constituer des moniteurs complexes. Afin de garantir les bonnes propriétés de robustesse de ces moniteurs, une étude a été menée à l'aide de l'outil de vérification formelle RAT. Il a notamment été prouvé que la connexion d'un moniteur asynchrone avec un circuit synchrone(à surveiller) était un point particulièrement délicat car les hypothèses du circuit synchrone contraignent le moniteur asynchrone. Il a donc été proposé d'introduire un dispositif de contrôle de l'horloge du circuit synchrone, appelé « clock stretching », afin de relaxer les hypothèses temporelles synchrones qui sont appliquées à la partie asynchrone. / With the advent of complex integrated systems, the assertion based verification(ABV) has emerged as a solution for the semi-formal circuits verification. The ABV is used to validate that a circuit satisfies a property(or assertion). Previous work has shown that it is possible to synthesize these properties in the form of hardware monitors. These can then be embeddded permanantly on a circuit so that they provide monitoring task. With a goal of security and surveillance, the use of such monitors is a plus. Nevertheless, they are as sensitive as the monitored circuits to environmental degradation(voltage, temperature, age, ...). To reduce the risk of failure in monitors, originally designed as synchronous circuits, an asynchronous variant(quasi-delay insensitive) is proposed in this thesis. This work is part of the ANR project SFINCS(Thales, Dolphin Integration, TIMA) and led to the definition of a method for synthesizing asynchronous hardware monitors leveraging the robustness and modularity of asynchronous implementations. The studies focus primarily on the design of a library of basic asynchronous monitors and an ad hoc method of interconnection to build complex monitors. To ensure the robustness of these monitors, a study was conducted using formal verification tool RAT. In particular it was proved that the connection of an asynchronous monitor with a synchronous circuit(to watch) was particularly tricky because the timing assumptions of synchronous circuit impact the asynchronous monitor. It was therefore proposed to introduce a devicet, called "clock stretching", for controlling the clock of the synchronous circuit and relax synchronous timing assumptions that are applied to the asynchronous monitor.

The growth of Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) was considered to be the ideal carrier of the high bandwidth applications like video on demand and multimedia e-learning. ATM emerged commercially in the beginning of the 1990's. It was designed to provide a different quality of service at a speed up 100 Gbps for both real time and non real time application. The turn of the 90's saw a variety of technologies being developed. This project analyzes these technologies, compares them to the Asynchronous Transfer Mode and assesses the future of ATM.