Master of Science / Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering / Don M. Gruenbacher / As semiconductor technologies advance, the smallest feature sizes that can be fabricated get smaller. This has led to the development of high density FPGAs capable of supporting high clock speeds, which allows for the implementation of larger more complex designs on a single chip. Over the past decade the technology market has shifted toward mobile devices with low power consumption at or near the top of design considerations. By reducing power consumption in FPGAs we can achieve greater reliability, lower cooling cost, simpler power supply and delivery, and longer battery life. In this thesis, FPGA technology is discussed for the design and commercial implementation of low power systems as compared to ASICs or microprocessors, and a few techniques are suggested for lowering power consumption in FPGA designs. The objective of this research is to implement some of these approaches and attempt to design a low power signal acquisition module. Designing for low power consumption without compromising performance requires a power-efficient FPGA architecture and good design practices to leverage the architectural features. With various power conservation techniques suggested for every stage of the FPGA design flow, the following approach was used in the design process implementation: the switching activity is addressed in the design entry, and synthesis level and software tools are utilized to get an initial estimate of and optimize the design’s power consumption. Finally, the device choice is made based on its features that will enhance the optimization achieved in the previous stages; it is configured and real time board level power measurements are made to verify the implementation’s efficacy

During this research, the concepts of Systems Engineering were applied to embedded system design. The objective was to apply the Systems Engineering methodology to the design of a particular embedded system. A Video Surveillancesystem was chosen as the particular embedded system. Systems Engineering concepts provide the foundation for an optimized design process and for the coordination between system modules. The functionality of the Video Surveillance system was achieved through the partitioning of the overall system functionality into three separate modules. The three modules were Image Capture, Image Processing and Image Transmission. The methodology employed resulted in a system that was flexible and portable. The three modules were designed using their own set of specifications and with completely defined linking interfaces. Following a concrete set of specifications resulted in a system, which can be modified at any later stage without the necessity of changing the whole architecture. The Video Surveillance system fulfilled the overall system requirements as well as those imposed by the subsystems. The partitioning of functionality resulted in ease of implementation and better upgradeability. Design based on Systems Engineering concepts provides for ease of integration. In addition, for modules that follow the same protocol, the existence of well defined interfaces enables connectivity to a variety of external units.