Power optimization of multi-level logic circuits utilizing circuit symmetries

Abstract

The property of circuit symmetry has long been applied to the problem of minimizing the area and timing of multi-level logic circuits. In this paper, we focus on another important design objective, power optimization, utilizing circuit symmetries. First, we analyse and establish the relationship between several types of circuit symmetry and their applicability to reducing power consumption of the circuit, proposing a set of re-synthesis techniques utilizing the symmetries. We derive an algorithm for detecting the symmetries (among the internal signals as well as the primary inputs) on a given circuit implementation. We then propose an effective transformation algorithm to minimize power consumption using the symmetry information detected from the circuit. Unlike many other approaches, our transformation algorithm guarantees monotonic improvement in terms of switching activities, which is practically useful in that user can check the intermediate re-synthesized designs in terms of the degree of changes of power, area, timing, and the circuit structure. We have carried out experiments on MCNC benchmark circuits to demonstrate the effectiveness of our algorithm. On average we reduced the power consumption of circuits by 12% with relatively little increase of area and timing.