Data Stream Processing in Networks-on-Chip
Jens Rettkowski, Diana Göhringer · 2017
Nowadays, the growing complexity in a wide variety of applications has led to the use of Multiprocessor Systems-on-Chip (MPSoCs). Networks-on-Chip (NoCs) have emerged as a scalable intra-chip communication technology for a high number of processing elements. However, the evolution of MPSoCs shows increasing communication requirements due to the growing number of PEs. This paper presents a novel Network-on-Chip microarchitecture that combines data transfers with data stream processing to exploit efficiently the transmission time. Data stream processing is enabled by a lightweight processing unit that is located within the transmission channels of the NoC. Thus, data can be processed by operations either in a processing element such as a MicroBlaze processor or inside the NoC while it is transferred. Operations executed by the NoC reduce the workload of the processing elements. In addition, the transmission time will be efficiently used. The novel microarchitecture is evaluated and compared to a state-of-the-art router on a Xilinx Zynq FPGA.