It's a trend to consider the power supply integrity at early stage to improve the design quality. Specifically, floorplanning process is modified to improve the power supply as well. In the modified floorplanning process, both the floorplan and power/ground (P/G) network are adjusted to search for optimal floorplan as well as the most robust power supply. In this paper, we propose a novel algorithm to carry out this modified floorplanning. A new analytical method is proposed to estimate the voltage drop while the floorplan is varying constantly. This fast analytical voltage drop estimating method is plugged into the modified floorplanner to speed up the whole floorplanning process. Compared with previous methods, our algorithm can search for the optimal floorplan with consideration of power supply integrity more efficiently and therefore leads to better results. Furthermore, this paper also proposes a novel heuristic method to optimize the topology of P/G network. This optimization algorithm could construct a more robust power supply system. Experimental results show the method can speedup the IR-drop aware floorplanning process by about 10 times and reduce the routing area of P/G network while maintaining the floorplan quality and power supply integrity.

This letter describes two low complexity receiver structures over a multi-broadcast channel of an orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA) multi-user system. The first is a one-group occupied receiver structure, whose complexity is much lower than that of a conventional OFDMA receiver structure. The other one, a multi-group occupied receiver structure, exploits multiple groups for one user, by which users' down-link data rate can be adaptively controlled by a base station (BS). Unlike unchangeable complexity of an OFDMA receiver structure that performs full-size of a fast Fourier transform (FFT) operation although only a few subcarriers are taken, its complexity linearly increases with the number of occupied subcarrier groups. The proposed receiver structures can meet the possible high-rate demand in the down-link and will become one of the strong candidates in next generation mobile communication systems.

Yield-driven clock skew scheduling was previously formulated as a minimum cost-to-time ratio cycle problem, by assuming that variational path delays are in Gaussian distributions. However in today's nanometer technology, process variations show growing impacts on this assumption, as variational delays with non-Gaussian distributions have been observed on these paths. In this paper, we propose a novel yield-driven clock skew scheduling method for arbitrary distributions of critical path delays. Firstly, a general problem formulation is proposed. By integrating the cumulative distribution function (CDF) of critical path delays, the formulation is able to handle path delays with any distributions. It also generalizes the previous formulations on yield-driven clock skew scheduling and indicates their statistical interpretations. Generalized Howard algorithm is derived for finding the critical cycles of the underlying timing constraint graphs. Moreover, an effective algorithm based on minimum balancing is proposed for the overall yield improvement. Experimental results on ISCAS89 benchmarks show that, compared with two representative existing methods, our method remarkably improves the yield by 10.25% on average (up to 14.66%).

In many radio frequency identification (RFID) applications, the reader identifies the tags in its scope repeatedly. For these applications, many algorithms, such as an adaptive binary splitting algorithm (ABS), a single resolution blocking ABS (SRB), a pair resolution blocking ABS (PRB) and a dynamic blocking ABS (DBA) have been proposed. All these algorithms require the staying tags to reply with their IDs to be recognized by the reader. However, the IDs of the staying tags are stored in the reader in the last identification round. The reader can verify the existence of these tags when identifying them. Thus, we propose an anti-collision algorithm with short reply for RFID tag identification (ACSR). In ACSR, each staying tag emits a short reply to indicate its continued existence. Therefore, the data amount transmitted by staying tags is reduced significantly. The identification rate of ACSR is analyzed in this paper. Finally, simulation and analysis results show that ACSR greatly outperforms ABS, SRB and DBA in terms of the identification rate and average amount of data transmitted by a tag.

The low complexity tree-structure based user scheduling algorithm is extended into up-link MLD-based multi-user multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) orthogonal frequency division multiplexing access (OFDMA) wireless systems. The system sum capacity is maximized by careful user selection on a defined tree structure. The calculation load is reduced by selecting the M most possible best branches and sampling in frequency dimension. The performances of the proposed scheduling algorithm are analyzed within three kinds of OFDMA systems and compared with conventional throughput-based algorithm. Both the theoretical analysis and simulation results show that the proposed algorithm obtains better performance with much low complexity.

Radio Frequency based Device-Free Localization (RFDFL) is an emerging localization technique without requirements of attaching any electronic device to a target. The target can be localized by means of measuring the shadowing of received signal strength caused by the target. However, the accuracy of RFDFL deteriorates seriously in environment with WiFi interference. State-of-the-art methods do not efficiently solve this problem. In this paper, we propose a dual-band method to improve the accuracy of RFDFL in environment without/with severe WiFi interference. We introduce an algorithm of fusing dual-band images in order to obtain an enhanced image inferring more precise location and propose a timestamp-based synchronization method to associate the dual-band images to ensure their one-one correspondence. With real-world experiments, we show that our method outperforms traditional single-band localization methods and improves the localization accuracy by up to 40.4% in real indoor environment with high WiFi interference.

In recent years, blockchain has been widely applied in the Internet of Things (IoT). Blockchain oracle, as a bridge for data communication between blockchain and off-chain, has also received significant attention. However, the numerous and heterogeneous devices in the IoT pose great challenges to the efficiency and security of data acquisition for oracles. We find that the matching relationship between data sources and oracle nodes greatly affects the efficiency and service quality of the entire oracle system. To address these issues, this paper proposes a distributed and efficient oracle solution tailored for the IoT, enabling fast acquisition of real-time off-chain data. Specifically, we first design a distributed oracle architecture that combines both Trusted Execution Environment (TEE) devices and ordinary devices to improve system scalability, considering the heterogeneity of IoT devices. Secondly, based on the trusted node information provided by TEE, we determine the matching relationship between nodes and data sources, assigning appropriate nodes for tasks to enhance system efficiency. Through simulation experiments, our proposed solution has been shown to effectively improve the efficiency and service quality of the system, reducing the average response time by approximately 9.92% compared to conventional approaches.

In this study, we propose a one dimensional (1D) based successive generalized sidelobe canceller (GSC) structure for the implementation of 2D adaptive beamformers using a uniform rectangular antenna array (URA). The proposed approach takes advantage of the URA feature that the 2D spatial signature of the receive signal can be decomposed into an outer product of two 1D spatial signatures. The 1D spatial signatures lie in the column and the row spaces of the receive signal matrix, respectively. It follows that the interferers can be successively eliminated by two rounds of 1D-based GSC structure. As compared to the conventional 2D-GSC structure, computer simulations show that in addition to having significantly low computational complexity, the proposed adaptive approach possesses higher convergence rate.

Orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) is very sensitive to the frequency errors caused by phase noise and Doppler shift. These errors will disturb the orthogonality among subcarriers and cause intercarrier interference (ICI). A simple method to combat ICI is proposed in this letter. The main idea is to map each data symbol onto a couple of subcarriers rather to a single subcarrier. Different from the conventional adjacent coupling and symmetric coupling methods, the frequency diversity can be utilized more efficiently by the proposed adaptive coupling method based on optimal subcarrier spacing. Numerical results show that our proposed method provides a robust signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) improvement over the conventional coupling methods.

Coupled with the discrete wavelet transform, SPIHT (set partitioning in hierarchical trees) is a highly efficient image compression technique that allows for progressive transmission. One problem, however, is that its decoding can be extremely sensitive to bit errors in the code sequence. In this paper, we address the issue of transmitting SPIHT-encoded images via noisy channels, wherein errors are inevitable. The communication scenario assumed in this paper is that the transmitter cannot get any acknowledgement from the receiver. In our scheme, the original SPIHT code sequence is first segmented into packets. Each packet is classified as either a CP (critical packet) or an RP (refinement packet). For error control, cyclic redundancy check (CRC) is incorporated into each packet. By checking the CRC check sum, the receiver is able to tell whether a packet is correctly received or not. In this way, the noisy channel can be effectively modeled as an erasure channel. For unequal error protection (UEP), each of those packets are repeatedly transmitted for a few times, as determined by a process called diversity allocation (DA). Two DA algorithms are proposed. The first algorithm produces a nearly optimal decoded image (as measured in the expected signal-to-noise ratio). However, its computation cost is extremely high. The second algorithm works in a progressive fashion and is naturally compatible with progressive transmission. Its computation complexity is extremely low. Nonetheless, its decoded image is nearly as good. Experimental results show that the proposed scheme significantly improves the decoded images. They also show that making distinction between CP and RP results in wiser diversity allocation to packets and thus produces higher quality in the decoded images.

In this paper, we present a new approach for the design of partially adaptive broadband beamformers with the generalized sidelobe canceller (GSC) as an underlying structure. The approach designs the blocking matrix involved by utilizing a set of P-regular, M-band wavelet filters, whose vanishing moment property is shown to meet the requirement of a blocking matrix in the GSC structure. Furthermore, basing on the subband decomposition property of these wavelet filters, we introduce a new dynamic subband selection scheme succeeding the blocking matrix. The scheme only retains the principal subband components of the blocking matrix outputs based on a prescribed statistical hypothesis test and thus further reduces the dimension of weights in adaptive processing. As such, the overall computational complexity, which is mainly dictated by the dimension of adaptive weights, is substantially reduced. The furnished simulations show that this new approach offers comparable performance as the existing fully adaptive beamformers but with reduced computations.

A one dimensional (1-D) based tree structure algorithm is proposed for estimating the 2D-DOAs of the signals impinging on a uniform rectangular array. The key idea of the proposed algorithm is to successively utilize the 1-D MUSIC algorithm several times, in tree structure, to estimate the azimuth and the elevation angles independently. Subspace projectors are exploited in conjunction with the 1-D MUSIC algorithms to decompose the received signal into several signals each coordinated by its own 2D-DOA. The pairing of the azimuth estimates and the associated elevation estimates is naturally determined due to the tree structure of the algorithm.

A low voltage operational active inductor circuit is attractive for spiral-inductor-less LNA because of realizing high gain and low voltage operation simultaneously. In this paper, a simply structured low-voltage operational active inductor to enhance the amplifier gain is introduced and analyzed. This active inductor, which utilizes a transistor load operated in the triode region and a source follower, features a small DC voltage drop suitable for low voltage LNAs. An LNA using the active inductor load was designed with an input matching circuit using 90 nm CMOS technology. The LNA tuned to 2.4 GHz operation has 19.5 dB of the internal gain. In addition, the frequency characteristics are easily varied by changing the capacitance value in the active inductor circuit. The core circuit occupies only 0.0026 mm2 and consumes 2.8 mW with 1.2 V supply voltage.

This paper investigates the communication range and interference range of millimeter-wave wireless personal area networks (WPAN) based on realistic system design. Firstly, the effective communication range of the millimeter-wave networks are calculated based on realistic physical (PHY) layer design and 60 GHz channel obtained from actual measurements. Secondly, an interference model is developed to facilitate the analysis of the impact of interferer-to-victim range on the victim link performance. It is found that system with BPSK modulation is able to support use cases with higher number of portable devices within a 3 m range, while system with 16QAM modulation is more suitable for fixed high speed data streaming devices within a shorter range of 1 m. Also, the interferer-to-victim range that causes no interference in all conditions is found to be approximately 40 m, while a 25 m range causes a typical bit error rate (BER) degradation of 1-digit (e.g. BER = 10-6 to 10-5).

A novel adaptive algorithm based on pilot channel (PCA) for MMSE multiuser detection in downlink CDMA is proposed in this paper. This algorithm uses the information in pilot channel to compute the desired weight vector directly. Compared with conventional adaptive algorithms and blind algorithms, it does not require training sequences nor channel estimation. Analysis shows that the weight vector obtained by the PCA algorithm converges to the Wiener solution globally and its computational complexity is O(N2). Simulation results show that the PCA algorithm can adapt rapidly to the changing environment. The steady state performance can be enhanced by increasing the transmitted power in pilot channel, but is worse than that of conventional recursive least-square (RLS) algorithm in decision-directed mode. Also, performance of the adaptive MMSE detector is much better than that of conventional RAKE receiver.

The paper describes a low complexity tree-structure based user scheduling algorithm in an up-link transmission of MLD-based multi-user multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) wireless systems. An M-branch selection algorithm, which selects M most-possible best branches at each step, is proposed to maximize the whole system sum-rate capacity. To achieve the maximum capacity in multi-user MIMO systems, antennas configuration and user selection are preformed simultaneously. Then according to the selected number of antennas for each user, different transmission schemes are also adopted. Both the theoretical analysis and simulation results show that the proposed algorithms obtain near optimal performance with far low complexity than the full search procedure.

We propose a dimension reduction algorithm for the receiver of the downlink of direct-sequence code-division multiple access (DS-CDMA) systems in which both the transmitters and the receivers employ antenna arrays of multiple elements. To estimate the high order channel parameters, we develop a layered architecture using dimension-reduced parameter estimation algorithms to estimate the frequency-selective multipath channels. In the proposed architecture, to exploit the space-time geometric characteristics of multipath channels, spatial beamformers and constrained (or unconstrained) temporal filters are adopted for clustered-multipath grouping and path isolation. In conjunction with the multiple access interference (MAI) suppression techniques, the proposed architecture jointly estimates the direction of arrivals, propagation delays, and fading amplitudes of the downlink fading multipaths. With the outputs of the proposed architecture, the signals of interest can then be naturally detected by using path-wise maximum ratio combining. Compared to the traditional techniques, such as the Joint-Angle-and-Delay-Estimation (JADE) algorithm for DOA-delay joint estimation and the space-time minimum mean square error (ST-MMSE) algorithm for signal detection, computer simulations show that the proposed algorithm substantially mitigate the computational complexity at the expense of only slight performance degradation.

This paper studies the multi-link multi-antenna amplify-and-forward (AF) relay system, in which multiple source-destination pairs communicate with the aid of an energy harvesting (EH)-enabled relay and the relay utilizes the power splitting (PS) protocol to accomplish simultaneous EH and information forwarding (IF). Specifically, independent PS, i.e., allow each antenna to have an individual PS factor, and cooperative power allocation (PA) i.e., adaptively allocate the harvested energy to each channel, are proposed to increase the signal processing degrees of freedom and energy utilization. Our objective is to maximize the minimum rate of all source-destination pairs, i.e., the max-min rate, by jointly optimizing the PS and PA strategies. The optimization problem is first established for the ideal channel state information (CSI) model. To solve the formulated non-convex problem, the optimal forwarding matrix is derived and an auxiliary variable is introduced to remove the coupling of transmission rates in two slots, following which a bi-level iteration algorithm is proposed to determine the optimal PS and PA strategy by jointly utilizing the bisection and golden section methods. The proposal is then extended into the partial CSI model, and the final transmission rate for each source-destination pair is modified by treating the CSI error as random noise. With a similar analysis, it is proved that the proposed bi-level algorithm can also solve the joint PS and PA optimization problem in the partial CSI model. Simulation results show that the proposed algorithm works well in both ideal CSI and partial CSI models, and by means of independent PS and cooperative PA, the achieved max-min rate is greatly improved over existing non-EH-enabled and EH-enabled relay schemes, especially when the signal processing noise at the relay is large and the sources use quite different transmit powers.

The design of the finite impulse response (FIR) notch filter with controlled null width is expressed as a derivatively contrained quadratic optimization problem. The problem is transformed into an unconstrained one by choosing a null matrix orthogonal to the derivative constraint matrix. In this paper, subband decomposition using wavelet filters is employed to construct the null matrix. Taking advantage of the vanishing moment property of the wavelet filters, the proposed method can adjust the null width of the notch filter for eliminating the intractable iterference by controlling the regularity of the wavelet filters. Simulation results show that the new method can offer comparable performance as those of the existing full-rank-based ones and thus provides a promising alternative to the existing works.

This paper proposes a prioritized aggregation method that supports compressed video transmission on millimeter wave wireless personal area network (mmWave WPAN) systems. Frame aggregation is an effective means to improve system efficiency and throughput for wide band systems such as mmWave WPAN. It is required by the applications that the mmWave WPAN systems should provide Gbps or multiGbps transmission capability. The proposed scheme targets not only transmission efficiency but also support of compressed video transmission which currently is very popular. The proposal combines MAC layer aggregation with PHY layer skew modulation to facilitate the video transmission in a way that more important data is better protected. Simulation results show that the average peak signal to noise ratio (PSNR) performance is improved by 5 dB compared to conventional method, while the Gbps transmission requirement is fulfilled.