Adopting an environmental approach in mixed-Signal SoC design : ECG case study

Details

Supervisors

Bol, David

Faculty

Ecole polytechnique de Louvain

Degree label

Master [120] : ingénieur civil électricien, à finalité spécialisée

Abstract

enIn front of the drastic climate changes and the continuous growth of the ICT sector, a better understanding of the environmental impact of this sector is necessary. In particular, design choices for integrated circuits can have a significant influence on their environmental footprint. This master thesis studies the impact of the choice of the technological node when implementing a system on chip (SoC). A specific SoC for ECG arrhythmia detection is implemented in three different technologies to compare their environmental impact. Following an LCA methodology, the embodied and operational footprint of the system are evaluated for each technological node. This is achieved by estimating the power consumption and area occupation in each case, and an optimization of these metrics is performed to limit the global environmental footprint. Even though this study is application specific, it gives concrete insights on design choices and trade-offs that limit the environmental footprint of SoCs.