Transient/Intermittent Computing
Systems that are capable of providing 'correct' operation, despite experiencing frequent loss of power.
Energy-Driven Computing
A New Paradigm for Energy Harvesting Systems
Energy harvesters are being increasingly used to power IoT and embedded systems, but their output power is usually variable and intermittent. To overcome this, systems typically add batteries or supercapacitors to smooth out changes, making the supply appear 'battery-like'. However, these additional devices require time for charging and increase the size, mass and cost of systems.
A new paradigm for energy harvesting systems is "Energy-Driven Systems", a system where the energy source is a key consideration in the design of the system, and energy storage hasn't been added to make it appear battery-like. They are typically characterised by a comparatively small energy storage element compared to average power consumption.
Our Research
Find out more about our research activities in the following areas of energy-driven computing, including our publications, downloads, videos and other related material:
Power-Neutral Computing
Systems which dynamically manage their operation to match the instantaneous power consumed to the instantaneous power harvested.
Application Case Studies
Explore our case studies of prototype energy-driven systems implementing a range of different application domains.
Overview Publications
The following publications provide an overview of energy-driven computing:
Journal Articles
- S.T. Sliper, O. Cetinkaya, A.S. Weddell, A. Das, B.M. Al-Hashimi and G.V. Merrett (2020) Energy-driven computing Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, 378 (2164), 1-4. (doi:10.1098/rsta.2019.0158).
Conference Papers, Posters and Presentations
- S.S. Sahoo, A. Kumar, M. Decky, S.C.B. Wong, G.V. Merrett, Y. Zhao, X. Wang and A.K. Singh (2021) Emergent design challenges for embedded systems and paths forward: Mixed-criticality, energy, reliability and security perspectives: Special Session Paper. At the International Conference on Hardware/Software Codesign and System Synthesis 2021, Virtual. 10 - 13 Oct 2021. 10 pp.
- G.V. Merrett (2020) Energy-driven systems and compute: Towards self-powered embedded computing systems At International Green and Sustainable Computing Conference, Virtual. 19 - 22 Oct 2020.
- G.V. Merrett V and B.M. Al-Hashimi B M (2017) Energy-Driven Computing: Rethinking the Design of Energy Harvesting Systems In Design, Automation & Test in Europe Conference & Exhibition (DATE), 2017. IEEE. 6 pp.
- G.V. Merrett (2016) Energy-driven computing for energy-harvesting embedded systems At ARM Research Summit 2016, United Kingdom. 15 - 16 Sep 2016.
- G.V. Merrett (2016) Transient and power-neutral computing: a paradigm shift for embedded systems? At "Hilariously Low-Power Computing" Workshop (ASPLOS 2016), United States.
Research Team
The energy-driven research team is formed of the following people. If you are interested in joining the team, please visit www.geoffmerrett.co.uk.