Pendulum--a reversible computer architecture

Energy dissipation in modern microprocessors is rapidly becoming a primary design concern. Microprocessors containing a few million transistors and dissipating tens of watts are commonplace, limiting their usefulness in portable applications and making heat removal in dense structures diicult. An expanding market for portable devices and increasing device density will continue to encourage low energy design. Computing engines can be designed that do not require energy dissipation, but only if the computation is logically reversible, a radical departure from both traditional logic design and traditional low energy design techniques. This thesis presents Pendulum, a logically reversible computer architecture that may operate without dissipating energy. The novel aspect of the Pendulum reversible processor is that all computation is reversible. The processor saves enough information to invert every operation. Programs may be executed in reverse. At any point in the computation the processor direction may be reversed and any intermediate results will be \uncomputed." Acknowledgments Thanks to Raj Amirtharajah, Mike \Misha" Bolotski, Tom Simon, and Charles \Chuckles" Isbell for the endless discussions of the engineering tradeoos involved in designing Pendulum. Thanks also for help in making the personal tradeoos involved in writing this thesis. Thanks to Matt DeBergalis for his tireless work in the early stages of this project. A hearty thanks to the denizens of 7ai who have been alternately nurturing, critical, supportive , cynical, and instructive. You know who you are. Thanks to Tom Knight, with whom I rst discussed a reversible processor, for the incredible range of topics he's taught me something about, and all the valuable advice he's given me during the course of my research. Thanks to my parents, for all the years of love and support.

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