Multicore architectures, especially chip multi-processors, have been widely acknowledged as a successful design paradigm. Existing approaches primarily target application-driven partitioning of the shared cache to alleviate inter-core cache interference so that both performance and energy efficiency are improved. Dynamic cache reconfiguration is a promising technique in reducing energy consumption of the cache subsystem for uniprocessor systems. In this paper, we present a novel energy optimization technique which employs both dynamic reconfiguration of private caches and partitioning of the shared cache for multicore systems with real-time tasks. Our static profiling based algorithm is designed to judiciously find beneficial cache configurations (of private caches) for each task as well as partition factors (of the shared cache) for each core so that the energy consumption is minimized while task deadline is satisfied. Experimental results using real benchmarks demonstrate that our approach can achieve 29.29% energy saving on average compared to systems employing only cache partitioning.

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The development of a novel and portable tabletop pulsed neutron source is presented. It is a battery powered neutron tube based on a miniature plasma focus (PF) device having all metal-sealed components. The tube, fuelled with deuterium gas, generates neutrons because of D–D fusion reactions. The inner diameter and the length of the tube are 3.4 cm and 8 cm, respectively. A single capacitor (200 J, 4.0 µF, 10 nH) of compact size (17 cm × 15 cm × 13 cm, 6.5 kg) is used as the energy driver. A power supply system charges the capacitor to 10 kV in 10 s and also provides a 30 kV trigger pulse to the spark gap. An input of 24 V dc (7.5 A) to the power supply system is provided by two rechargeable batteries (each 12 V, 7.5 A, 20 h). The device has produced neutrons for 150 shots within a period of 120 days in a very reliable manner without purging the deuterium gas between the shots. For the first 50 shots, the average yield is (1.6 ± 0.3) × 106 neutrons/shot in 4π sr with a pulse width of 23.4 ± 3.3 ns. The estimated neutron energy is 2.47 ± 0.22 MeV. The neutron production reduces slowly and reaches the detection threshold value of 3 × 105 neutrons/shot towards the last shots. The device produces neutrons in a similar manner on evacuation and refilling. The height of the mounted PF tube with the capacitor and the spark gap is 35 cm. The complete setup comprising the capacitor with spark gap, the PF tube, the power supply system with two batteries and the control panel weighs only 23 kg.

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