SiPhotonics 2014 - 1st International Workshop on Exploiting Silicon Photonics for energy-efficient heterogeneous parallel architectures (SiPhotonics'2014)

The main purpose of this workshop is to promote further research interests and activities on Silicon Photonics and related topics in the perspective of its adoption in future computer systems. In fact Silicon Photonics poses in itself crucial challenges and interesting design tradeoffs for being deployed in future computer systems effectively, also in integration with other technologies. Furthermore, the unique features of photonics (e.g. extreme low-latency, end-to-end transmission, high bandwidth density) have the potential to constitute a discontinuity element able to modify the expected shape of future computer systems from the design point of view and also from the programmability and/or runtime management perspectives.
Summarizing, silicon photonics can bring innovations and benefits into current and foreseeable computing systems directly, due to their intrinsic features, but also indirectly enabling the evolution towards architectures, runtime and resource management approaches that maximize the photonic raw technological opportunities and lead to more efficient overall designs, otherwise impossible.
This workshop aims to increase the synergy from a complete range of perspectives, from raw technology issues and solutions up to studies at the overall system level of modern multi-/many-core systems, both from academic and industrial researchers working in this area. We are interested in experimental, systems-related, and work-in-progress papers in all aspects of the Silicon Photonics technology at all levels of development.
Topics of interest:
The topics of interest include, but are not limited to:
- Integration of positive features of both electronic and photonic interconnection technology.
- Low-level technological improvements and implications (e.g. integrated lasers, modulation and detection technologies, microring resonators).
- Fabrication issues (e.g. precision) and new tools (e.g. design, place and route, ecc) to easy the topological exploration.
- Emerging challenges and solutions for on-chip interconnections, cache coherence protocols, runtime and OS scheduling, and programmability, for future homogeneous/heterogeneous energy-aware CMPs
- Simulation, validation and verification
- Photonics in the memory hierarchy and I/O of computing systems
- QoS management and performance analysis
- Programming languages and compilers for thermal-, energy-, and power-aware architectures
- Solving the requirements of multiple heterogeneous parallel applications.
- Interaction between photonic features and current computer design issues.
- Industrial practices and case studies