Patents Assigned to Sonics, Inc.
  • Publication number: 20130073878
    Abstract: An interconnect-power-manager (IPM) cooperates and communicates signals with an integrated-circuit-system-power-manager (SPM) in the integrated-circuit. The interconnect network (IN) is partitioned into multiple power domains and has hardware circuitry integrated into the IN to manage a quiescent state for all components in each power domain in the IN when a routing pathway for transactions in the IN spans across one or more power domain boundaries and causes interdependencies of power domains within the IN other than where the power domains of the initiator agent and final target agent of the transaction are located within. The SPM is configured to cooperate and communicate with the IPM to quiesce, to wake up, and any combination of the two, one or more of the multiple power domains within the IN.
    Type: Application
    Filed: March 29, 2012
    Publication date: March 21, 2013
    Applicant: SONICS, INC.
    Inventors: Doddaballapur N. Jayasimha, Drew E. Wingard, Stephen W. Hamilton
  • Publication number: 20130051397
    Abstract: A method includes receiving flits forwarded from an upstream router into a first input virtual channel (VC) associated with an input port. The flits are associated with packets originated from a first Intellectual Property (IP) core and forwarded to a second IP core. The flits are stored in a VC storage associated with the first input VC. The method further includes performing link width conversion based on a width of the flits being different from a width of an output port. Link width conversion includes accumulation of the flits when the width of the output port is wider and unpacking of the flits when the width of the output port is narrower. Credits are generated based on the flits being forwarded from the first input VC to the output port. The credits are sent to the upstream router to enable receiving more flits from the upstream router.
    Type: Application
    Filed: August 26, 2011
    Publication date: February 28, 2013
    Applicant: SONICS, INC.
    Inventors: LIPING GUO, DODDABALLAPUR N. JAYASIMHA, JEREMY CHAN
  • Publication number: 20130051385
    Abstract: A method for generating headers in packetized protocols for a flexible routing network for a Network on a Chip (NoC) architecture includes generating packets based on transmission traffic received from an initiator or a target connected to a routing network that connects disparate initiators and targets. Logic to generate the packets is in an interface located between the initiator or the target and the routing network. A header portion of a packet is variable in length and includes a header payload and header control information. Each of the header portion and the body portion includes one or more standard sized transmission units. The size of the transmission units and width of the header payload are determined by logic included in the interface. The width of the header payload is determined based on orthogonal groups with each of the orthogonal groups being associated with targets sharing an initiator thread.
    Type: Application
    Filed: August 26, 2011
    Publication date: February 28, 2013
    Applicant: SONICS,INC.
    Inventors: Doddaballapur N. Jayasimha, Jeremy Chan, Liping Guo
  • Publication number: 20130051391
    Abstract: A method for routing information in a flexible routing network which connects disparate initiators and targets includes implementing a packetization logic at an interface between an initiator or a target and a routing network to receive transmission traffic from the initiator or the target and to packetize the transmission traffic into packets. Each packet includes a header portion and a body portion. Each of the header portion and the body portion includes one or more standard sized transmission units. Each standard sized transmission unit includes a control section and a payload section. A payload section associated with the body portion includes one or more chunks. The method includes encoding the one or more chunks using the CDF. All transmissions within the routing network are based on the CDF. The CDF facilitates narrow-to-wide and wide-to-narrow link width conversion without having to manipulate subparts of data fields in the transmission traffic.
    Type: Application
    Filed: August 26, 2011
    Publication date: February 28, 2013
    Applicant: SONICS, INC.
    Inventors: Doddaballapur N. Jayasimha, Jeremy Chan, Jay S. Tomlinson
  • Publication number: 20120329122
    Abstract: Microorganisms such as microalgae are collected and separated from a host medium such as water. Cellular walls and membranes of the microorganisms are then ruptured to release their lipids using a lipid extraction unit. Thereafter, the lipids from the host medium are collected and separated using a lipid collection and separation unit. Related apparatus, systems, techniques and articles are also described.
    Type: Application
    Filed: August 23, 2011
    Publication date: December 27, 2012
    Applicant: FloDesign Sonics, Inc.
    Inventors: Bart Lipkens, Eric Mitchell, Joey Carmichael, Dane Mealey, Jason Dionne
  • Publication number: 20120328477
    Abstract: Systems are provided with varying flow chamber configurations which acoustically agglomerate microorganisms such as algae for separation from a host fluid such as water. Related apparatus, systems, techniques and articles are also described.
    Type: Application
    Filed: August 23, 2011
    Publication date: December 27, 2012
    Applicant: FloDesign Sonics, Inc.
    Inventors: Jason Dionne, Jeff King, Bart Lipkens, Edward A. Rietman
  • Publication number: 20120325747
    Abstract: A system is provided that includes one or more acoustic microfilters through which is flowed a mixture of a fluid and a particulate to selectively filter particles from the fluid. Also included are one or more phononic crystal units coupled to the acoustic microfilter(s) to further selectively filter particles from the fluid. Related apparatus, systems, techniques and articles are also described.
    Type: Application
    Filed: August 23, 2011
    Publication date: December 27, 2012
    Applicant: FloDesign Sonics, Inc.
    Inventors: Edward A. Rietman, Bart Lipkens, Jason Dionne
  • Publication number: 20120325727
    Abstract: A flow chamber is provided through which is flowed a mixture of a fluid and a particulate. The flow chamber comprises at least one multi-phase water inlet through which multi-phase water enters the flow chamber, a water outlet through which water exits the flow chamber, a solids outlet through which particles having a density at or above a pre-defined threshold exit the flow chamber, and a low density outlet through which particles having a density below the pre-defined threshold exit the flow chamber. Also provided are one or more ultrasonic transducers and one or more reflectors corresponding to each transducer to acoustically filter the fluid and cause particles/fluid to be selectively diverted to one of the outlets. Related apparatus, systems, techniques and articles are also described.
    Type: Application
    Filed: August 23, 2011
    Publication date: December 27, 2012
    Applicant: FloDesign Sonics, Inc.
    Inventors: Jason Dionne, Bart Lipkens, Edward A. Rietman
  • Patent number: 8308853
    Abstract: A damper arrangement is described which provides for selective separation of the insulator compartments from the main body of a wet electrostatic precipitator (WESP), permitting maintenance to be performed on the insulator in the compartment while process gas continues to flow through the WESP.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 23, 2008
    Date of Patent: November 13, 2012
    Assignee: Turbo Sonic Inc.
    Inventors: Carl W. Bender, William A. L. Gamble
  • Patent number: 8229723
    Abstract: Various methods and apparatuses are described that provide instrumentation and analysis of an electronic design. A method for providing performance instrumentation and analysis of the electronic design includes defining a first and second set of intended software instrumentation test points and an associated first and second set of performance analysis units. The method further includes instrumenting the first and second sets of software instrumentation test points and the associated first and second sets of performance analysis units to a first model and a second model, respectively. The method further includes creating a first and a second set of software instances associated with the first and second sets of intended software instrumentation test points and associated sets of performance analysis units during run time of a first simulation and a second simulation of the electronic design associated with the first model and second model, respectively.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 7, 2007
    Date of Patent: July 24, 2012
    Assignee: Sonics, Inc.
    Inventors: Krishnan Srinivasan, Chien-Chun Chou, Drew Wingard
  • Patent number: 8190804
    Abstract: Various methods and apparatus are described for a memory scheduler. The memory scheduler has a pipelined arbiter to determine which request will access the target memory core. Pipelining occurs in stages within the arbiter over a period of more than one clock cycle. The pipelined arbiter uses two or more weighting factors affecting an arbitration decision that are processed in parallel. A predictive scheduler in the memory scheduler uses data from a previous cycle to make the arbitration decision about a request during a current clock cycle in which the arbitration decision is made in order to increase overall system efficiency of requests being serviced in the integrated circuit.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 12, 2009
    Date of Patent: May 29, 2012
    Assignee: Sonics, Inc.
    Inventors: Krishnan Srinivasan, Drew E. Wingard
  • Publication number: 20120117301
    Abstract: Various methods and apparatus are described for communicating transactions between one or more initiator IP cores and one or more target IP cores coupled to an interconnect. A centralized Memory Management logic Unit (MMU) is located in the interconnect for virtualization and sharing of integrated circuit resources including target cores between the one or more initiator IP cores. A master translation look aside buffer (TLB) stores virtualization and sharing information in the entries of the master TLB. A set of two or more translation look aside buffers (TLBs) locally store virtualization and sharing information replicated from the master TLB. Logic in the MMU or other software updates the virtualization and sharing information replicated from the master TLB in the entries of one or more of the set of local TLBs.
    Type: Application
    Filed: November 3, 2011
    Publication date: May 10, 2012
    Applicant: SONICS, INC.
    Inventor: Drew E. Wingard
  • Publication number: 20120110106
    Abstract: A method, apparatus, and system for providing layer concurrency connecting two or more master Intellectual Property cores to a Network on a Chip (NoC) for an integrated circuit is provided. An embodiment includes two masters connected using a common tightly coupled protocol to a first interface of an NoC. A protocol conversion unit can be coupled between the two or more masters and the NoC to convert a request in the tightly coupled protocol to a decoupled protocol that decouples request phasing from response phasing and then passes the request in the decoupled protocol format onto the NoC. The system also provides for arbitration amongst the two or more masters. Requests from the masters are still in the common tightly coupled protocol and are translated by the protocol conversion unit into a request in a decoupled protocol to enable out of order return of responses.
    Type: Application
    Filed: November 2, 2010
    Publication date: May 3, 2012
    Applicant: SONICS, INC.
    Inventors: BENOIT DE LESCURE, KRISHNAN SRINIVASAN
  • Patent number: 8166214
    Abstract: In one embodiment, payload of multiple threads between intellectual property (IP) cores of an integrated circuit are transferred, by buffering the payload using a number of order queues. Each of the queues is guaranteed access to a minimum number of buffer entries that make up the queue. Each queue is assigned to a respective thread. A number of buffer entries that make up any queue is increased, above the minimum, by borrowing from a shared pool of unused buffer entries on a first-come, first-served basis. In another embodiment, an interconnect implements a content addressable memory (CAM) structure that is shared storage for a number of logical, multi-thread ordered queues that buffer requests and/or responses that are being routed between data processing elements coupled to the interconnect. Other embodiments are also described and claimed.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 8, 2010
    Date of Patent: April 24, 2012
    Assignee: Sonics, Inc.
    Inventor: Stephen W. Hamilton
  • Publication number: 20120054511
    Abstract: A method, apparatus, and system in which an interconnect for an integrated circuit communicates transactions between one or more initiator Intellectual Property (IP) cores and one or more target IP cores coupled to the interconnect, including a power manager having a hierarchy of two or more layers including a hardware logic portion to control a power consumption of two or more domains in the integrated circuit, where each layer of the power manager performs its own function; wherein the power manager has its own dedicated CPU or dedicated state machine to execute power management instructions; and wherein the power manager controls the power consumption of two or more domains without using a CPU IP core utilized by other IP cores on the integrated circuit to execute power management instructions.
    Type: Application
    Filed: August 31, 2010
    Publication date: March 1, 2012
    Applicant: SONICS, INC
    Inventors: Ray Brinks, Benoit de Lescure
  • Publication number: 20120036509
    Abstract: A method, apparatus, and system in which an integrated circuit comprises an initiator Intellectual Property (IP) core, a target IP core, an interconnect, and a tag and thread logic. The target IP core may include a memory coupled to the initiator IP core. Additionally, the interconnect can allow the integrated circuit to communicate transactions between one or more initiator Intellectual Property (IP) cores and one or more target IP cores coupled to the interconnect. A tag and thread logic can be configured to concurrently perform per-thread and per-tag memory access scheduling within a thread and across multiple threads such that the tag and thread logic manages tags and threads to allow for per-tag and per-thread scheduling of memory accesses requests from the initiator IP core out of order from an initial issue order of the memory accesses requests from the initiator IP core.
    Type: Application
    Filed: August 6, 2010
    Publication date: February 9, 2012
    Applicant: SONICS, INC
    Inventors: KRISHNAN SRINIVASAN, RUBEN KHAZHAKYAN, HARUTYUN ASLANYAN, DREW E. WINGARD, CHIEN-CHUN CHOU
  • Publication number: 20120036296
    Abstract: A method, apparatus, and system are described, which generally relate to an integrated circuit having an interconnect. The flow control logic for the interconnect applies a flow control splitting protocol to permit transactions from each initiator thread and/or each initiator tag stream to be outstanding to multiple channels in a single aggregate target at once, and therefore to multiple individual targets within an aggregate target at once. The combined flow control logic and flow control protocol allows the interconnect to manage simultaneous requests to multiple channels in an aggregate target from the same thread or tag at the same time.
    Type: Application
    Filed: October 18, 2011
    Publication date: February 9, 2012
    Applicant: SONICS, INC.
    Inventors: Drew E. Wingard, Chien-Chun Chou, Stephen W. Hamilton, Ian Andrew Swarbrick, Vida Vakilotojar
  • Patent number: 8108648
    Abstract: Various methods and apparatus are described for a memory scheduler. The memory scheduler couples to a target memory core that includes a bank of memories. The memory scheduler contains two or more configurable address tiling functions to transform an incoming address of data requested in a request to the target memory core to determine what physical addresses in the bank of memories will service the first request. The two or more configurable address tiling functions are programmable by a user to create two or more distinctly different memory regions in the target memory core. Each memory region has its own distinct tiling function based on configuration parameters 1) selected by the user and 2) stored in tiling registers in the memory scheduler. The multiple tiling functions are configured to operate concurrently in the integrated circuit.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 12, 2009
    Date of Patent: January 31, 2012
    Assignee: Sonics, Inc.
    Inventors: Krishnan Srinivasan, Drew E. Wingard, Vida Vakilotojar, Chien-Chun Chou
  • Patent number: 8073820
    Abstract: Various methods and apparatuses are described that provide instrumentation and analysis of an electronic design having one or more bus interconnects. A relational database may have defined tables designed for interconnect analysis of transactions occurring between initiator intellectual property (IP) cores and target IP cores of the electronic design. A query tool may be configured to format input data to be stored in the defined tables, and have application programming interfaces to retrieve data from the defined tables based on performing a query. The query tool executes an algorithm based on the query to provide the interconnect analysis.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 7, 2008
    Date of Patent: December 6, 2011
    Assignee: Sonics, Inc.
    Inventors: Krishnan Srinivasan, Chien-Chun Chou, Pascal Chauvet
  • Publication number: 20110278218
    Abstract: Several prototype systems are described for separating oil and water from emulsions. The systems operate at ultrasonic resonance and are thus low power. Each system contains one or more acoustic transducers operating in the 100 kHz to 5 MHz range. Each system contains flow input for the emulsion and two or more flow outputs for the separated oil and water. Existing prototypes operate from 200 mL/min to >15 L/min. Each uses low power in the range of 1-5 W.
    Type: Application
    Filed: April 12, 2011
    Publication date: November 17, 2011
    Applicant: Flodesign Sonics, Inc.
    Inventors: Jason Dionne, Bart Lipkens, Edward A. Rietman