INDUSTRY

The field of computing has been transformed by the concept of widgets called Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs), integrated circuits combining logic and memory, that can process digital information. FPGAs that can be reprogrammed after their manufacture resemble microprocessors in their functionality, and they have tremendous value in such applications as satellites, where the mission may change but the computer is out of reach. In a new book, "Reconfigurable Computing: Accelerating Computation with Field-Programmable Gate Arrays" (Springer-Verlag), Los Alamos scientists Maya B. Gokhale and Paul S. Graham provide the first comprehensive exposition of the field of reconfigurable computing with FPGAs. The authors are among the originators of reconfigurable computing and are recognized leaders in the field. The book premiered at the Design Automation Conference June 13-17 in Anaheim, Calif. By mapping algorithms directly into programmable logic, FPGA accelerators offer and deliver a 10X-100X performance increase over microprocessors for a large range of application domains. Reconfigurable computing is found in virtually every computing milieu, from satellites to supercomputers. By tailoring the circuit to each algorithm or by modifying parts of the circuit during operation, new commodity FPGAs rival the performance of the traditionally faster Application Specific Integrated Circuits. Drawing on their long experience with reconfigurable computing, the authors survey every aspect of the field, from FPGA device architecture, reconfigurable systems architectures, programming languages and compilation tools to the application domains of signal processing, image processing (aided by Reid Porter of Los Alamos), network security, bioinformatics (with Dominique Lavenier and Mathieu Giraud of the Institut de Recherche en Informatique et Systèmes Aléatoires at Rennes) and supercomputing (derived from two papers by Los Alamos authors Christine Ahrens, Jan Frigo, Gokhale, Ron Minnich, Justin Tripp, Anders Hansson and Henning Mortveit).