A Hot Channel

TL;DR

This paper investigates on-chip communication channels affected by non-ideal heat sinks, proposing a model where noise variance depends on past inputs, revealing conditions under which channel capacity is bounded or unbounded.

Contribution

It introduces a novel channel model with noise variance influenced by past inputs and characterizes conditions for capacity bounds, advancing understanding of thermal effects in on-chip communication.

Findings

Capacity can be bounded or unbounded depending on heat sink effects.

Necessary and sufficient conditions for capacity bounds are established.

The model links thermal dynamics to information-theoretic limits.

Abstract

This paper studies on-chip communication with non-ideal heat sinks. A channel model is proposed where the variance of the additive noise depends on the weighted sum of the past channel input powers. It is shown that, depending on the weights, the capacity can be either bounded or unbounded in the input power. A necessary condition and a sufficient condition for the capacity to be bounded are presented.