Multi-bit Output LFSR Kernel Architecture for a Low Power Design for the Link Encryption in Bluetooth and WiMAX Protocols in Software Defined Radios

A Multi-bit output Linear Feedback Shift Register (MBO LFSR) based kernel (computational object) is proposed. This paper describes the results of a study on the required hardware components in the MBO LFSR kernel. The kernel provides an advantage of required programmability in computing hardware of a Software Defined Radio (SDR) along with the low power implementation in processing of digital wireless standards and protocols. The proposed kernel uses shared memory-block architecture. It significantly reduces the energy dissipation in the memory accesses (P
_access
). There is dominating effect and energy cost in modulus operation. The kernel replaces modulus operation by an equivalent operation, which drastically reduces the number of machine cycles and thus execution time. The kernel has the characteristics of reduced switching activity. Proper use of LFSR polynomial and a systematic optimization approach at all levels of the design enabled a low power design of the kernel. The MBO LFSR kernel is shown to be applicable in the link encryption of Bluetooth wireless 802.15.1 and OFDM based protocols WLAN 802.11a and WiMAX 802.16 standards. The paper also gives the results for computations for the dynamic power consumption (P
_dynamic
) in the different kernel components and total P
_dynamic
for the kernel. The paper also gives the results when using a gated clock for obtaining the lower P
_dynamic
in the MBO LFSR components. The results of simulating the kernel will be taken up in future to verify the results of the computations.