Response time properties of some asynchronous circuits

We discuss response time properties of linear arrays and tree-like arrays of cells with various handshake communication behaviours. The response times of a network are the delays between requests and succeeding acknowledgments for the first cell. We derive simple formulas for the worst-case response time and amortized response time of such networks using a general variable-delay model, where delays may vary between a lower and upper bound. The properties are independent of any particular implementation of the cells of the network.