12.2 p-Circuits: Neither Digital Nor Analog

Custom integrated circuits aim to solve important problems with ultra-high efficiency, making use of analog and digital circuits, with well-known tradeoffs. This work is about a new paradigm which is neither analog nor digital, we call it a p-circuit [See for example, 1–12]. In terms of inputs and outputs, our p-circuits look-like digital circuits (Fig. 12.2.1), thus requiring no ADC's or DAC's. However, the output is not a Boolean function of the inputs. It is a random binary variable whose probability P(B=1) of being 1 is given by an analog function A of the inputs which takes on values continuously between 0 and 1.