An energy/security scalable encryption processor using an embeddedvariable voltage DC/DC converter

摘要

Security concerns for battery-operated wireless systems requirenthe development of energy-efficient data-encryption techniques that cannadapt to the time-varying data rates and quality-of-service requirementsninherent in a wireless application. This work describes the design andnimplementation of a configurable encryption processor that allows thensecurity provided to be traded off with respect to the energy that isndissipated to encrypt a bit. The processor features an embeddednhigh-efficiency variable-output DC/DC converter that allows the supplynvoltage to be dynamically varied to match the time-varying throughputnand quality requirements of the data stream being encrypted. Thenresulting processor consumes 134 mW at 2.5 V when encrypting data at anrate of 1 Mb/s using a maximum bit width of 512 bits. The converternefficiency is 96% at the peak load of 134 mW. A comparison of ournprocessor to a software implementation running on a low-powernprogrammable processor shows that our implementation is two to threenorders of magnitude more energy efficient