Headlines
WANTED: Post-docs!
The NVSL is actively recruiting
post docs to work on a variety of non-volatile memories-related
projects ranging from systems, to programming languages, to
architecture, to embedded systems. If you are interested please
drop me a line.
UCSD Non-volatile
Memories Workshop
About the NVSL
The Non-volatile Systems
Laboratory (NVSL) was founded in 2008 and focuses on developing
hardware
and software prototypes
to understand the hardware, software, security, and reliability
implications of non-volatile, solid-state memories. These
memories are poised to fundamentally alter the role of
persistent state in computing systems:
- Operating Systems:
Their increased performance (between 1,000x and 1,000,000x
faster than disk) gives us the chance fundamentally rethink how
operating systems manage and
use non-volatile state
- Green Computing:
Their reduced power consumption relative to both disk and DRAM mean
they will play a key role in enabling "green" and "energy porportional"
computing
systems.
- Universal memory:
Advanced non-volatile memories can fullfill the promise of a "universal
memory," playing the part of both DRAM and disk.
- Data-centric
Computing: Their enormous density (relative to DRAM) and speed
(relative to disk) make them an essential component in emerging
high-perfomance, data-centric
computing systems.
At the same time, these
technologies present difficult (and exciting!)
challenges:
- Reliability:
Many of the technologies have durability
and data integrity limitations and require careful engineering to
ensure system-level
reliability.
- Security: The
complexity of flash-based, solid-state disks (e.g., in
cell phones and palm tops) raise security
concerns because "deleted" data can easily be retreived.
- Error detection:
Solid-state memories suffer from a range of failure modes
and require aggressive error
correction and detection mechanisms to ensure data integrity.
Our approach to all of
these problems is to build hardware and software
systems ranging from embedded
storage arrays to flash-enabled
high-performance clusters that allow us to characterize the
challenges and test solution on "real world" systems. We work
with researchers at the Center for
Magnetic Recording Research, the San
Diego Super Computing Center, and within the Computer Science and
Engineering Departement to bring a wide range of expertise to
bear on each of these issues. |
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People
Publications
Grupp, L., Caulfield, A.M., Coburn, J., Yaakobi, E., Swanson, S.,
Siegel, P.,
"Characterizing Flash Memory: Anomalies, Observations, and
Applications" To appear in MICRO'09. (pdf) (Flash memory summit slides) (More
information about our flash characterization project is available here.)
Caulfield, A. M., Grupp, L. M., and Swanson, S. 2009. Gordon:
using
flash memory to build fast, power-efficient clusters for data-intensive
applications. In Proceeding of the 14th international Conference on
Architectural Support For Programming Languages and Operating Systems.
ASPLOS '09 (pdf) (Selected
for IEEE Micro "Top Picks" 2009)
Sponsors and Partners
Tools and Prototypes
To understand the role that solid state will play in future systems, we
are building a series of hardware prototypes. These include the
Zarkov I SSDs (left), our multi-technology test bed (middle) and our
flash characterization system (right).
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Zarkov
I: SSD Prototype
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Prototyping
cluster: Seven BEE3
FPGA prototyping systems attached via PCIe to seven
servers, each equipped with 72GB of RAM, SSD and HD-based RAID arrays,
and FusionIO SSDs
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Ming
the Merciless: Flash characterization board
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