Microsoft Research on Energy-Efficient Computing

Microsoft is supporting research into Energy-Efficient Computing. I came accross this recently when a collogigue mentioned they had attedned a attended a symposium on Sustainable Design-Make-Serve at Microsoft Research Cambridge.

REDMOND, Wash. — April 28, 2008 — As part of its Sustainable Computing Program, Microsoft Corp. today announced it will support four academic research projects focused on energy efficiency in computing in the areas of datacenter power efficiency, power management and the creation of parallel computing architecture with decreased power demands. ...

The Sustainable Computing Program explores two main areas of research that can have a major impact. The first is the principle of “pay for play,” which is the idea that the power consumed by a computing device should be proportional to the demand placed upon it, lowering the amount of energy consumed at low load and idle. Secondly, energy efficiency, even at peak loads, is equally important in reducing the overall consumption of electricity and should be managed as a first-class resource. The program encourages researchers to use novel approaches in hardware design, software, networking, benchmarking, analysis, virtualization and any other avenue that might provide improvements in the field.

Under the program, a total of $500,000 will be awarded among the four winners. A summary of the winners and descriptions of their projects follows:

•	“Control-Theoretic Power and Performance Management for Green Data Centers”; University of Tennessee; aimed at developing frameworks for integrating power and performance improvements in virtualized datacenters
•	“Building a Building-scale Power Analysis Infrastructure”; Stanford University; for the design and deployment of a dense sensor network for power analysis, producing data for future research on power-aware computing
•	“A Synergistic Approach to Adaptive Power Management”; Harvard University; for the development of a dynamic runtime environment that ensures that power consumption is proportional to the computational demands made on the system
•	“Simulating Low Power x86 Architectures with Sooner, a Phoenix-based Simulation Framework”; University of Oklahoma; for the development of a simulation framework that supports the study of low-power microarchitectures for innovative multicore systems

Microsoft Research is committed to delivering breakthrough innovations in research in the areas of energy efficiency and conservation, weather study and prediction, air pollution and quality, climate change, and hydrology. Other efforts range from sensor networks to assist scientists in understanding global ecological issues by tracking animals, to Web-enabled sensors that could be used in businesses and homes to monitor energy consumption. For example, research with the Berkeley Water Center, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and National Marine Fisheries Service will use these technologies to help form a “digital” picture of watershed health. ...

From: Microsoft Research Supports Exploration Into Energy-Efficient Computing, April 28, 2008