Energy-Efficient Algorithms

We study algorithmic techniques for energy savings in computer systems. Research in this area concentrates mostly on two topics. (1) Power-down mechanisms: When a system is idle, it can be transitioned into low power stand-by or sleep states. The goal is to find state transition schedules that minimize the total energy consumption. (2) Dynamic speed scaling: Many modern microprocessors can operate at variable speed. Here the objective is to utilize the full speed/frequency spectrum of a processor so as to optimize the consumed energy and possibly a second QoS measure. This lecture investigates a variety of settings and presents recent research results. The focus is on the design of algorithms that achieve a provably good performance.