Security and Advanced Computing in Reconfigurable Hardware

Dear Colleagues,

At present, both digital and analog reconfigurable hardware circuits have become widely accessible to the public. They provide platforms for the implementation of commercial solutions that can either be later migrated to ASICs or made available directly on reconfigurable circuits. The technological progress in this area has been extremely rapid in recent years, leading to a strong demand for engineers and researchers capable of developing applications on such platforms.

At the same time, there has been a profound shift in algorithm design: algorithms that were initially conceived for sequential processor-based systems must now be adapted to the fully parallel resources offered by reconfigurable hardware. This is one of the key motivations for launching this special section.

On the one hand, security solutions have become increasingly necessary for dedicated hardware systems connected to the global Internet (IoT, cloud, big data) and are well-suited for implementation on reconfigurable platforms. Cybersecurity has evolved from software-only solutions running on the target system to independent, hardware-accelerated modules that demonstrate ever higher performance in terms of data protection, integrity, and system resilience.

On the other hand, other areas of information technologies—not necessarily limited to cybersecurity—have also migrated to the reconfigurable hardware domain. Examples include artificial intelligence (AI) and advanced computational paradigms such as quantum computing, which can be both implemented and emulated on reconfigurable platforms.

This section therefore welcomes research papers, review articles, and case studies focusing on dedicated digital and analog reconfigurable hardware platforms, as well as on integrated approaches to reconfigurable hardware and reconfigurable computing, such as those found in modern graphics accelerators and heterogeneous computing architectures.

Recommended topics, without being limited to these, include the following:

• Cybersecurity solutions implemented in reconfigurable hardware;
• Data integrity and security in dedicated hardware systems;
• Error detection and correction algorithms, encryption algorithms implemented on reconfigurable circuits;
• Dedicated hardware applications for communication systems;
• Artificial intelligence on reconfigurable hardware, evolvable hardware;
• AI algorithms adapted to run on reconfigurable architectures;
• Hardware design of AI models for faster inference and data analysis;
• Hardware solutions for Industry 4.0;
• Edge-computing solutions for real-time image analysis;
• Image-processing acceleration through hardware solutions;
• Quantum computing emulation on reconfigurable structures.

Recent research directions and topics also include the following:

• Deployment of FPGA-based accelerators in cloud and edge infrastructures for AI/ML workloads;
• Neuromorphic computing on reconfigurable devices for ultra-low-power pattern recognition;
• Quantum-inspired algorithms accelerated on reconfigurable hardware to solve optimization problems;
• Integration of reconfigurable hardware in heterogeneous systems (CPU–GPU–FPGA) to achieve high performance with lower energy costs;
• Hardware–software co-design methodologies that shorten development cycles and enable seamless migration from prototype to production.

Dr. Laurentiu-Mihai Ionescu
Prof. Dr. Nicu Bizon
Dr. Nadia Ionescu
Guest Editors

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