Hardware solutions for fuzzy control

A large fraction of software designs using microcontrollers is today adopting fuzzy logic algorithms and this fraction is likely to increase in the future. Hardware implementation of fuzzy logic ranges from standard microprocessors to dedicated ASICs and each different approach is targeted to a different application domain or market area. In this paper, we present an overview of the computational complexity of the fuzzy inference process and the various techniques adopted for fuzzy control tasks, highlighting the tradeoffs that can guide a system designer toward correct choices according to application features and cost/performance issues. In addition, we detail three case studies of architectures that address three different market segments in the fuzzy hardware scenario: dedicated fuzzy coprocessors, RISC processors with specialized fuzzy support and application specific fuzzy ASICs