Evolvable Building Blocks for Analog Fuzzy Logic Controllers

This work discusses the use of an Evolvable Hardware (EHW) platform in the synthesis of analog electronic circuits for Fuzzy Logic Controllers. A Fuzzy Logic Controller (FLC) is defined by a collection of fuzzy if-then rules and a set of membership functions characterizing the linguistic terms associated with the inputs and output of the FLC. The EHW analog platform, named PAMA-NG (Programmable Analog Multiplexer Array – Next Generation), is a reconfigurable platform that consists of integrated circuits whose internal connections can be programmed by Evolutionary Computation techniques, such as Genetic Algorithms, to synthesize circuits. The PAMA-NG is classified as a Field Programmable Analog Array (FPAA). FPAAs have appeared recently and constitute the state of the art in the technology of reconfigurable platforms. These devices will become the building blocks of a forthcoming class of hardware, with the important features of self-adaptation and selfrepairing, through automatic reconfiguration. This article focuses on the development of building blocks for analog FLCs on the PAMA-NG and presents case studies.