Energy-Aware Modelling of Garbage Collectors for New Dynamic Embedded Systems

Modern embedded devices (e.g. PDAs, mobile phones) are now incorporating Java as a very popular implementation language in their designs. These new embedded systems include multiple complex applications (e.g. 3D rendering applications) that are dynamically launched by the user, which can produce very energy-hungry systems if they are not properly designed. Therefore, it is crucial for new embedded systems a better understanding of the interactions between the applications and the garbage collectors to reduce their energy consumption and to extend their battery life. In this paper we present a complete study from an energy viewpoint of the different state-of-the-art garbage collectors mechanisms (e.g. mark-and-sweep, generational garbage collectors) for embedded systems. Our results show that typical optimizations aiming at performance improvement for Java-based systems do not necessarily produce low-power final solutions.