International Journal of Engineering Research & Technology (IJERT)

ISSN: 2278-0181
Vol. 2 Issue 3, March - 2013

4-Bit Arithmetic And Logic Unit Design Using Structural

Modelling In VHDL
Rupali Jarwal1 and Ulka Khire2
1, 2 Microelectronics and VLSI Design,
Electronics & Instrumentation Engineering department, SGSITS, Indore, M.P., India

Abstract Arithmetic Logic Unit (ALU) is a critical

component of a microprocessor and is the core
This paper presents design concept of 4-bit component of central processing unit. ALU can
arithmetic and logic unit (ALU). Design perform all the 16 possible logic operations or 16
methodology has been changing from schematic different arithmetic operations on active HIGH or
design to HDL based design. active LOW operands. . Arithmetic instructions
We proposed arithmetic and logic unit include addition, subtraction, and shifting
using VHDL structural and dataflow level operations, while logic instructions include
design. Each module of ALU is divided into Boolean comparisons, such as AND, OR, XOR,
smaller modules. All the modules in arithmetic and NOT operations.
and logical unit design are realized using VHDL
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design. Functionalities are validated through 2. Block diagram description
synthesis and simulation process. Besides ALU works in conjunction with the register
verifying the outputs' ,the outputs' timing array for many of these, in particular, the
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diagram and interfacing signal are also accumulator and flag registers. The accumulator
tracked to ensure that they adhere to the holds the results of operations, while the flag
design specification.ALU using VHDL fulfils register contains a number of individual bits that
the needs for different high performance are used to store information about the last
operation carried out by the ALU. More on these
application.
registers can be found in the register array
Index terms-Arithmetic and logic unit (ALU),
section.
Very high scale integrated circuit Hardware
Description Language.

1. Introduction
The ALU, or the arithmetic and logic unit, is
the section of the processor that is involved with
executing operations of an arithmetic or logical
nature. In ECL, TTL and CMOS, there are
available integrated packages which are referred
to as arithmetic and logic units (ALU). The logic
circuitry in this units is entirely combinational (i.e.
consists of gates with no feedback and no flip-
flops).The ALU is an extremely versatile and
useful device since, it makes available, in single
package, facility for performing many different
logical and arithmetic operations.

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 International Journal of Engineering Research & Technology (IJERT)
ISSN: 2278-0181
Vol. 2 Issue 3, March - 2013

Arithmetic and logic unit consists of two blocks b : in STD_LOGIC;

c : in STD_LOGIC;
for different operations- d : out STD_LOGIC;
a. Arithmetic operations. e : out STD_LOGIC);
b. Logical operations. end component;
begin
a1:nor1 port map (x,y,q);
Addition and subtraction a2: nand1 port map(x,y,q);
a3: ader1 port map(x,y,z,r,s);
These two tasks are performed by a4:asub1 port map (x,y,z,t,u);
constructs of logic gates, such as half adders and process (p,q,r,s,t,u,v,x1,x2)
full adders. While they may be termed 'adders', begin
w<=((not x1)and (not x2)and r)or
with the aid of they can also perform subtraction ((not x1)and x2 and t)or
via use of inverters and 'two's complement' (x1 and (not x2)and p)or
arithmetic. (x1 and x2 and q);
w1<=(not x2 and s )or (x2 and u);
A binary adder-subtractor is a combinational end process;
circuit that performs the arithmetic operations of
addition and subtraction with binary numbers. end Behavioral;
Connecting n full adders in cascade produces a
binary adder for two n-bit numbers.

Logical operations
3. Implementation
Further logic gate s are used within the
ALU to perform a number of different logical
tests, including seeing if an operation produces a
result of zero. Most of these logical tests are used
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to then change the values stored in the flag
register, so that they may be checked later by
separate operations or instructions. Others produce
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a result which is then stored, and used later in

further processing.

2. Proposed ALU using VHDL code

architecture Behavioral of alu is

signal p,q,r, s,t,u,v:STD_LOGIC;
Component nand1 is
Port (a: in STD_LOGIC;
b: in STD_LOGIC;
c : out STD_LOGIC);
end component;
component nor1 is
Port ( a : in STD_LOGIC;
b : in STD_LOGIC;
c : out STD_LOGIC);
end component;
component ader1 is
Port ( a : in STD_LOGIC;
b : in STD_LOGIC;
c : in STD_LOGIC; Block diagram of ALU
d : out STD_LOGIC;
e : out STD_LOGIC);
end component;
component asub1 is 4. Simulation Results
Port ( a : in STD_LOGIC;

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 International Journal of Engineering Research & Technology (IJERT)
ISSN: 2278-0181
Vol. 2 Issue 3, March - 2013

Design is verified through simulation, Simulated Waveform

which is done in a bottom-up fashion. Small
modules are simulated in separate testbenches
before they are integrated and tested as a whole.
All four arithmetic operations available in the
design are tested with the same inputs. The
sequence of operations done in the simulation is
addition. The results of operation on the test
vectors are manually computed and are referred
to as expected result.

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Fig 3. Output waveform

Fig 2.RTL view of 4 bit ALU

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 International Journal of Engineering Research & Technology (IJERT)
ISSN: 2278-0181
Vol. 2 Issue 3, March - 2013

5. Conclusion
In this paper, we have proposed efficient
VHDL behavioural coding verification method.
We have also proposed several algorithms using
different design levels.
Our proposals have been implemented
in Verilog and verified using Xilinx ISE 10.1
analyzer. We have reduced the number of bus
lines and all the designs have been implemented
and tested. This ALU design using VHDL is
successfully designed, implemented, and tested.
Currently, we are conducting further research that
considers the further reductions in the hardware
complexity in terms of synthesis and finally
download the code into Altera SPARTEN-3E:
FPGA chip on LC84 package for hardware
realization.

6. Acknowledgement
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We gratefully acknowledge the Almighty
GOD who gave us strength and health to
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successfully complete this venture. We wish to

thank lecturers of our college for their helpful
discussions. We also thank the other members of
the VHDL synthesis group for their support.

7. Reference
1. Brown S., Vranesic Z “Fundamental of Digital Logic
Design with VHDL” McGraw Hill, 2nd Edition.
2. Bhasker J, “A VHDL Primer”, P T R Prentice Hall,
Pages 1-2, 4-13, 28-30.
3. Jiang Hao, Li Zheying, “FPGA design flow based on
a variety of EDA tools” in Micro-computer
information, 2007(23)11-2:201-203.
4. Xilinx, Inc. Xilinx Libraries Guide, 2011.
5. Sewak K, Rajput P, Panda Amit K, “FPGA
Implementation of 16 bit BBS and LFSR PN
Sequence Generator:
6. A Comparative Study”, In Proce. of the IEEE
Student Conference on Electrical, Electronics and
Computer Sciences 2012, 1-2 Mar 2012, NIT
Bhopal, India.
7. Douglas L. Perry, VHDL, McGraw-Hill, 1995.
8. “Digital Integrated Circuits” by Jan M. Rabaey
, Anantha Chandrakasan and Borivoje Nikolic

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