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FPGA
Applications
Rocket Science
Scientists at NASA have selected the
ADM-XRC for use in their Mars mission.
High performance, flexibility and ease-of-use
were key considerations. Meanwhile Boeing
are evaluating the use of 3 ADM-XRCs
fitted to the ADC-VME for use in the
Space Shuttle program.
JPL have been using the ADM-XRC to
develop long-life reconfigurable processor
technologies and specific architectures
for implementing software reconfigurable
(software-defined) network processor
for space applications.
They have designed a prototype of
the software defined reconfigurable
processor which is operating in the
laboratory at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
The reconfigurable processor performs
the functions of the physical layer
(software radio), namely modulation,
demodulation, pulse-shaping, error
correction coding and decoding, as
well as the data link layer, network
layer, transport layer, and application
layer science processing.
The primary motivations behind the
spacebased software reconfigurable
network processor are the following:
- To enable rapid-prototyping and
rapid space-qualified implementations
of communications, navigation, and
science signal processing functions.
- Providing long-life communications
infrastructure enabled by on-orbit
processor reconfiguration.
- Providing greatly improved science
instrumentation and processing capabilities
through on orbit science-driven
reconfiguration.
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