SBIR-STTR Award

Specialized digital circuitry in weapon systems can be replaced with general purpose chips, FPGAs, whose circuitry is configured and reconfigured through software. This facilitates continual improvement throughout the lifecycle of the weapon system, reduces the range of spare parts required, reduces parts obsolescensce and improves the long-term supportability of the weapon system. There are many requirements for long term support for high tech systems without having to change microprocessors or other circuitry that becomes obsolete within a few years of life. With the advent of reconfigurable logic through the use of field programmable gate arrays, funtions of previous and current design microprocessors and support circuitry can be programmed into the FPGA chips. The problem to date has been the ability to cost effectively program the FPGA chips and utilize the reconfigurability of the chips. Star Bridge Systems has solved this problem by developing a software compiler and FPGA program development tool which makes complete integration of reconfigurable FPGAs into existing and new logic functions a cost effective reality. This technology is applicable to devices ranging from cell phones to supercomputers.

Reconfigurable computing using FPGAs offers the opportunity for increased performance and capability in a reduced size with reduced power consumption. There is a need for a standardized high-level programming language that will efficiently and effectively program FPGAs, making it possible that code can be reused for different applications and hardware platforms. Star Bridge Systems’ reconfigurable computing-based high-level programming language is a standardized, competitive, and time-efficient solution. The project plan is to develop specific library functions and algorithm applications as part of a Weapons Platform Integration Toolkit. This WPIT code will be reusable and will provide the same functions on different configurations of hardware. This will demonstrate that reconfigurable computing hardware from many different manufacturers can be effectively programmed using Viva as a standardized high-level programming platform to provide improved performance and processing capacity

Keywords:
Reconfigurable Computing, Microprocessor, Munitions Computer, Software Development System, Object Oriented Programming languag, Embedded Systems, Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA, High-Level programming languages