Military Embedded Systems June 2022

@military_cots

John McHale

7

USSOCOM and open architectures

Technology Update

8

Convertible UAS debuts in Ukraine

Special Report

SpaceVPX: Standards-driven

Industry Spotlight Top Trends for Space 2.0 www.MilitaryEmbedded.com

MILITARY RAD-HARD DESIGN ACTIVITY ROBUST DESPITE SUPPLY-CHAIN HEADACHES

12 38

June 2022 | Volume 18 | Number 4

COPY TO COME

P 28

P 26 Military AI speeds up human decision-making Interview John Canipe, COPY TOwith COME Director of Business Development, Air Force, at SparkCognition Government Systems

Accelerating Time from Concept to Product More competitors. More demands.

More rapidly emerging threats.

Analog Devices has a depth of industry and technical expertise that is unmatched.

Together with an unrivaled portfolio of RF and microwave solutions, you can now reduce the prototype phase of design by months and get to market faster than you ever thought possible.

Get to market faster at analog.com/ADEF

Featured High-Performance EW and SIGINT Solution

EXTEND YOUR

TRANSCEIVERS TO 44 GHz HTL44E

4 Channel, 2 MHz to 44 GHz Up/Down Converter > Key Features • Ruggedized, man-portable, high performance frequency up/down converter • Extends any transceiver’s frequency coverage up to 44 GHz • 4 channel independent or phase coherent operation - Ideal for switched or N-channel phasecoherent DF

• Weight: < 8 lbs • Dimensions: 3” H x 5” W x 10” D without handles

Take your mission further with HTL solutions!

For information, email marketing@herricktechlabs.com

herricktechlabs.com

www.militaryembedded.com

TABLE OF CONTENTS 12

June 2022 Volume 18 | Number 4

16

COLUMNS Editor’s Perspective 7 USSOCOM and open architectures

By John McHale

Technology Update 8 Convertible UAS debuts in Ukraine war zone

FEATURES

By Dawn M.K. Zoldi

Mil Tech Insider 9 Bringing security to legacy systems for modern missions

By Steve Edwards

SPECIAL REPORT: Military satellite communications 12 Standards-driven innovation: A perspective on SpaceVPX

By Tim Meade, CAES 16 Standalone 5G networks will transform military operations

By Dr. Rajeev Gopal, Hughes Network Systems

THE LATEST

20 Creating the data fabric for tactical edge with software-defined wide

Defense Tech Wire 10 By Lisa Daigle

area networking

By Dominic Perez, Curtiss-Wright Defense Solutions

Connecting with Mil Embedded 46 By Mil Embedded Staff

MIL TECH TRENDS: Enabling artificial intelligence in military systems 8

26 Military AI speeds up human decision-making Interview with John Canipe, Director of Business Development, Air Force, at SparkCognition Government Systems

By John McHale, Group Editorial Director

INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT: Rad-hard electronics design trends 28 Military rad-hard design activity robust despite supply-chain headaches

By John McHale, Group Editorial Director

WEB RESOURCES Subscribe to the magazine or E-letter Live industry news | Submit new products http://submit.opensystemsmedia.com WHITE PAPERS – Read: https://militaryembedded.com/whitepapers

34 Enabling next-generation Space IoT with a unified memory architecture

By Paul Armijo and Kristine Schroeder, Avalanche Technology 38 An evolution in the industry: Top trends for Space 2.0

By Inderjit Singh and Minal Sawant, AMD 42 Properly evaluating ADCs for harsh conditions

By Jonathan Harris, Renesas

WHITE PAPERS – Submit: http://submit.opensystemsmedia.com All registered brands and trademarks within Military Embedded Systems magazine are the property of their respective owners. © 2022 OpenSystems Media © 2022 Military Embedded Systems ISSN: Print 1557-3222

To unsubscribe, email your name, address, and subscription number as it appears on the label to: subscriptions@opensysmedia.com Published by:

4 June 2022

ON THE COVER: Designers of radiation-hardened components destined for use in space are working to meet the reduced size, weight, power, and cost (SWaP-C) restrictions of these demanding environments. These balancing acts must be performed while maintaining radiation tolerance and dealing with the supply-chain headaches that continue to plague the electronics industry as a whole.

https://www.linkedin.com/groups/1864255/

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

@military_cots

www.militaryembedded.com

Developed in Alignment with the VITA and SOSA™ Technical Standards

3 phase. 3U.1 choice.

THE MILITARY FLIES HIGH WITH VPXtra 704™ When the mission calls for a 3-phase 3U power supply that can stand up to the most rugged environments, the military chooses VPXtra 704™ from Behlman – the only VPX solution of its kind built to operate seamlessly from MIL-STD-704F power for mission-critical airborne, shipboard, ground and mobile applications. > 3-phase AC or 270V DC input; high-power DC output > Available holdup cards store 700W of DC power for up to 80 msec > Overvoltage, short circuit, over-current and thermal protection > Provides full output performance during both normal and abnormal transients

The Power Solutions Provider : 631-435-0410

: sales@behlman.com

: www.behlman.com

ADVERTISERS PAGE

ADVERTISER/AD TITLE

45 AirBorn – Active optical cables 2 Analog Devices, Inc. – Accelerating time from concept to product 41 Avalanche Technology, Inc. – Ultimate SWAPc* profile 5 Behlman Electronics, Inc. – 3 Phase. 3U. 1 Choice.

31 Elma Electronic – Enabling the warfighter with OpenVPX 19 GMS – X9 Spider. The world's smallest battlefield mission system 3 Herrick Technology Labs – Extend your transceivers to 44 GHz 48 Pentek – Breakthrough performance.

Weight no more.

35 Phoenix International – Phalanx II: The ultimate NAS 17 PICO Electronics Inc – DC-DC converters, transformers & inductors 41 Radiation Test Solutions (“RTS”) – Are your missions and components rad hard ready?

41 Spirit Electronics – DDR qualified for LEO space 35 Verotec – Verotec electronic enclosures 33 State of the Art, Inc. – Reliability ... the only option 23 Wolf Advanced Technology – 3U-VPX blade servers & sensor processors 24 Wolf Advanced Technology – VPX video, radar & sensor boards, SOSA aligned & OpenVPX compliant 25 Wolf Advanced Technology – Rugged embedded boards for defense and aerospace

GROUP EDITORIAL DIRECTOR John McHale john.mchale@opensysmedia.com ASSISTANT MANAGING EDITOR Lisa Daigle lisa.daigle@opensysmedia.com CREATIVE DIRECTOR Stephanie Sweet stephanie.sweet@opensysmedia.com WEB DEVELOPER Paul Nelson paul.nelson@opensysmedia.com EMAIL MARKETING SPECIALIST Drew Kaufman drew.kaufman@opensysmedia.com WEBCAST MANAGER Ryan Graff ryan.graff@opensysmedia.com VITA EDITORIAL DIRECTOR Jerry Gipper jerry.gipper@opensysmedia.com

SALES/MARKETING DIRECTOR OF SALES AND MARKETING Tom Varcie tom.varcie@opensysmedia.com (734) 748-9660 DIRECTOR OF MARKETING Eric Henry eric.henry@opensysmedia.com OPERATIONS & AUDIENCE DEVELOPMENT (541) 760-5361 STRATEGIC ACCOUNT MANAGER Rebecca Barker rebecca.barker@opensysmedia.com (281) 724-8021 STRATEGIC ACCOUNT MANAGER Bill Barron bill.barron@opensysmedia.com (516) 376-9838 STRATEGIC ACCOUNT MANAGER Kathleen Wackowski kathleen.wackowski@opensysmedia.com (978) 888-7367 SOUTHERN CAL REGIONAL SALES MANAGER Len Pettek len.pettek@opensysmedia.com (805) 231-9582 DIRECTOR OF SALES ENABLEMENT Barbara Quinlan barbara.quinlan@opensysmedia.com AND PRODUCT MARKETING (480) 236-8818 INSIDE SALES Amy Russell amy.russell@opensysmedia.com STRATEGIC ACCOUNT MANAGER Lesley Harmoning lesley.harmoning@opensysmedia.com EUROPEAN ACCOUNT MANAGER Jill Thibert jill.thibert@opensysmedia.com TAIWAN SALES ACCOUNT MANAGER Patty Wu patty.wu@opensysmedia.com CHINA SALES ACCOUNT MANAGER Judy Wang judywang2000@vip.126.com

EVENTS

WWW.OPENSYSMEDIA.COM

IEEE Nuclear & Space Radiation Effects (NSREC) July 18-22, 2022 Provo, UT https://www.nsrec.com/

PRESIDENT Patrick Hopper patrick.hopper@opensysmedia.com EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT John McHale john.mchale@opensysmedia.com EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT AND ECD BRAND DIRECTOR Rich Nass rich.nass@opensysmedia.com

AUSA 2022 Annual Meeting & Exposition October 10-12, 2022 Washington, DC https://meetings.ausa.org/annual/2022/index.cfm

ECD EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Brandon Lewis brandon.lewis@opensysmedia.com TECHNOLOGY EDITOR Curt Schwaderer curt.schwaderer@opensysmedia.com ASSOCIATE EDITOR Tiera Oliver tiera.oliver@opensysmedia.com ASSISTANT EDITOR Taryn Engmark taryn.engmark@opensysmedia.com

59th Annual AOC International Symposium & Convention October 25-27, 2022 Washington, DC https://www.crows.org/mpage/2022HOME

ASSISTANT EDITOR Chad Cox chad.cox@opensysmedia.com CREATIVE PROJECTS Chris Rassiccia chris.rassiccia@opensysmedia.com MARKETING COORDINATOR Katelyn Albani katelyn.albani@opensysmedia.com FINANCIAL ASSISTANT Emily Verhoeks emily.verhoeks@opensysmedia.com

WEBCAST Cooling Systems: Removing Heat from Embedded Electronics Systems Sponsored by LCR Embedded Systems, nVent Schroff, & Pixus Technologies https://bit.ly/3HdNuHt

6 June 2022

SUBSCRIPTION MANAGER subscriptions@opensysmedia.com CORPORATE OFFICE 1505 N. Hayden Rd. #105 • Scottsdale, AZ 85257 • Tel: (480) 967-5581 REPRINTS WRIGHT’S MEDIA REPRINT COORDINATOR Wyndell Hamilton whamilton@wrightsmedia.com (281) 419-5725

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

EDITOR’S PERSPECTIVE

USSOCOM and open architectures

By John McHale, Editorial Director Enthusiastic crowds were a theme at each show I attended over the last six months, as folks were eager to be back among their defense industry colleagues, clients, and partners. None were more excited than attendees at the annual Special Operations Forces Industry Conference (SOFIC) in Tampa, Florida, a show put on by the National Defense Industries Association (NDIA).

Navigating the exhibition aisles of that show was like trying to walk through a crowded bar, as this was SOFIC’s first in-person get-together since 2019.

The show is always an excellent event, with impressive capability demos of operators performing high-altitude/lowopening (HALO) jumps, rappelling from helicopters to board a vessel, and other dangerous-looking performances. The audience was crowded outside for all of it.

I actually find the press briefing on acquisition strategy early in the week the most informative part of the show, which makes sense considering the nature of this magazine. This year’s briefing was no different, as it covered open architectures, leveraging commercial technology for special operations applications, and AI [artificial intelligence] strategies.

Regarding open architectures, Jim Smith, Acquisition Executive for U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM), told me: “It’s embedded in our acquisition strategy and the reason for that is that SOCOM being a joint force needs to be interoperable with the [other services].”

SOCOM also has concerns about open architectures interacting with the Joint All-Domain Command and Control (JADC2) process, in terms of how it will work with SOCOM mission command system, he added.

Smith said that SOCOM quite likes the Sensor Open Systems Architecture (SOSA) Technical Standard, especially for what it means for counter-UAS [unmanned aircraft system] applications. The system is designed to deal with multiple threats and will need an open architecture that can work with more than one sensor, he added.

As a follow-up, I asked, “As SOCOM has a faster acquisition pace than the other services, are you worried that their slower process will impact interoperability?” He paused, smiled, and said, "At Special Ops, we like to set a trail for technology [innovation].”

He added that SOCOM continues to work at getting technology more quickly to operators in the field through efforts like the SOFWERX platform, a partnership between DefenseWerx and SOCOM that works with industry to provide rapid prototyping www.militaryembedded.com

John.McHale@opensysmedia.com

of new technology. The number of items developed through SOFWERX rapid prototyping is in the double digits, Smith says.

According to the SOFWERX website (www.sofwerx.org) the organization also sponsors science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) efforts at universities.

This is an opportunity space for SOCOM in the digital domain, as solutions leveraged by special operators’ solutions frequently end up adopted by other services. “As long as we adhere to open architectures, we will set the pace for how DoD does that.”

There is a distinction between what SOFWERX does and what the Defense Innovation Unit (DIU) does, as DIU is more of a technology scout, finding opportunities for government investment and emerging tech, Smith continued. SOFWERX is more about bringing ideas into USSOCOM, for the rest of SOF to do partially what DIU does. “Many of the [technology solutions] they set the pace for are things we are now working with in SOCOM. “We are reaching out to nontraditional companies at SOFWERX [those who are not a typical defense contractor],” he continued.

“While there are contractual language limits on what [these companies] are allowed to say in the public domain, they can make a big splash to say they work with USSOCOM. We have a good control of info released to the public space so it does not add operational risk to our commanders.

“I don’t think government has to be the system integrator,” he continued. “In the case of mission command, if you get the right partners under the tent, it is a good way to set the standards up front.”

Another commercial capability innovation Smith says he would like to get into operators’ hands is artificial intelligence (AI).

“My view of AI is that it is basically helping operators make better decisions. The [Special Operations Forces (SOF)] AI solution would take disparate data and form it into useful information and deliver it to a small, disconnected team at the edge.

This is where the SOF aspect of AI is. We can’t assume our small teams will have access to the cloud (not persistent access at least). We need to look at how we leverage AI algorithms at the edge to enable our operators to make decisions better.

Our operators are very comfortable with technology. We [also] need to improve the fidelity of how we present information to the user.”

For more on how AI speeds up decision-making in military applications, see my interview with John Canipe of SparkCognition Government Systems on page 26.

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS June 2022

7

TECHNOLOGY UPDATE

Convertible UAS debuts in Ukraine war zone

By Dawn M.K. Zoldi The Vector uncrewed aircraft system (UAS) – a fixed-wing electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) drone – made an effective battlefield debut in Ukraine for NATO allies, proving that such commercially developed systems can be deployed quickly for decisive wartime advantages.

Ukrainian and partner forces now also use the Vector for tactical mapping, mission planning, battle-damage assessment, and collecting evidence of war crimes. The first one was delivered in Ukraine in early May of 2022. According to QS Inc. CEO Dave Sharpin, himself a U.S. Air Force veteran, more Vectors are on the way to assist Ukraine.

Developed by Quantum-Systems Inc. (QS Inc., Moorpark, California), the U.S. subsidiary of Munich, Germany-based Quantum-Systems GmBH, the Vector has disrupted existing defense and security markets with its fully autonomous, artificial intelligence (AI)-infused two-inone design.

The Vector is lightweight and backpacktransportable, easily able to convert from a fixed-wing craft to a quad that can fly either autonomously or tethered (“The Scorpion”). In its fixed-wing mode, the 7.4 kg (16.3 pound) Vector can fly for about 120 minutes at cruise speeds of 15-20 m/sec. (49 to 66 feet/sec.). It can take off in a variety of challenging environments, including at altitudes as high as 3,000 m (9,843 feet) above mean sea level (AMSL). In its multicopter configuration, the 5 kg (11 pound) Vector can fly as long as 45 minutes at cruising speeds of 0 to 15 m/sec. (0 to 49 feet/ sec.). When tethered, it comes with a 70 to 100 m (230 to 328 foot) cable, which can quickly disconnect from the aircraft to enable it to fly away. (Figure 1.)

In any configuration, a single operator can assemble and deploy this modular kit-based system within three minutes.

8 June 2022

The ground control station (GCS) consists of a high-performance x86-based personal computer with touch screen functionality and controls, protected in a rugged case.

Operationally, the UAS includes an integrated test system of actuators that are fully controlled by a controller area network (CAN). Its rich communication services (RCS) enable operators to adjust mission plans literally on the fly, while remaining cybersecure through a mesh IP-encrypted datalink. It also has an automatic return-to-base feature for emergency scenarios.

It also features United Nations-certified heated lithium-ion batteries that maintain cells at 15 °C (59 °F), rain- and dustprotected airspeed sensors, a cooling system to protect data links and electronics, shock-absorbing landing gear and a quick-lock mechanism, all encapsulated in a fiber-reinforced plastic airframe.

A key feature for combat operations: The company built the system to be quiet and difficult to detect, remaining inaudible at 200 m (656 feet) altitude and slant range.

Camouflage matte paint adds to its low observability profile.

The vehicle avionics package comes with detachable gimbals that plug-andplay with an agnostic range of sensors to enhance data collection. Recently, QS Inc. added Australia-based Ascent Vision Technologies’ Micro Gimbal, the CM62, to its design. The CM62 is a small gyro-stabilized multisensory gimbal used for imaging and a range of surveillance duties, all contained in a sub-260 g (0.57 pound) system. This addition provides for improved beyond-line-of-sight situational awareness.

It also leverages advanced artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities, supported by automatic identification and tracking algorithms for dynamic data collection and assessment. On the back end, its

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

Figure 1 | Pictured is the Vector eVTOL on display at the 2022 AUVSI Xponential trade show.

mesh IP network provides GPS coordinates to capture targets. This setup integrates with AI/edge computing capabilities that bolster advanced tracking, detection, and classification interfaces; enhance command-and-control battlemanagement systems; and enable operations in GNSS-denied areas.

A variety of use cases The QS team designed Vector primarily for all-environment tactical intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) and reconnaissance, surveillance, and target acquisition (RTSA). By combining the advantages of both helicopters and airplanes, Vector provides both closein support and long-range coverage of large areas and long corridors. Once deployed, it can provide actionable intelligence out to 25 km (15-plus miles), even in remote areas.

Quantum now plans to build "drone ports," with a vision of a base to which aircraft return to recharge, with another deploying autonomously to take its place.

“Because the UASs operate autonomously, the operator will only need to focus on targets. This will decrease operator workloads,” Sharpin explains.

“More importantly, by removing operators from hot zones, our drone port will ultimately save lives.”

Dawn M.K. Zoldi (Colonel, USAF, Retired) is the CEO of P3 Tech Consulting LLC. www.militaryembedded.com

MIL TECH INSIDER

Bringing security to legacy systems for modern missions

By Steve Edwards An industry perspective from Curtiss-Wright Defense Solutions Many defense and aerospace processing systems are upgraded or refreshed rather than replaced for cost efficiency and to reduce out-of-service time. Particularly in the defense domain, upgraded systems require security to be built-in to protect sensitive mission information and maintain warfighter technology advantage. What’s more, system protection is mandated by U.S. government policy for new research, development, and acquisition programs. While adding new capabilities, an opportunity is created to add security to legacy systems originally designed with minimal or no protection capabilities. The system integrator’s challenge becomes how to protect these systems while minimizing the impact on the overall design.

Until now, embedding security IP into fielded systems required extensive customization of the target system hardware. System integrators were forced to upgrade all the hardware (system replace), a complicated process that consumes considerable time and materials and usually requires system-level recertification after completion.

Alternatively, integrators were forced to add a new dedicated security card to the target system, which requires a slot to be available and usually calls for extensive software reconfiguration.

A better, third approach is to use a plug-in mezzanine module to address system security and provide additional system processing capability. This method enables system designers to add security to any module supporting an XMC (VITA 42/61) site, including OpenVPX or VME modules, as well as modules designed to align with SOSA Technical Standard 1.0 and the U.S. Army’s C5ISR/EW Modular Open Suite of Standards (CMOSS) technical standards. Additionally, high-performance rackmount servers can be supported using an appropriate PCIe/XMC carrier, which enables embedding security to fielded systems without a complete system redesign.

This approach is especially well-suited for addressing three types of security solution use cases: › Trusted boot › Secure enclaves for mission-critical applications › Extension of security Trusted boot An XMC security card can provide the system with secure boot capabilities if it hosts a contemporary FPGA [field-programmable gate array] device, such as a Xilinx Ultrascale+ MPSoC. The security card can use the built-in security features of the FPGA, such as authentication and encryption, to provide confidentiality, integrity, and authentication (CIA) of the boot code and user application – both software and FPGA bitstream. Additional security features, such as a 256-bit physically unclonable function (PUF), are options on many leading-edge FPGAs. Secure enclaves for mission-critical applications To provide secure enclaves using a security XMC module, the application is separated into nonsecure components and secure components requiring protection.

The secure components are hosted on one or more of the FPGA’s processing cores, while the remainder of the application continues to run on the root of performance (e.g., an Intel processor). The secure application is encrypted at rest and either stored in the XMC card’s flash memory or remotely loaded over PCIe/Ethernet after the card has booted. Additional security components can be loaded during the secure boot process. www.militaryembedded.com

Figure 1 | The XMC-528 XMC module can add security IP to COTS modular open systems.

Extension of security Extension of security (EoS) from a trusted module to additional commercial off-theshelf (COTS) components within a system can be realized through the integration of advanced security IP. EoS ensures that standard COTS modules can be interrogated to verify unique identities and security states prior to use within a system; EoS can also free system developers and architects from using outdated custom solutions. This approach enables system security architectures to remain in sync with the latest advancements in high-performance COTS offerings from commercial vendors.

An example of an XMC module for enabling the security of critical data and technology on deployed systems is Curtiss-Wright’s XMC-528 Xilinx Ultra­ scale+ MPSoC XMC mezzanine card (Figure 1). It can ease the integration of advanced security IP, such as Idaho Scientific’s Immunity cryptographic products, into OpenVPX and legacy VMEbus system solutions to lower overall life cycle costs by capitalizing on the economies of scale that COTS devices provide. If preferred, the same security IP suite provided by the XMC mezzanine module can also be integrated directly into the onboard security FPGA resident on security-ready OpenVPX digital signal processor card and next-generation processor modules.

Steve Edwards is Director of Secure Embedded Solutions for Curtiss-Wright.

Curtiss-Wright Defense Solutions https://www.curtisswrightds.com/

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS June 2022

9

DEFENSE TECH WIRE NEWS | TRENDS | DoD SPENDS | CONTRACTS | TECHNOLOGY UPDATES

By Lisa Daigle, Assistant Managing Editor

Optical intersatellite links demoed by SEAKR Engineering and DARPA Aerospace manufacturer SEAKR Engineering announced that it demonstrated optical intersatellite links between two satellites operated by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). According to the report from SEAKR Engin­eering – a wholly-owned subsidiary of Raytheon Technologies – during the first test, more than 280 gigabits of data were transferred at a range of 114 km (70.8 miles) during a period of more than 40 minutes.

Under DARPA’s Blackjack project, two Mandrake 2 spacecraft were launched in 2021 to demonstrate advanced laser commuFigure 1 | Artist concept of the "Pit Boss" AI system that will enable the Blackjack nications. The satellites carried optical links from SA Photonics constellation to operate autonomously. (SEAKR image.) onboard an Astro Digital Bus. The project was originally scheduled for January 2021, but a prelaunch incident damaged both satellites. SEAKR repaired and rebuilt the satellites, delivering them for launch in under six months.

Software-defined satellite ground system gets nod for satellite network Kratos Defense & Security Solutions announced that its OpenSpace satellite ground platform has been chosen by satellite services provider Intelsat as a key piece of its next-generation ground and space network. According to the award announcement, Intelsat specified a standards-based software-defined platform that would adapt quickly to changes at the space layer to deliver services on demand and support migration to 5G technologies.

The Kratos software-defined OpenSpace Platform, Intelsat said in the release, will be able to instantiate carrier-grade services in minutes instead of the weeks or even months commonly required with traditional hardware-based systems. Under the OpenSpace system, signal processing runs in software and all services can run on off-the-shelf computers without additional hardware. The companies further stated that the platform will also support 5G and nonterrestrial network features once a new standard is established.

USAF to update security for combat training systems Cubic Corp.’s Cubic Mission and Performance Solutions (CMPS) division won a firm-fixed-price contract from the U.S. Air Force (USAF) to provide the P5 Combat Training System (P5CTS) system security update (SSU), which will further encrypt and secure the Air Combat Maneuver Instrumentation (ACMI) training systems used by aircrews to train for combat missions.

According to the award announcement, Cubic’s P5 SSU solution includes an National Security Agency (NSA)-certified Type 1 multilevel encryptor that works to enable or restrict the access and transfer of information between security domains on the P5CTS without modifying the current training Concept of Operations (CONOPS). The CMPS SSU is set to be delivered in the next 18 to 24 months, enabling encryption for a portion of the P5 infrastructure in the U.S.

10 June 2022

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

Figure 2 | Cubic Combat Training System. Cubic image.

www.militaryembedded.com

AI technologies tested during autonomous exercises for warfighters Artificial intelligence (AI) company SparkCognition Government Systems (SGS) participated in the Autonomous Warrior 2022 (AW22) exercises, held recently in Australia. As part of the exercise, SGS showed participants AI capabilities enabling real-time data analysis from any source, across the globe, even in harsh or degraded environments.

Figure 3 | The Autonomous Warrior exercises tested newer technologies, including artificial intelligence, aimed at solving maritime-security problems. Stock image.

Logan Jones, president and general manager of SGS, described the exercises as a set of real-time tests enabling SGS to use its open-architecture, hardware-agnostic systems to turn data into actionable insights, thereby optimizing battle management and decision-making. AW22 brought together more than 300 people from 40 organizations in Australia, the U.K., and the U.S. to test technologies designed to solve emerging maritime-­security challenges. The activities generated real-life data, live from around the world, from testing of about 40 autonomous systems and technologies covering maritime, littoral, air, and land operations.

Boeing-NATO autonomous challenge highlights UAS innovation The joint Boeing-NATO PROJECT X innovation challenge – a threemonth-long innovation challenge aimed at generating new ideas for autonomous systems – enabled teams from universities in the Netherlands to propose and test new approaches and technologies.

During an event in May 2022, “Team Alpha” presented a multiagent system that incentivizes unmanned aerial systems (UASs) to explore, identify, verify, and resolve targets of interest.

NAVAIR signs secure data-transfer agreement with Mercury Systems Mercury Systems won a three-year basic ordering agreement (BOA) worth as much as $50 million from the Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) for engineering services and products relating to Mercury’s Advanced Data Transfer System (ADTS), aimed at deployment across multiple rotary-wing and tilt-rotor platforms.

The other team, dubbed “Team Monarch,” showed its hierarchical model of specialized UASs that can autonomously survey hazardous areas, evaluate risk, and prioritize UAS positioning. The Team Monarch three-level network structure was described as enabling accurate assessment of dynamically changing environments, making the concept suitable for applications like search and rescue, disaster management, surveillance, and target detection. Following deliberation from the jury of assembled experts from NATO and industry, Team Alpha’s concept was named winner of the PROJECT X design competition.

The ADTS is a rugged data/video/audio loader and recorder with cybersecurity capability that the military uses for moving mission data securely to and from the aircraft for pre- and post-mission analysis. The agreement has a period of performance of three years – covering ADTS hardware such as data transfer units, data transfer devices, encryption modules, and other key components – with work expected to be done at Mercury’s Torrance, California facility.

RF geolocation data to aid U.S. Navy with maritime domain awareness Kleos Space and the U.S. Navy signed an agreement under which Kleos will provide the Naval Surface Warfare Center Division, Crane (NSWC Crane) with its radio frequency (RF) geolocation data in realistic test scenarios to improve maritime domain awareness for real-world challenges. According to the announcement of the pact, the scenarios tested will include sanctions reporting, embargo, trans-shipment monitoring, search and rescue, resource management, fisheries control, smuggling, and border control.

The agreement falls under the Navy’s SCOUT campaign, which was launched in 2021 to integrate automated and artificial intelligence (AI) technologies into its standard processes. Kleos uses a four-­ satellite-per cluster approach, flown in formation, to enable gathering of resilient and globally available RF data. Company officials say that Kleos currently operates a constellation of 12 satellites and plans to launch its fourth cluster later in 2022. www.militaryembedded.com

Figure 4 | Kleos Space will provide the U.S. Navy with RF geolocation data.

Kleos Space image.

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS June 2022

11

SPECIAL REPORT

Standards-driven innovation: A perspective on SpaceVPX

By Tim Meade

Standards-driven product innovation creates a symbiotic relationship between systems integrators and technology developers.

As new component-level technologies are introduced, they enable faster, lower-cost, and improved SpaceVPX (VITA 78.0) platform implementations. SpaceVPX systems that utilize these new technologies will have an increased adoption and deployment rate, creating improved development investment returns for the component suppliers while enabling accelerated deployment and usage of the integrated SpaceVPX systems.

12 June 2022

Military satellite communications

In pursuit of technological excellence, microelectronics developers must continuously innovate compelling solutions that enable advancement of their target applications. Identifying and defining the best purpose-built solutions demands input from multiple sources and skillsets.

While creating truly novel technology is exhilarating and, if widely adopted, will reap proportionally large gains, it is also accompanied by numerous high-risk factors. One such risk is market acceptance and adoption rate due to the unique nature of novel solutions. When a technology developer doesn’t have a single major application upon which to focus, like an iPhone, an alternative approach is required such as targeting standards. Consider the ubiquitous nature of MIL-STD-1553, which has been deployed in nearly every military aircraft and satellite since the 1970s. Investing in MIL-STD-1553 solutions over the decades would have brought returns many times over, simply by the use and adoption rate of the technology.

Reliable and highly capable interface components based on standards like MIL-STD-1553, SpaceWire (ECSS-E-ST-50-12C), RS-485 (EIA/TIA-485), and CAN Bus (ISO 11898-x), among many others, have served generational military and space systems. Although these interface components provide a strong ecosystem of solutions supporting a multitude of systems and applications, they do not, by themselves, drive the system level interface requirements. Instead, the system architectural definition determines which components are required. Broadly adopted system definitions – preferably those which are developed and ratified through an industry standardization body – can clearly highlight opportunities to innovate

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

component-level solutions enabling effective implementation of the open system standard.

SpaceVPX (VITA 78.0) is a great open system-level standard that carries integra­tion flexibility, high-performance signaland sensor-processing potential, and exceptional fault resiliency. Unit-level form factors include 3U and 6U with standard and extended length options and as many as 32 logic module slots.

The standards group gave a lot of consideration toward defining the platform with no single-point failures in mind, so that redundancy is infused through the system. Yet, realizing all the promise of SpaceVPX depends heavily on the component ecosystem capable of fulfilling the demanding platform requirements including those unique to power supplies, utility modules (SpaceUM), chassis controllers, Serial RapidIO and SpaceWire switch cards, and ultimately payload cards.

High-level SpaceVPX overview The SpaceVPX system is typified by redundant groups of slot cards, or modules. As shown in Figure 1, the module groupings fall into either the Primary (Side A) or Secondary (Side B). Within a module grouping, there are three module classes: power-supply modules, logic modules, and utility modules/ SpaceUM. While the power-supply and utility modules serve very distinct roles within the SpaceVPX system, Logic modules span a range of purposes and can be refined into subgroups.

Payload modules represent the slot cards that perform the system application functions and will vary widely based on the program requirements. The controller module performs chassis-management functions and communicates throughout the system on the utility plane and control plane. Finally, the data switch module provides crossbar switching of the highbandwidth data plane communication between all payload modules.

Keeping in mind fault tolerance via redundancy is a staple of the SpaceVPX specification, cross-strapping control, utility, and data plane communication links are essential. www.militaryembedded.com

Figure 1 | Graph shows a SpaceVPX system high-level module overview.

Interfaces and responsibilities within a SpaceVPX module It might be helpful to further delve into the interfaces and responsibilities within each SpaceVPX module. Standing in the shoes of the module designer frequently illuminates problems where readily available component solutions are insufficient to effectively meet the system requirements. These capability gaps represent great opportunities to define and develop innovative component solutions that will enable more effective implementation of the SpaceVPX requirements. Let’s look at the power-supply and SpaceUM modules.

SpaceVPX system power-supply units (PSUs) receive external power from the satellite power bus or other specific architecture-defined voltage domain. Each power supply is responsible for generating up to seven voltage rails: +12 V/VS1, +12 V/AUX, +3.3 V/VS2, +3.3 V/AUX, +5 V/VS3, -12 V/AUX, and VBAT. While there are not many major blocks in the power supply, the complexity is in the details, particularly when considering the limited availability of radiation-hardened (rad-hard), space-qualified, high-power-density, isolated converters capable of delivering >100 W with high efficiency. If, as is typical, the average efficiency of the 500 W supply is 85%, the module will need to thermally dissipate 75 W. That is no easy feat; especially in a 3U form factor module operating in the vacuum of space.

Advanced packaging capabilities and increasing availability of better technologies like gallium nitride (GaN) mean improved parts; further, when more rail wattage is required, the GaN converters can also be placed in parallel.

An additional untapped area of potential innovation within the power supply is integration of “smart” functions enabled through incorporation of power management bus (PMBus). PMBus provides many useful, converter-oriented, functions capable of dynamically adjusting regulator parameters such as output voltage, current limits, switching frequencies, and ramp rates to name a few. Furthermore, PMBus offers a rich set of fault detection and response controls as well as numerous status and telemetry features.

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS June 2022

13

SPECIAL REPORT Communicating over an I2C physical layer – which is already a common physical layer within SpaceVPX by virtue of the intelligent platform management bus (IPMB) used on the utility plane – PMBus affords the power-supply designer to add a small, low power, host controller to configure, control, and gather housekeeping information from PMBus-enabled converters while reporting all relevant information back to the SpaceVPX chassis controller over utility plane. Although host controller solutions are available, no space-qualified DC/DC converter is presently offered with PMBus capability, representing a prime opportunity to innovate.

Disassembling the SpaceVPX SpaceUM The SpaceUM is perhaps the most challenging module within the SpaceVPX system to design because of its vast responsibilities that must be handled with limited availability of miniaturized, purpose-built, radiation-hardened components. Some of the primary tasks levied upon the SpaceUM include 1. Muxing all primary/redundant power rails to each logic module (max eight modules per SpaceUM) 2. Routing IPMB communications between the selected side A/B chassis controller and fanning them out in a “star topology” to each logic module 3. Repeating and fanning out system reset, reference, and auxiliary clocks to each logic module Figure 2, a simplified high-level diagram of the SpaceUM module, depicts the two independent system controllers and a single block representing the redundant power supplies feeding utility plane signals and all six duplicate power rails to the SpaceUM card, respectively. The SpaceUM replicates all of its inputs to each SpaceVPX logic/ payload slot – up to eight slots per SpaceUM card. For simplicity, the diagram only shows signals and power going to a single logic/payload slot card. A sideband set of selection signals are used by the SpaceUM card to select which system controller and power supply it will pass through to the backplane.

From a component supplier viewpoint, there are a number of interesting functions to serve. Starting with the chassis controller fanout block, the three utility plane signal sets appear fairly simple. At closer inspection, the quantity of signals required for fanout can become I/O-intensive. For example, the IMPB includes four I2C signals per slot. With as many as eight logic/payload slots plus the system controller, the fanout device requires 36 I2C-capable I/O, which quickly outstrips the resources available on all space-qualified microcontrollers. Additionally, the fanout device needs the ability to manage I2C protocol flow control between the system controller and targeted logic/ payload slot cards. While the commercial/terrestrial microelectronics solutions include

Military satellite communications I2C fanout devices, the same cannot be said for rad-hard solutions.

After the utility plane signals have been buffered and fanned out, each side A/B signal grouping must be multiplexed to the plug-in modules through the backplane interface. The IPMI interface is particularly tricky because the I2C signal characteristics must be retained with bidirectional capability. Unfortunately, the space industry is not presently supported with a true I2C router or multiplexor. Yet, the problem may be solved with transmission gate bus switches. The ideal solution would be transmission gate (T-gate) multiplexors, which don’t presently exist in space-qualified formats either, but there are space assured singlepole/single-throw bus switches that can be configured to serve the multiplexing function.

By selecting appropriate channels on the bus switching device, single-pole, single-throw bus switches can be used in a multiplexing configuration. Due to the low series impedance (5 ohms typical) of transmission gates, they offer very fast propagation delay with a high degree of input-to-output signal characteristic matching and natural bidirectional signal transfer.

The next utility plane challenge is routing four differential clock domains to the plug-in modules. The side A and B system controllers provide a differential system clock, auxiliary clock, and two reference clocks. The SpaceUM modules must receive these clocks and fan them out to each plug-in module using a clock-management device.

The last major responsibility of the SpaceUM modules is switching a plethora of power rails to the plug-in modules, or “power-muxing.” Switching a single power rail to a given load is rather simple and straightforward. All that is required is a shunted power MOSFET [metal-oxidesemiconductor field-effect transistor] and gate driver. However, SpaceVPX demands much more.

Figure 2 | A high-level block diagram shows the layout of the SpaceUM module.

14 June 2022

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

Power muxing requires reverse current blocking on each redundant power rail, www.militaryembedded.com

Focusing on the space-assured power-switching solutions, the designer has several differentiating factors to trade. On the 3.3 V and 5 V rails, some solutions integrate the switching FETs within the controller itself, which favors smaller implementation footprints, but is often current-limited to <10 amps. If the plug-in module is specified for higher current, these devices need to be paralleled up. An additional consideration is fault protection and housekeeping (telemetry) requirements, which are somewhat limited or nonexistent on most of the components.

Figure 3 | Smart power-switch controllers enable an agnostic stance on current class, extensive FDIR capability, and integrated telemetry for integrated voltage and current monitoring.

which is generally addressed with a second series shunted ideal diode FET (increasing reliability or power) to block current flowing from the selected supply through the load switch and back into the nonselected power supply. Further, the muxing action requires a selection switch on each rail to connect the commanded supply to the desired payload slot. All combined, a power mux requires up to four power switches and a gate driver/controller for each switch.

Additional considerations affecting the power switching portion of the SpaceUM module include fault detection, isolation and recovery (FDIR); inrush current limiting; current monitoring; and (if desired) housekeeping information on each switched power rail. Depending upon the current class allocated to each plug-in module, the conductive voltage drops through the switching action can create very difficult design constraints toward meeting the regulated voltage tolerance on each load as well. This is particularly challenging on the 3.3 V and 5 V domains where voltage tolerance is more stringent and current demands are generally higher than what is allocated on the 12 V supply rails.

The space industry offers a fairly broad spectrum of 3.3 V and 5 V power-switch solutions and a slightly narrower range of 12 V switching components. There are no -12 V switch solutions available, leaving it to SpaceUM designers to develop their own discrete -12 V power muxing circuitry. www.militaryembedded.com

Alternatively, using devices like the UT05PFD103 (5 V rail) and UT36PFD103 (12 V rail) smart power-switch controllers (SPSCs) empowers the designer with current class agnosticism, extensive FDIR capability as well as integrated voltage and current monitoring telemetry (Figure 3). Using the PMBus interface on the SPSC, the SpaceUM chassis controller fanout-management component can leverage a single I2C port to directly configure, command, control, and gather extensive status and telemetry from every power rail controlled by the SPSCs. Still, the perfect SpaceVPX power-switching solution does not exist today. Retaining the manifold advanced features of the SPSCs with embedded power switches supporting >20 amps of current delivery would be a great move toward miniaturizing the SpaceUM power-switching functions. Moreover, adding the power MUX function within a single controller could cut the footprint overhead per switched rail in half. For low-voltage, high-current, power rails the conductive voltage drops must be minimized, which begs for n-channel or GaN power switches for these rails. Finally, a -12 V power-switching solution is an imperative to round out the full SpaceVPX power muxing requirements.

Walk a mile in the designer’s shoes SpaceVPX promises a powerfully flexible, scalable, and fault-resilient platform enabling the highest degree of compute and sensor processing in an open, plug-in module, oriented system. Delivering on the potential benefits offered by SpaceVPX requires an extensive ecosystem of advanced space-assured components. The spaceindustry supplier base has innovated many purpose-built solutions to enable successful SpaceVPX implementations, yet more technology innovation is needed to see SpaceVPX realize its full potential.

By standing in the SpaceVPX designer’s shoes, component suppliers can quickly learn where the limitations lie. The extent to which component suppliers invest in SpaceVPX-enabling technologies will in turn facilitate more SpaceVPX deployments, resulting in a win-win proposition for both the component suppliers and the system integrators, ultimately providing programs with a flexible, reliable, and scalable platform to implement advanced sensor, artificial intelligence (AI), and computationally intensive applications more quickly and cost-effectively. MES Tim Meade serves as a systems design engineer for the CAES Space Systems Division. During his more than 20 years at CAES, Tim has held space semiconductor marketing and development positions in the areas of applications engineering, application engineering management, product management, and systems architectural design. He played an integral role in growing the company’s semiconductor and system solutions footprint beginning with development of CAES’ first space-qualified embedded controller circuit cards, which have deployed on FalconSat-1, CNOF/S, and the International Space Station. Tim studied at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs where he earned a BS in electrical engineering and an MBA in technology management. Readers may email the author at Tim.L.Meade@CAES.com.

CAES • https://caes.com/

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS June 2022

15

SPECIAL REPORT

Standalone 5G networks will transform military operations

By Dr. Rajeev Gopal As devices get smarter and generate more data, military users must find secure, high-data-rate methods to access all of this information, no matter their tactical location. New 5G networks will support quick and secure access to this data, bringing it even closer to the tactical edge by leveraging the agility of software-enabled techniques. Military planners need to consider how to provide this same 5G speed, flexibility, and uninterrupted data access to all users, no matter the location.

16 June 2022

Military satellite communications

5G networks, including the latest standalone technologies, are under test by the U.S. military as part of the U.S. Department of Defense initiative to enable advanced communications for service members. Hughes image.

Resilient wideband satellite communications (SATCOM) connectivity from commercial providers can connect defense users worldwide with locations both close by and remote. In addition to this geographic reach, these multitransport networks can deliver operational and cost efficiencies with intelligent artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML)-based networking and orchestration, plus access to the 5G edge cloud.

As connected devices get smarter and generate more data, military users face the challenge of finding secure, high-data-rate methods to access this information no matter their tactical location. New 5G technology can support high-performance networks that will transform how the U.S. military does everything from aircraft maintenance to in-theater operations. Connecting these 5G networks via satellites will enable their use anywhere in the world and provide a high level of network resiliency. To understand how this can be implemented for military users, let’s use an example: Military base maintenance personnel need to work on equipment – with near-real-time assistance, sometimes from a distance – on remote inspection and engineering support.

Operating at any tactical location Technology that was developed for the next generation of wireless connectivity, known as 5G, can provide a communications “speed lane” alongside existing Wi-Fi networks, capable of connecting thousands of devices aboard ships, on military bases, and even among tactical formations engaged in field operations. These multitransport

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

A50_MilEmbSys_2_12x10.qxp_A45.qxd 4/14/22

Figure 1 | Graphic depicts a 5G standalone network used for testing at Naval Air Station Whidbey Island that leverages multi-edge cloud processing, AI/ML-enabled network management, and high-throughput LEO and GEO satellites. Hughes graphic.

networks can deliver operational and cost efficiencies by using edge application servers, artificial intelligence (AI), and machine learning (ML) to help manage and orchestrate the network. Wideband satellite connectivity can connect users worldwide, creating a “network of networks” crisscrossing the planet and delivering higher speeds, lower latency, and more capacity for military units virtually anywhere.

5G networks, including the latest standalone technology, are under test by the U.S. military in several locations as part of the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) initiative to provide advanced communications for members of the various services: 1. In a demonstration for the Army, a leading defense contractor outfitted several small drones with 5G antennas. The drones were flown over a truck convoy that had a driver in the lead truck while the other vehicles were selfdriving, taking commands via the drone network. The convoy maneuvered over a wide test range.

2. Hughes is leading a 5G standalone system installation at Whidbey Island Naval Air Station in Washington state to show how a 5G network, with a local edge cloud, can support base operations, aircraft maintenance, and flight fueling management. (Figure 1.)

3. Personnel in many flightline operations currently depend on pickup trucks using walkie-talkies to patrol the airfield prior to flight operations, checking for debris that could be sucked into jet engines. For safety, reliability, and efficiency, this operation could be accomplished with robots connected to the new 5G network.

4. A jet-engine manufacturer demonstrated how an aircraft mechanic could wear a pair of augmented-reality (AR) glasses when working on a plane. The glasses display the steps for each task and can connect the mechanic to a manufacturer’s representative if there are questions or problems.

Standalone 5G networks can leverage software- and cloud-enabled techniques The 5G standalone networks use off-the-shelf components sourced from U.S. companies that will fit into small, transportable racks. They employ the new 5G radio (5G NR) access network and a 5G network core, making them cloud-native and independent of existing 4G LTE standards, as opposed to non-standalone 5G networks that use a 4G LTE RAN and network core. A 5G standalone network can link multiple types of devices from a wide range of manufacturers at the same time over several low-, mid-, and high-spectrum bands with significant capacity gains.

DC-DC Converters Transformers & Inductors DC-DC Converters 2V to 10,000 VDC Outputs 1-300 Watt Modules

• MIL/COTS/Industrial Models • Regulated/Isolated/Adjustable Programmable Standard Models • New High Input Voltages to 900VDC • AS9100C Facility/US Manufactured • Military Upgrades and Custom Modules

Transformers & Inductors

Surface Mount & Thru Hole • Ultra Miniature Designs • MIL-PRF 27/MIL-PRF 21308 • DSCC Approved Manufacturing • Audio/Pulse/Power/EMI Multiplex Models Available • For Critical Applications/Pico Modules, Over 50 Years’ Experience For full characteristics of these and the entire PICO product line, see PICO’s Full line catalog on our NEW Website:

www.picoelectronics.com

PICO ELECTRONICS, Inc. 143 Sparks Ave., Pelham, New York 10803 Call Toll Free 800-431-1064 FAX 914-738-8225

E Mail: info@picoelectronics.com

A key component of the network is a containerized software server that supports authenticated users and applications, known as multiaccess edge computing (MEC). A link through a GEO [geosynchronous Earth orbit] or LEO [low Earth orbit] satellite enables a central cloud to exchange data across a wide area with these www.militaryembedded.com

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS June 2022

17

SPECIAL REPORT

Military satellite communications

MEC instances. Similarly, local network operations and security operations capability can provide flexibility while augmenting the overall security and network-­management capability. Use of AI/ML techniques across the network and edge cloud further improves efficiency and resiliency.

Secure connections transform basic and complex applications Obviously, network security is a top priority, made more complex because hundreds and thousands of devices from many different manufacturers and users may be connected at any given time for these tactical operations. To address this situation, engineers have designed the networks with a zero-trust architecture, with every component on the network meeting the requirements for rolebased access control within the perimeter. Once on the network, the software ensures that the wide range of devices connect seamlessly with one another.

For enhanced security, the network management, the user interface, and control data all run on different paths within the network. The management software instructs the network to self-correct to resolve most issues that may arise. The network architecture is also compatible with the National Security Agency’s Commercial Solutions for Classified (CSfC) standard for transporting more sensitive information.

Best practices are surfacing for designing standalone 5G standalone networks.

While the architecture of these networks may continue to evolve, some conclusions gleaned from these demonstrations include: 1. The degree of sophistication of a network should be in line with the type of operation required. Consumer-grade 5G network equipment might be fine for managing and tracking the inventory of a supply base.

But a network that supports AR glasses to help a mechanic work on an airplane engine will require servers, antennas, and other components suited to that specific task.

18 June 2022

Figure 2 | Aircraft demonstrations at Naval Air Station Whidbey Island (Washington) are highlighting the ways in which secure, standalone 5G network architecture can be used with edge cloud processing and satellite backhaul.

2. Satellite connectivity should be part of any network for a 5G standalone system to connect to tactical sites and the wider world for backhaul, network resilience, and redundancy. GEO satellites provide wide area coverage and high-capacity density and should be augmented with LEO satellites for operations requiring low latency and global coverage.

3. The ease of using conventional Wi-Fi networks should not create a mindset that 5G networks are simple. From initial installation to routine day-to-day operation, these networks have high configurability and require continuous management and monitoring and operational efficiency enhanced with AI/ML. Beyond conventional Wi-Fi The 5G networks are not meant to replace existing Wi-Fi networks, but are instead intended to provide a resilient and high-performance communications path that is more robust and much more reliable than conventional Wi-Fi. A 5G network can support many more devices and can be set up indoors or outdoors to connect everything from soldier cellphones to devices embedded throughout an aircraft carrier and – via satellite – hooked into remote tactical locations around the world.

The U.S. military can significantly benefit from 5G to enhance its warfighting capabilities. The series of demonstrations now underway (Figure 2) highlight the various ways these networks can be used for a wide range of military operations. These demonstrations are also helping network engineers refine their designs and determine the best off-the-shelf components to support 5G technology. Conclusions gleaned from these demos will guide the DoD in selecting the tools, satellite connections, and network-management protocols for 5G technology to improve the capabilities of the U.S. military. MES Dr. Rajeev Gopal, vice president at Hughes Network Systems, leads the company’s advanced engineering programs. His work spans 5G, LEO, and GEO high-throughput satellite technologies, leveraging artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), cloud, and cybersecurity innovations. Prior to joining Hughes, Dr. Gopal led automation projects for clinical and cancer research and development at CTIS. A member of the IEEE 5G World Forum, he serves on the editorial board of Wiley’s International Journal of Satellite Communications and Networking (IJSCN). Dr. Gopal earned a Ph.D. in computer science from Vanderbilt University and a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from the Birla Institute of Technology & Science (BITS) in Pilani, India.

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

Hughes Network Systems • https://www.hughes.com/ www.militaryembedded.com

BATTLEFIELD THE WORLD’S SMALLEST

MISSION SYSTEM WITH FULLY FEATURED CPU, GPU, STORAGE & HIGH SPEED I/O HOST CPU FEATURES

- Intel® Xeon® W up to 8 cores (Tiger Lake) - 64GB DDR4 ECC DRAM - 4x Thunderbolt™ 4 with Display Port and 100W per port - NVIDIA® RTX-5000 GPGPU (PCIe Gen4) - Dual 100GigE Ethernet ports with Fiber Interface - Quad M.2 sites to support Wi-Fi, Mil STD-1553, Cell and GPS - Dual M.2 80mm for high performance SSD

X9 SPIDER DISTRIBUTED SYSTEM FAMILY OF PRODUCTS

X9 DISTRIBUTED SYSTEM ADVANTAGE

The X9 modular, scalable, distributed architecture simplifies applications that require rugged high-performance computing, high-definition video, sensor processing, artificial intelligence (AI) battlefield edge processing, storage, display, and I/O in a small, rugged enclosure with amazing performance per dollar per Watt. All X9 products are modular, expandable or scalable, with Thunderbolt™ 4 technology and our patented LightBolt™ 40Gbps connections in copper or fiber, with optional 100W per port power for up-/down-stream sensors and system expansion.

All General Micro Systems, Inc products are proudly designed and manufactured in the U.S.A.

CONTACT US TO LEARN MORE ABOUT THE FUTURE OF DISTRIBUTED COMPUTING

GENERAL MICRO SYSTEMS, INC.

800-307-4863 / GMSINC.COM

SPECIAL REPORT

Creating the data fabric for tactical edge with softwaredefined wide area networking

By Dominic Perez A software-defined WAN (SD-WAN) can establish a data fabric capable of dealing with any tactical edge scenario where reliable WAN is needed.

20 June 2022

Military satellite communications

More than ever, data for situational awareness and key communications is located in one or more cloud systems. The U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) is actively looking to aggregate and distribute this information through programs such as the Joint All Domain Command and Control (JADC2) strategy and the associated efforts of the U.S. Air Force’s Advanced Battle Management System (ABMS), the Army’s Project Convergence, and the Navy’s Project Overmatch. However, all this data is useless if the wide area network (WAN) chosen is down or unavailable – a situation far too common in denied, degraded, intermittent, or limited (DDIL) communications environments.

JADC2 is one of the most ambitious programs the DoD has ever undertaken. It’s going to take years to achieve the JADC2 vision and will require the combination of currently available technologies applied to new problems as well as new technologies to fill gaps. The goal of JADC2, greatly simplified, is to break down existing barriers to communication and situational understanding. To prevent the warfighter being impaired by a lack of information, we need to tear down the communications walls between the domains of land, sea, air, space, and cyber.

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

A crit­ical piece of that data fabric is the wide area networks (WAN) that link disparate organizations, locations, and domains together.

All U.S. armed forces and coalition partners need to be able to share data and that data must be shared rapidly – as close to real time as possible – to connect the shooter with the information from sensors. To realize the JADC2 vision, a platform for data collection and processing will be created to power decision making with artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) algorithms. The foundation of the JADC2 vision is the data fabric for information sharing. A critical piece of that data fabric is the wide area networks (WAN) that link disparate organizations, locations, and domains together. Think of these WANs as the thread that weaves the data fabric that will carry JADC2 to success.

As the military has moved from expensive, proprietary or GOTS [government off-the-shelf] solutions, to more costeffective COTS [commercial off-the-shelf] solutions, the services have realized the importance of keeping industry abreast of their needs. At technical exchange meetings, for example, the Army presents industry with its roadmap for future capabilities. These capability sets are presented in two-year increments named after the year. Thus, we have capability set CS21, 23, and on up through 27, and probably beyond, shortly. Through this process, the Army hopes to ensure that the commercial solutions of tomorrow align with the needs of the U.S. military.

A key piece of the Army’s Future Inte­ grated Tactical Network is a transportagnostic pipe composed of virtualized bandwidth. This bandwidth needs to be able to be tuned on the fly and optimized as needed for the most critical applications and data at any given point in time.

Similar goals are present in the U.S. Air Force’s ABMS and the Navy’s Project Overmatch. The operational view and challenges envisioned a few years out www.militaryembedded.com

Figure 1 | No current, single WAN technology is “best” under all circumstances. SD-WAN combines the strengths of multiple WAN technologies.

from today in Capability Set 27 anticipate that major features will rely on a transport agnostic network across the lower and upper tactical Internet.

We frequently hear of DDIL (or DIL) as shorthand for the challenges faced by electronic communications in the field, especially wireless communications. Today’s plan for mitigating DDIL includes using automated PACE: PACE is the military’s concept of a combination of technologies, defined as Primary, Alternate, Contingency and Emergency path. An example of such technologies, for wireless communications, might be DISA, SATCOM, MPLS, 5G/LTE, and broadband. A PACE plan defines how and when to employ each of these technologies, actually a DoD solution to what is really a global problem. WAN or internet access is expected to be ubiquitous even in remote locations, which is just as true for critical business, infrastructure, or healthcare as it is for military and emergency responders.

When we look at these wireless technologies – whether SATCOM, cellular, Wi-Fi, radio, or line of sight (LoS) – they are all to some extent subject to denial or disruption. This breakdown in service can be due to an adversary or malicious actor, environmental conditions, hardware failure, or even simple misconfiguration or real-world compromises in deployment. Even when things are working well, some technologies will only provide intermittent communication.

For example, SATCOM is subject to rain fade or the loss of a line of sight for an LoS connection. These individual technologies are limited in bandwidth compared to what’s available to most enterprises, whereas, in most cities you can call up one or more providers and get a multigigabit WAN connection provisioned within days.

Some technologies – like commercial cellular or MANET [mobile or wireless ad hoc network] – may provide a good connection and be relatively inexpensive, but neither are particularly fast. Remember, we’re talking about communications in a tactical environment, not in the newest 5G ultrawideband bubble. Other technologies like commercial low-Earth-orbit (LEO) SATCOM may be comparatively cost-effective and fast, but right now they are not very reliable. Even as the technology matures it’s unclear if military customers are going to be able to get priority access to these commercial resources needed in an emergency. (Figure 1.)

While any one current technology isn’t flawless, we can combine multiple WANs, taking the best features of each and overcoming the limitations. Most enterprise network vendors have an SD-WAN offering that solves or attempts to solve this problem.

Nearly universally, SD-WAN solutions decouple network hardware from network

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS June 2022

21

SPECIAL REPORT

Military satellite communications

Figure 2 | A conceptual diagram illustrates SD-WAN across a battlefield network.

control and utilize centralized management to improve the deployment and maintenance process. (Figure 2.)

The more advanced or complete SD-WAN offerings can be application-aware and use that information to steer traffic – long gone are the days of miles-long access control lists and DSCP markings for classifying and managing network traffic.

Further, these updated solutions gain intelligence from billions of commercial “WAN-hours” learning from countless connection technologies and how they react under adverse condition.

When selecting a deployable system for fielding SD-WAN, systems designers can address a few key questions to ensure they obtain the best solution. For example: › Does the system work on private networks? › How long can the system run with a connection to the orchestrator, and what features are disabled when running in this mode? › Can the orchestration be distributed, and can the orchestrator be overridden from the node? › How do multiple orchestrators sync and can they do meshed management?

The system designer must also decide what type of hypervisors and what processing and memory requirements the

22 June 2022

operate standalone off AC, DC, or battery power. They can also be snapped together with other 400-series modules or deployed into a smart chassis. MES

Figure 3 | The PacStar 447, powered by the Cisco ESR 6300 router, is ready to connect to Cisco SD-WAN-enabled networks.

system will be able to support for different speed networks. For example, whether the system be x86-based only or will require proprietary hardware.

Additional considerations include the number of WAN ports the system will need to support and how it will handle provisioning.

An example of a compact, power-efficient, hardware router that can deploy high-speed networking at the tactical edge and provide connectivity to the Cisco SD-WAN ecosystem is provided

by Curtiss-Wright’s PacStar 447 router, powered by Cisco IOS-XE. (Figure 3.)

For Cisco or other virtual SD-WAN products, the PacStar 451 server supports all of the major hypervisors and carries as many as five Ethernet ports.

Both of these rugged, compact modules, just 5.3" wide and 7.1" deep, have been tested to MIL-STD 810 and can

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

Dominic Perez, CISSP is the CTO at Curtiss-Wright Defense Solutions and a Curtiss-Wright Technical Fellow; he was with PacStar since 2008 and joined Curtiss-Wright through its acquisition of PacStar in 2020. Dominic currently leads the teams developing Curtiss-Wright’s PacStar Commercial Solutions for Classified, Modular Data Center, and Tactical Fusion System product lines. Prior to PacStar, Dominic worked for Biamp where he created automated testing infrastructure for the hardware, firmware, and software powering its network distributed audio, teleconferencing, and paging systems. Dominic studied mechanical engineering and computer science at Oregon State University. He currently holds multiple professional certifications from VMware in Data Center Administration; Cisco in Design, Security, and Routing/ Switching; and EC Council and ISC2 in Security.

Curtiss-Wright Defense Solutions https://www.curtisswrightds.com/ www.militaryembedded.com

3U-VPX Blade Servers & Sensor Processors

Powered by NVIDIA® ARM, ConnectX® and Xilinx®

SOSA BLADE SERVERS Rugged Embedded Boards for Defense and Aerospace VIDEO, RADAR & SENSOR: Capture • Process • AI-Inference • Encode • Display

wolf.ca/blade | +1.905.852.1163

VPX Video, Radar & Sensor Boards, SOSA aligned & Open VPX Compliant ™

Powered by NVIDIA® ARM, ConnectX® and Xilinx®

Rugged Embedded Boards for Defense and Aerospace VIDEO, RADAR & SENSOR: Capture • Process • AI-Inference • Encode • Display

wolf.ca/sosa | +1.905.852.1163

VPX3U-RTX5000E-VO

VPX3U-XAVIER-CX6-SBC

Display and HPEC, SOSA™ Aigned Payload Profile (WOLF-1348)

HPC and Display Autonomous SBC NVIDIA Jetson AGX Xavier™ SBC or Payload Profile (WOLF-12T0/12TZ)

NVIDIA RTX™ 5000, 9.5 TFLOPS peak, 384 Tensor Cores, video output This module with its integrated NVIDIA Turing GPU can be used to accelerate HPEC, AI and video processing tasks such as EW, ISR, synthetic vision, sensor fusion, and encoding, reducing cognitive overload at the tactical edge.

Xavier Industrial SoC, 1.4 TFLOPS, 20 TOPS, ARM64 8-core, ConnectX 100GbE This SBC provides the data processing capability needed for HPC tasks such as sensor data processing, machine vision, and other C4ISR tasks. This autonomous module includes an NVIDIA Jetson AGX Xavier Industrial, an NVIDIA ConnectX-6 SmartNIC for fast and secure data transfer, and a WOLF FGX which provides support for non-native video formats such as SDI and analog.

XMC-A2000E-IO

VPX3U-RTX5000E-SWITCH

Video I/O with NVIDIA Ampere and WOLF FGX, SDI, CVBS, DP (WOLF-3470)

HPC GPU, PCIe and Network Switch in one slot saving SOSA™ Switch Profile (WOLF-134S)

NVIDIA Ampere, 8.25 TFLOPS peak, WOLF FGX for capture and video conversion This versatile capture and process board includes both an advanced NVIDIA Ampere architecture GPU and WOLF’s Frame Grabber eXtreme (FGX). This board supports multiple I/O, including SDI, CVBS, RGsB, STANAG 3350 and other formats as required.

VPX3U-RTX5000E-COAX-CV Display and HPC, Converted Video, AV67.3 Coax for SDI and CVBS output, SOSA™ Aligned Payload Profile (WOLF-1349)

NVIDIA Turing, 9.5 TFLOPs peak, WOLF FGX video conversion, PCIe Gen4 switch Integrate, demonstrate, deploy and upgrade sensor data processing efficiently with SOSA and AV67.3 coaxial connections. Tune power and PCIe topologies to reduce slot count and increase overall system efficiency. Deploy HPC and AI processing for EW, ISR and data processing.

NVIDIA Turing 9.5 TFLOPS peak, 8x 10GBASE-KR, 24x PCIe Gen4 Reduce slot count, simplify system architectures, and optimize the OpenCOTS system. The HPEC GPU adds the compute processing needed for the tactical edge while the PCIe and network capabilities address the fabric switching requirements of larger systems.

VPX6U-A4500E-DUAL-VO

Display and HPC, SOSA™ Aligned and OpenVPX Payload Profile support (WOLF-2448)

Dual NVIDIA Ampere, 35 TFLOPs peak for HPC, video output support for DP, DVI, HDMI This dual GPU video ouptut and HPC board includes two high performance NVIDIA Ampere GPUs and a PCIe Gen4 switch. The embedded GPUs provide advanced processing capabilities for HPC and artificial intelligence processing for tasks such as sensor data processing, machine vision, and other C4ISR tasks or C5ISR tasks.

Rugged Embedded Boards for Defense and Aerospace VIDEO, RADAR & SENSOR: Capture • Process • AI-Inference • Encode • Display

wolf.ca/sosa | +1.905.852.1163

MIL TECH TRENDS

Enabling artificial intelligence in military systems

Military AI speeds up human decision-making

By John McHale, Editorial Director

John Canipe Director of Business Development, Air Force, at SparkCognition Government Systems

caption

Imagining military artificial intelligence (AI) applications can make one dream up scenarios like those in the Terminator films, but in reality, AI solutions for defense are much more mundane and focused on improving decision-making for humans, whether they’re aircraft maintenance personnel; pilots; or intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) analysts, says John Canipe, Director of Business Development, Air Force, at SparkCognition Government Systems, during a conversation we had at his company headquarters in Austin, Texas. We also discussed the difference between AI and machine learning (ML), how AI is being applied across multiple military domains, and more. Edited excerpts follow.

MCHALE: Please provide a brief description of your responsibility within SparkCognition Government Systems and your group’s role within the company.

CANIPE: As Director of Business Development, Air Force, my current responsibilities are product development, capture management, price/licensing of products, and generating new and recurring sales.

MCHALE: We often see AI/ML [artificial intelligence/machine learning] in the same sentence, or used to describe the same thing, but what is the actual difference between AI and ML? CANIPE: Differentiating AI from ML is a struggle everyone is having right now. We see AI as a broad umbrella term, with ML as the heartbeat of AI, enabling actual applications of putting in data and getting an outcome, rather than data and tools. That’s why we refer to SparkCognition and SparkCognition Government Systems (SGS) as machine-learning companies.

When speaking of both, it helps if we remove the fictional AI in films like “Terminator” from the discussion, because that is just fantasy and not reality. Instead, we need

26 June 2022

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

to focus the AI on solving the critical, behind-the-scenes problems our military faces, like search features in the depot maintenance world. While that’s not a Hollywood headline, it is still vital for mission readiness. It greatly reduces downtime for aircraft. It enables that maintainer to look back in time and see what happened, how it happened, and pull that data quickly. Without this capability, such problem-solving could take a week or longer, costing time and money.

MCHALE: What are the design and requirement trends driving AI innovation in military applications?

CANIPE: There is a lot of opportunity to improve upon current legacy systems www.militaryembedded.com

the military is fielding. These platforms and systems are not going away. By adding AI solutions to already existing platforms to drive cognitive capability, data filtering, and the like. it enables the life of the platform to be extended while enhancing capability. An example of a program tackling this concept is Project Kaiju, which is exploring AI solutions to embed cognitive electronic warfare (EW) at the edge.

There is a big push toward improving the readiness of the aircraft. How to solve that readiness challenge at the maintainer level with AI is the million-dollar question. Getting maintenance readiness above 50% to 60% will impact the whole defense community.

For deployed applications, AI requirements will focus on battlespacemanagement scenarios to speed up decision-making for warfighters at the edge of battle. This is done by AI algorithms that help filter out ISR [intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance] data close to the sensor, so the human operator monitoring the feed from an unmanned aerial system (UAS) sensor pod – for example – can more quickly decide what intel is actionable and get that actionable intel to the commanders in the field, speeding up the sensor to shooter process.

It comes down to speeding up human decision-making – whether the human in question is a maintainer at the depot level, a fighter pilot, or an ISR specialist analyzing data from a UAS sensor. There are so many decisions that need to be made that can overwhelm the cognitive load of a human mind.

MCHALE: How does AI enhance autonomy?

CANIPE: From an F-35 pilot perspective, the goal will be to have a wingman that is autonomous, but with instructions on what and how to attack a target. The autonomous wingman will alleviate cognitive weight for the F-35 pilot, improving decision-making speed. For the past few years, we’ve seen research and development around www.militaryembedded.com

this technology. Funding has focused on prototyping to see if these capabilities are ­actually feasible. Project Kaiju has done a good deal of this type of R&D, prototyping, and testing.

MCHALE: Predictive maintenance, decision-making, and autonomous navigation are three of the most well-known AI capabilities. Are there others that the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) is investing in?

CANIPE: The DoD is focused on updating most of its software and evaluating its current processes. This will, in turn, allow the DoD a great opportunity to leverage new technologies. In the spirit of speed, however, we build our solutions to embed into the existing systems, which allows a seamless user experience and helps the DoD keep additional software costs down.

MCHALE: What are the acquisition pain points with AI? Are they technological?

Bureaucratic?

CANIPE: AI is a software-as-a-service (SaaS) model, which is a new mindset for the government. The DoD is used to owning the technology they buy, such as a tank or aircraft and the electronics onboard the platform, like computer hardware or software operating systems. That is not a SaaS model. Some in government are still trying to understand the sustainment cost of an AI SaaS product, asking questions like: How do I acquire AI? Where is the IP? Who owns it? Can we create it on our own?

MCHALE: How has military technology changed since you served as an Air Force pilot and how is AI enabling that evolution?

CANIPE: Since 2018, there has been a cultural shift within the Air Force, from a culture of procurement and quick wins to one of innovation, so they don’t get left behind. It’s a more long-term strategy. It’s incredible to see the change over the last few years.

What’s crucial is that the push toward innovation is coming from the top, from Air Force leadership down to individual airmen.

MCHALE: SparkCognition founder, Amir Husain, has said that AI can be applied to every stage of the war and almost every activity. How is the DoD progressing at mastering these domains? Where should the focus be going forward?

CANIPE: AI can and is being applied across all areas of war, and it can be exciting thinking about possibilities and future applications. However, the key focus shouldn’t be the exciting, headline-capturing projects. Instead, we believe the DoD will realize exponential value by focusing on the smaller wins that may be less attractive to a wider audience, but deliver real return on investment to the DoD’s cost savings, speed of decision, and mission readiness. These smaller wins will pave the way to some of those more exciting projects down the line when the DoD has a more intimate understanding of the procurement and deployment cycles of AI solutions.

MCHALE: Looking forward, what disruptive technology or innovation will be a game-changer in the AI/ML? Predict the future.

CANIPE: The founder of my previous company in the oil and gas industry said that the future winners will be those that can take all the data into a single location and make sense of it. That was about 10 years ago. That statement holds true today. A major challenge facing the DoD at the moment is disparate data, spread across many different databases and stakeholders. The goal is to streamline a decision-maker’s access to the right data and ensure the correct protocols are in place to act upon that data.

Once this access is unlocked, “unknown unknowns” will be easier to identify and act upon, unlocking innovation across the DoD. MES

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS June 2022

27

INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT

Title

By John McHale, Editorial Director Military rad-hard design activity robust despite supply-chain headaches abstract

By John McHale, Editorial Director Military funding – not only for traditional long-life missions but also for nontraditional shorter life, lower-cost The satellite applications – continues to small grow. Radiation-hardened component designers are working to meet the reduced size, weight, power, and cost (SWaP-C) demands of these new missions while maintaining radiation tolerance and dealing with the supplychain headaches that continue to plague the electronics industry.

28 June 2022

Rad-hard electronics design trends

caption

Robust growth in the radiation-hardened (rad-hard) component arena is due in part to the growing adversarial threat in space from nations like China, which motivates more funding from the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD).

Mounting demand can also be ascribed to the success of lower-cost New Space applications like small satellites (small sats) and Low Earth Orbit (LEO) megaconstellations or satellite swarms.

Evidence of that motivation is seen the Air Force Fiscal Year 2023 DoD budget request, which provides increased funding for the Space Force. Examples of that investment, according to the Air Force, are the funding request for $987 million for space technology development and prototyping missile warning/ tracking as well as the $1 billion requested for ground and space segments of the Next-Generation Overhead Persistent Infrared (OPIR) missile-warning system.

“We’re seeing stable activity with business growing in the military market.

Previewing the DoD budgets, we see those and what’s requested and it’s steady looking forward,” says Bob Campanini, Vice President of Optoelectronics, for Micropac (Dallas, Texas).

The DoD funding commitments and market pressures are affecting the growth in rad-hard designs.

“We are seeing a very diverse and interesting market for radiation-hardened and radiation-tolerant components and systems today,” says Ken O’Neill, Associate Director, Space and Aviation Marketing, Microchip Technology (San

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

Figure 1 | Microchip’s portfolio of radiation-hardened and radiation-tolerant solutions includes high performance FPGAs [field-programmable gate arrays], mixed-signal ICs, isolated DC-DC converter modules, custom power supplies, hybrid solutions, MOSFETS, and more.

missions that have driven a lot of testing,” Campanini says. “The architectural approach of having multiple instances of the same satellite drive an attractive volume production for constellations. Of course, the radiation exposure to devices and signal paths does depend upon the intended orbit, potential shielding from the physical build decisions, choice in radiation tolerant device materials. Materials such as fiber optic signal paths seen great supplier advances in radiation tolerance and are inherently resilient to electric and magnetic fields.”

Long-life classified missions are still critical to the U.S. military, but there is increasing demand for shorter-life systems that are low-cost and high-performance that can be deployed more quickly than a traditional military-satellite mission.

Jose, California). “Every segment of the market is very active at the moment.

There seem to be many different factors at play. U.S. and international funding for human spaceflight, increasingly ambitious robotic and autonomous missions, elevated priority on defense earlywarning and communications systems, and commercial ventures offering earth observation and communications services are all factors in today’s buoyant space market.”

“Designs are constantly churning. The increased U.S. investment in military space is driving growth in classified and unclassified applications. The small sat business is growing even faster,” says Anton Quiroz, President of Apogee Semi­conductor (Plano, Texas).

Manned missions are also getting funding dollars. “A lot of attention is going to shorter mission length in certain orbits but there are other longer, manned www.militaryembedded.com

“When electronics is involved, the ’hottest application‘ is always the highest volume application and currently that is the (small sat) LEO constellations,” Campanini says.

“Several of these end applications drive the same/similar demands for electronics. LEO small sats and manned space flight have similar radiation needs (minimal radiation requirements if humans are also present). Manned missions drive other requirements related to redundancy, fault tolerance, and fail safe.”

“Military systems are exploring the trade-space encompassing mission success, ­procurement cost, and time to launch,” O’Neill says. “Traditional systems had high mission success, but were expensive and took a long time to build, test, and launch.

While traditional systems are still under development, there are also military systems in development which seek novel ways to reduce cost and development time without sacrificing mission success.” (Figure 1.)

Supply-chain shortages The only obstacle seemingly slowing this rapid growth is the supply-chain shortage plaguing the entire globe. Orders for components are coming in, but delivery delays abound for all types of parts.

“The supply-chain shortage is still haunting the industry,” Quiroz notes. “We still see quotes with 52-week lead times for certain components. Due to this crisis, we see military customs demanding systems be made in the U.S., with DoD investing more in long-term onshore semiconductor manufacturing. Building this infrastructure in the U.S will take time, but it will help and it’s better late than never. The tensions between China and Taiwan are still an issue and a risk factor with an unknown result in the long term, so this investment is necessary. From our perspective, we manage our inventory, maintaining IC components in stock for key contracts.”

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS June 2022

29

INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT It’s not just semiconductors that are on back order, but electronics components of every type.

“The delays have expanded to all materials, ICs, passive components, mechanical connectors, and more,” Campanini says. “It will take a comprehensive approach to overcome these challenges to the military supply chain. Micropac is part of the Defense Microelectronics Cross Function Team, among other consortia, working to overcome challenges to the warfighter. The microelectronics offshore challenge was not created in a year and it will take more than a year to solve. So yes, there will be a risk exposure for a few more years.

“Government funding will help, but that will take time to unravel and to flush out any bottlenecks,” Campanini continues. “They will want to make sure it’s not just a knee-jerk reaction, and that they maintain onshore capability. It will require providing electronics at lower cost – which is why everything moved to Taiwan in the first place.

Running semiconductor fabs in the U.S. will be more expensive than in Taiwan due to labor and other costs.”

Many suppliers are expanding their facilities and also their workforces to combat the delays, but no one has yet gotten ahead of the supply curve: “We see that our industry partners and subcontractors are investing to increase capacity and to hire additional staff, so we expect that the current supply constraints will ease in the near future,” O’Neill says. “Even though longer lead times on radtolerant FPGAs are driven more by assembly and screening-cycle times than by semiconductor wafer availability, we still welcome government investment in domestic

Rad-hard electronics design trends microelectronics production as it will provide us with more choices for future generations of products and help reduce reliance on foreign sources.”

Some question whether government investment in the short term will be enough.

“The electronics market is fueled by lower costs and customers will always push for lower and lower costs, especially in the commercial markets which drives most of the demand for semiconductors.” Campanini says. “Will this lower-cost desire push production offshore again in the future? A more comprehensive approach beyond simply throwing some money at the short-term needs may be needed to avoid the future pendulum swing back to lower cost, offshore production.

Managing costs and COTS in space While the supply chain remains a procurement challenge, designers are being

Applications for Future SOSA Conformant Solutions Sponsored by Aitech and Curtiss-Wright Now that the Technical Standard for the Sensor Open Systems Architecture (SOSA) Reference Architecture, Edition 1.0 has been published, it is only a matter of time before products that are currently aligned to SOSA start going through the process to become conformant to the SOSA Technical Standard. Once pronounced conformant, these products get designed into mission-critical applications and deployed for use in applications such as radar, electronic warfare, and SIGINT. In this webcast, a slate of experts covers those potential applications and the benefits – both technological and economic – that SOSA conformant solutions bring to these important missions. (This is an archived webcast.)

Watch the keynote and sessions: https://bit.ly/3QftOHc

WATCH MORE WEBCASTS:

https://militaryembedded.com/webcasts/archive/ 30 June 2022

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

“To manage the reduced cost requirements and demand for COTS components, we leverage commercial foundries,” Apogee’s Quiroz says. “For higher-volume applications like small sats, the price points are better than upscreening. When you upscreen a part, you’re basically wrapping a $100 bill around it. With a ground-up commercial silicon process, you’re bolting on the rad-hard components using plastic packaging.

This allows you to take advantage of commercial test flows and tailor the product to an aggressive price target and high-volume applications – those that procure more than 100,000 units.” (Figure 2.)

Figure 2 | Apogee Semiconductor’s rad-hard logic family is available at 30 to 300 krads, with plastic and ceramic package flows, for small sat, military space, and commercial missions.

Microchip has two complementary approaches to the demands for higher-volume, lower-cost space components, O’Neill says: “One of our approaches revolves around the concept of ‘Sub-QML’ [qualified manufacturers list] devices. This concept takes products which have been designed to provide a high level of radiation tolerance and reduces or eliminates costly QML testing and screening. The result is a product line that

forced to innovate to meet reduced size, weight, power, and cost (SWaP-C) demands with commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) while maintaining acceptable radiation-tolerance levels so the systems don’t fail when hit with cosmic rays.

The demand is for rapid deployment of systems with lower costs that are built with system-level redundancy rather than component-level redundancy, Campanini notes. “This makes it tough to pack in rad-tolerance, but the lower mission assurance goes along with the constellation architecture. On a positive side, designing these simpler systems can be done more quickly than larger, more complex systems, so you have a faster time to deployment.”

There is a “consistent trend to lower radiation levels, but guaranteed at those lower levels, in support of the vastly increasing LEO missions,” he continues. “While not to a low enough level to allow use of commercial or nonradiation hardened components without shielding or other system level mitigation features, there is an expectation of significant cost reductions. Semiconductor suppliers are stepping up to provide lower radiation performance products, often in plastic packages at significantly lower costs.

Leveraging commercial manufacturing can also help traditional rad-hard electronics suppliers mitigate some of the challenges with readying COTS components for space applications www.militaryembedded.com

Leaders in Open Standards

Enabling the Warfighter with OpenVPX

Get ready for next-gen sensor platforms with chassis, boards and system management solutions aligned to the new SOSA™ Technical Standard 1.0 for modular open systems architectures (MOSA).

Performance you can count on Elma Electronic Inc.

elma.com

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS June 2022

31

INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT

Rad-hard electronics design trends

has the radiation characteristics and the flight heritage of a traditional QML product line, but with optimized testing and reduced paperwork and a lower price point. The second approach is the ‘COTS to RT’ concept, which takes commercial or automotive products and provides additional screening and radiation testing to provide assurance on the suitability of the product for deployment in space.”

With the military, however, it’s never a one-size-fits-all approach. It always comes down to requirements and it’s a fact that those requirements – component, system, or platform – are all determined by the mission.

“Rad-hard product costs are driven by material costs as rad-hard components are often 500 to over 1,000 times more expensive than COTS components. The key to leveraging COTS components for space is to understand the true component requirements, why the engineers and procurement officers are buying this part,” Campanini explains. “They help us tailor the certification flows to a COTS level. Figuring out what you need and don’t need, understanding the true requirements, enables designs with next-level mitigation schemes to allow the use of components with no reduction in reliability.” (Figure 3.)

Open standards Open standards and architectures are also a strategy for reducing costs and leveraging commercial technology for military systems.

Figure 3 | Pictured is the Micropac FMC card – high-rel board design.

“SpaceVPX and other standards have been seen across many military space customers,” Campanini says. “Micropac is advancing a Common Device Archi­tec­ ture (CDA) approach to standardization.

“The significant growth in small-sat applications is directly fueled by open standards,” he continues. “The very standardized CubeSat (available as catalog items) to the larger small sats

RADIATION TEST TRENDS Testing bottlenecks have radiation-hardened component designers turning to pulsed-laser test systems for initial screening.

“The big bottlenecks with single-event effects (SEE) testing are mostly due to there being just a few facilities around the globe that support heavy-ion testing,” says Malcolm Thomson, President of Radiation Test Solutions (RTS – Colorado Springs, Colorado.).

“The most visited facilities in the U.S are located at Texas A&M and University of California, Berkeley. Customers can end up low on the priority with these facilities as university research work takes priority. Military contractors and government programs help fund these facilities which can result in large chunks of time being booked and pushing everyone else aside. This is partly why we made an investment in the laser-based [system] to provide an alternative to those who can’t get time with the traditional facilities.

“Laser testing for SEE has been known about for a number of years, but no standard has yet been developed,” Thomson explains. “For example, while it can help triage components before sending to Texas A&M, laser testing does not provide the results and traceability required for defense applications. Military programs require part performance to a MIL DLA standard using specified methods that only achievable at facilities like Texas A&M. Small-sat companies might very well accept laser testing results as ‘good enough’ to meet mission requirements, but sufficient for military platforms. Standardization will become even more important as more and more semiconductor manufacturing comes back on shore.”

“To help alleviate the bottleneck and screen parts before they need to go to traditional heavy ion testing, we leverage pulsed-laser test systems that can provide the same effect as a cosmic ray,” he continues.

“These systems also enable designers to build in rad-hard assurance from the ground up at the basic product level, speeding up design and lowering development costs. The RTS system is called the SEREEL2 and provides laser-based testing for SEE at the company’s Colorado Springs facility.” (Sidebar Figure 1) This system uses lasers to simulate the same process used at the heavy ion testing labs, he notes. “As those testing services are in high demand, laser systems are able to do some testing to screen out parts that won’t pass at those facilities. So, if a component doesn’t pass the laser screening, then you can be certain it will fail at one of those facilities and [you can] save money by not submitting it. And if the product passes, it is a good candidate with qualified data to send off to Texas A&M or another heavy-ion testing location.

32 June 2022

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

Sidebar Figure 1 | Radiation Test Solutions now offers SEREEL2 laser-based testing for single-event effects (SEE) at its Colorado Springs facility. www.militaryembedded.com

using standard elements such as VPX cards and off-the-shelf building blocks (batteries, processor cards, etc.) within custom chassis is gaining in popularity.

Short(er) lead times and ease of development is driving this approach.” (For more on SpaceVPX see the article on page 12.)

Standards are also being developed and discussed for packaging of components.

“We are involved in the Space Power Consortium (spacepower.org), which looks to bring commercial standards to power systems for space exploration,” Quiroz says. “There is also a standard being developed around plastic packaging for space components. This is happening inside JEDEC [standards body]. While there is a standard process around traditional ceramic flow, with military specifications that must be met, there is not one for a plastic flow.

As demand for plastic packaged devices increases a standard will be necessary to ensure consistent performance. I think we are at least a year away from a formal announcement regarding the standard.”

AI innovation in space systems Open architectures and commercial technology also drive innovation in artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML), now being used in military systems. Suppliers are seeing increased requirements for AI solutions in space systems.

“There are a few companies coming up with AI-based solutions for imaging or other sensor applications in space systems,” Quiroz says. “Defense funding is driving some of this.”

Many initial applications for AI in space are geared toward imaging and other sensor applications.

“There are many reasons why AI is interesting to developers of space systems. An example often quoted is cloud detection,” O’Neill says. “In an Earthobservation system which seeks to capture images of objects on the Earth’s surface, images of the tops of clouds obscuring the ground or sea beneath are of no use. An AI system that can recognize www.militaryembedded.com

images as cloud tops and discard them conserves storage capacity and downlink bandwidth. There are many other examples where AI can be used to conserve resources, or to make autonomous decisions on-orbit, removing ground-based humans from the decision loop, speeding response times for autonomous or robotic missions, speeding the acquisition of scientific data, or perhaps even enabling a rapid response during a national-security mission.”

Microchip has introduced the VectorBlox AI/ML software development kit and IP for use in its FPGAs for image-processing applications, O’Neill notes. It saves as much as 70% power when compared to equivalent SRAM [static random-access memory] FPGAs. The ability to perform intense AI applications while generating significantly less heat than competing solutions provides a significant advantage for space designers, he adds. MES

Reliability… the Only Option NASA first selected our chip resistors for a mission to Jupiter and Saturn that launched in 1977 and is still operating in interstellar space. Our chip resistors continue to be selected for high reliability applications on Earth and in space. On Earth, our resistors are selected for mission critical applications in military weapon and defense systems. In space, our chips are found in weather and communications satellites and on missions to Mars, Jupiter, and Pluto.

Mission Critical?

Choose State of the Art resistors.

State of the Art, Inc. RESISTIVE PRODUCTS

Made i th in tthe USA.

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS June 2022

33

INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT

Rad-hard electronics design trends

Enabling next-generation Space IoT with a unified memory architecture

By Paul Armijo and Kristine Schroeder The unique environmental challenges of space require truly distributed edge computing for scale and autonomous operation – these systems must have sufficient processing capability and revamped memory architectures to support the vast collection and processing of data in real time. Standardizing around common flexible architectures that embrace universal memory is critical to enabling robust designs with optimized size, weight, power, and cost (SWaP-C), all critical elements for the space community.

However, until the advent of recent spin torque transfer (STT) magnetoresistive random access memory (MRAM) solutions, there were no legacy memory technologies that could support the reliability, speed, and robustness required for this pivotal role.

Emerging satellite constellations with increasingly advanced capabilities promise insights and enhanced communications in space that mirror those of terrestrial Internet of Things (IoT) systems and even data centers. From planetary climate monitoring to galactic exploration, scientific research is now intersecting commercial-use models in the final frontier, enabled by lower costs of entry and accelerated timelines.

34 June 2022

Newer technologies such as synthetic aperture radar (SAR) augment traditional optical sensors and radio frequency (RF) imagery with far greater resolution, range, and wavelength discrimination to facilitate new discovery and opportunity, relevant to both commercial and national security interests. (Table 1).

These enhancements have resulted in a data stream magnification from megabits per second (Mbits/sec) a decade ago, then to gigabits per second (Gbits/sec) just a few years ago, to the staggering terabits per second (Tbits/sec) seen today. Such an escalation of advanced processing capability, sensor fusion data, and artificial intelligence (AI) has driven commensurate increases in communication speeds and memory-density requirements; however, these challenges are magnified in the environment of space.

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

for dramatically larger memory resources than have been commercially feasible from legacy memory technologies. Factor in radiation resilience requirements – along with the complex power supply dynamics of satellites in orbit – and the universe of viable memory options with sufficient robustness, size, and performance narrows considerably.

To minimize latency for real-time processing, the gathered sensor data needs to be processed locally, on the Space IoT asset. Bandwidth to the ground is still highly limited, resulting in the need

Battery Backed SRAM

nvSRAM

FRAM

Toggle MRAM

Avalanche STT-MRAM

Cell Size (F2)

120 ~ 200

120 ~ 200

4~6

50 ~ 200

6 ~ 50

Density

4 - 16Mb

64Kb - 16Mb

2 - 8Mb

256Kb - 16Mb

16Mb -16Gb

Non-Volatile (Battery)

Non-Volatile (Capacitor)

Non-Volatile

Non-Volatile

Non-Volatile

No

No

No

Yes

Yes

Read Speed

Very Fast

Very Fast

Medium+

Fast

Very Fast

Write Speed

Very Fast

Very Fast

Medium+

Fast

Very Fast

Read Current

Low

Low

Medium

Low

Low

Write Current

Low

Low

Medium

Medium

Medium

Leakage

High

High

Low

Very Low

Very Low

Very High

Very High

Medium+

High

Very High

> 10

> 10

> 10

> 10

> 1016

Soft Error

Medium

Medium

Medium

No

No

Scalability

No

No

No

No

Yes

Technology/ Features

Data Retention Immunity to Radiation Effects

Throughput Write Endurance

16

16

14

16

Table 1 | Common nonvolatile memory technologies are compared.

AS 9100D / ISO 9001:2015 CERTIFIED

PHALANX II: THE ULTIMATE NAS Supports AES-256 and FIPS140-2 encryption

VERO Electronic Enclosures

Ph: 203-745-3537 • sales@verotec.us • verotec.us modular development systems Built From standard elements • user-ConFiguraBle with rapid ttm • emC ieee1101.10/11 Card Cage • pluggaBle or emBedded power supplies • thermally managed emC enClosures • high perFormanCe BaCkplanes

Utilizing two removable SSDs, the Phalanx II is a rugged Small Form Factor (SSF) Network Attached Storage (NAS) file server designed for manned and unmanned airborne, undersea and ground mobile applications. w w w . p h e n x i n t . c o m

Verotec are specialists in the design, manufacture and integration of electronic enclosure products. For over 50 years the name VERO has been synonymous with engineering excellence and product quality.

With facilities in the UK and US, Verotec continues that tradition. www.militaryembedded.com

PHX_OSP_3.375_4.875.indd 1

1/22/18 11:36 AM

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS June 2022

35

INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT Over time, the space community has witnessed a transition from large satellites to distributed small sats resulting in a standardization of small sat buses, communication systems, and propulsion subsystems. Programs like Blackjack out of DARPA [Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency] among several others have both driven innovation and opened the door for standardized platforms to improve efficiencies in design, test, and deployment.

Standardization through the use of technologies like flexible FPGAs [field-programmable gate arrays] enables designers and engineers to repurpose functions and move away from point solutions. Similar evolution is happening with flexible SBCs [singleboard computers] and GPUs [graphics processing units], from prior generations of SBCs such as BAE Systems’ RAD750, used on the NASA Mars Rover platforms, to their latest RAD5545 along with other platforms including DDC’s SCS3740, MOOG’s GPU SBC, and Space Micro’s PROTON 600K. All this extra processing power previously limited to terrestrial systems requires even more memory to store the boot image for the systems and then execute computations. Figure 1 shows the progression of memory requirements for these evolving SBCs. These memories, much like the processors themselves, still require significant radiation-effects mitigation to overcome inherent vulnerabilities. Moreover, they functionally are fairly specialized and therefore limited in their utility. Upon examination of commonly used nonvolatile memory technologies, such as flash, exposure to radiation can physically displace electrons from the floating gate, changing the state of the cell and resulting in a bit error or SEU [single-event upset]. These flash errors from radiation exposure increase significantly at higher altitudes as the intensity of radiation increases. NAND flash is most susceptible to SEU, resulting in the need for significant redundancy and overhead and ultimately a reduction in storage density.

They also require reliability mitigation requiring external error correction and wear leveling, thereby expanding the required footprint. Legacy technologies like

Rad-hard electronics design trends

Directly addressing these identified challenges within higherperformance platform designs, truly unified memory can be leveraged for things like FPGA and processor boot code, while also being able to store the data during collections or analytics.

EEPROM, NOR, and SONOS offer recognized robustness, but as the legacies carry large geometry charge pumps, do not allow compact size and density scaling. Similarly, volatile DRAM and SRAM technologies are susceptible to single-event latch-up (SEL) from radiation exposure, requiring a power reset to recover, jeopardizing critical data, and potentially hurting the device itself.

In a satellite orbiting Earth, this kind of failure can be devastating to system function and longevity.

A universal memory architecture that could handle both nonvolatile and volatile memory needs for these processing platforms reduces the need for added testing and radiation-mitigation resources that add size, weight, and power (SWaP) to a system. Nonvolatile spin torque transfer magnetic RAM (STT-MRAM) is available with densities that can compete with NAND and DRAM while not requiring external error correction or wear leveling, speeds resembling that of SRAM, and reliability and robustness optimal for use in space. STT-MRAM is both inherently immune to radiation and magnetic fields and is flexible and capable enough to replace volatile and nonvolatile memory instances in space.

Figure 1 | Shown: a notional spaceborne processing system.

36 June 2022

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

Directly addressing these identified challenges within higher-performance platform designs, truly unified memory can be leveraged for things like FPGA and processor boot code, while also being able to store the data during collections www.militaryembedded.com

transient data from the sensors can be stored before it is committed to NAND or always-on DRAM. Mega-constellations of Space IoT micro satellites are coming online in LEO looking to synchronize their data with space data centers without relying on a connection to Earth and will depend on unified memory architecture. This is the trial run for systems that will one day be deployed in orbits around the moon and Mars. MES

Figure 2 | Shown: a simplified spaceborne processing system with a unified memory architecture.

or analytics. Specifically, it can support a full boot image for one of the latest FPGA platforms like the AMD/Xilinx Versal devices, which require 1 Gb for each copy; most users are also required to maintain a “golden copy” as well as a few extra copies.

This is a giant leap in requirements from previous device versions including SIRF/ Virtex-5QV, whose boot image could fit within a single heritage 64 MB MCM toggle MRAM. Today, with more than 8 Gb in a single BGA [ball-grid array] package – and 16 Gb with a DDR3 interface expected by the end of 2022 – loading an RTOS such as Linux in addition to the boot images is now possible, while still having room for ongoing processing support, replacing NOR, DRAM, and NAND devices. This level of ubiquity, density, and robustness will enable optimization, standardization and scaling of these flexible processing platforms required for Space IoT and data centers to become a reality. (Figure 2.)

This platform optimization and standardization enables companies to innovate system capabilities in new dimensions with lower risk and economies of scale using proven hardware and available operating systems rather than having to develop, test, and mitigate their own AI hardware platforms. The emergence of space data centers shows parallels to terrestrial data centers, where companies can focus on leveraging advanced sensors and data analytics from proven processing and memory platforms already optimized for SWaP-C scaling. As the data being managed by these data centers grows to tens of terabytes, deterministic connections with low risk of data loss due to power supply interruptions is critical. Avalanche Technology supplies the L4 cache of the streaming links from hundreds of low Earth orbit (LEO) space IoT satellites and to the ground base stations that act as bulk storage for data analytics and ML/DL [machine learning/deep learning] model-generating computers. By using this high-density nonvolatile STT-MRAM capable of SRAM performance, the streaming www.militaryembedded.com

Paul Armijo is the Chief Technology Officer of Aerospace & Defense at Avalanche Technology. Paul has had the privilege of leading numerous flagship programs and technology development efforts over his career to further enable the space community, at companies including GSI Technology, Cobham Semiconductor Solutions, General Dynamics, and others. With particular specialty in radiation effects, Paul received his B.S. in electrical engineering from Arizona State University. He may be reached at parmijo@avalanche-technology.com.

Kristine Schroeder is the Sr. Director of Business Development at Avalanche Technology. Kristine has spent the bulk of her career in a sales and business development capacity within various aspects of the semiconductor industry, including foundry, IP, an independent manufacturer’s rep firm, and device OEMs such as Texas Instruments and Altera. In recent years, increasingly focusing her efforts on the critical needs of the defense community, Kristine received her B.S. in electrical engineering from the University of Vermont. She can be reached at kristine@avalanche-technology.com.

Avalanche Technology www.avalanche-technology.com/

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS June 2022

37

INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT

Rad-hard electronics design trends

An evolution in the industry: Top trends for Space 2.0

By Inderjit Singh and Minal Sawant Space 2.0 represents a major shift in the development of defense and aerospace applications: With artificial intelligence (AI) applications moving aboard, systems must support higher processing and throughput capabilities. On-orbit processing requires an adaptive architecture so that systems can process, analyze, and reconfigure themselves to optimize performance and responsiveness. This, in turn, is driving innovation in organic packaging and reliability. Finally, to build these complex systems, engineers need greater design agility to accelerate development, maintain lower costs, and achieve faster time-to-launch.

There has never been a more exciting time to design for space. Developing and launching systems into space is no longer solely within the reach of governments.

The innovation, agility, and vision of private enterprise are ushering in a whole new era: Space 2.0. The shape of space is expanding far beyond traditional defense and aerospace to an expansive range of practical – and profitable – applications.

Consider SpaceX’s low-Earth orbit constellation of satellites to provide

38 June 2022

broadband connectivity. Because these satellites require less fuel to get into orbit and are less expensive to launch, they can deliver value while having a shorter expected lifecycle of just four or five years. In this time, technology will have advanced and the next generation of satellites will be ready to replace them.

Emerging trends The tremendous interest in low-Earth-orbit constellations goes well beyond simply connecting the world’s seven billion-plus people. There are countless applications possible with this technology. Using a traditional satellite can take up to a month to process an image. In contrast, a constellation of smaller craft can provide real-time imaging that can be used immediately to help firefighters on the ground, detect and track objects like planes using hyperspectral cameras and synthetic aperture radar, or transform how users navigate the planet, just to name a few examples.

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

Low-Earth-orbit satellites also can mean shorter missions, which reduces risk and costs. Using satellites in this way means a possible increase in the overall pace of innovation in space, moving to newer process nodes and packaging technologies much earlier. When the payload can be updated every five years instead of every 10 to 20 years, this enables mission specialists to do more with less each successive generation.

Among the major trends is the rise of onorbit processing, which requires more compute and input/output (I/O) slots; this, in turn, is driving the move toward organic BGA [ball-grid array] packaging and away from legacy technologies like ceramic column-grid-attach solutions.

Also seen: a sharp increase in development agility, resulting in faster evaluation, prototyping, and the launch of new technology. (Figure 1.)

Challenges of designing for space Operating in space presents some of the most challenging barriers to design: First, the environment is extreme and unforgiving, and systems must be ruggedized and designed for no single point of failure. Downtime for maintenance is not an option in space. In addition, designers must deal with challenges such as: 1. Limited downlink bandwidth: A satellite can capture a lot of data; however, the pipe to Earth isn’t wide enough to send it all back.

2. Faster time to market: The window for launching new products is shrinking as development expands beyond traditional defense and aerospace applications.

3. Designed for reuse: Space-based systems are no longer one-anddone; they must now be platforms whose IP can be reused across multiple missions.

4. Low latency and high bandwidth: For broadband communications to be viable, the system must have minimal latency with seamless and reliable connectivity. (Figure 2.)

Machine learning in space The foundation of addressing these de­sign challenges is to offload processing www.militaryembedded.com

from the ground station and bring it on-board. Rather than sending data and images to Earth for processing – and introducing all the latency associated with this – satellites will process data themselves and send information about what that data means instead. This requires satellites to support AI capabilities in orbit, including object detection and image classification, to start.

A key part of making on-orbit processing viable is understanding that AI is an everchanging field of research and that machine learning (ML) models require continual optimization. First, ML models can adapt over time to become faster and more accurate. Second, the algorithms themselves change as new breakthroughs are made.

Thus, space-based systems need a flexible and adaptive architecture that can change models and algorithms “on the fly.”

Because ML is involved, programmable software is not enough. ML is compute-intensive and requires hardware acceleration to provide real-time responsiveness. When the algorithms change, the hardware needed to accelerate the algorithms change as well. Thus, an adaptive platform requires a combination of configurable software and hardware that can update in concert with each other. In short, to support on-orbit processing, systems need to be able to process, analyze, and reconfigure from the architecture up through to the application code.

Moving toward organic packaging Being able to deliver reliable system components that will operate during the long mission life needed and the extreme environments found in space require a completely different level of design, manufacturing, and testing. Quality control must

Figure 1 | On-orbit processing requires more compute and I/O, which means a shift in packaging requirements.

Figure 2 | The challenges of designing for space are detailed.

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS June 2022

39

INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT work with design teams from the very start to achieve the levels of reliability required by the government.

For example, Six Sigma, an established and reliable leader in the defense and aerospace industry for over 30 years, is the sole supplier of solder column attachment to ceramic-grid-array packages, primarily used in space applications. While the government has actively sought out a second source, the processes and expertise required to provide the world-class reliability offered by Six Sigma are so rigorous that, to date, no other supplier has been able to achieve certification.

As the industry moves toward new process nodes like 7 nm technology, the dies are too large for legacy space-grade packaging and techniques like solder column attachment. Simply put, the processing requirements for on-orbit AI won’t fit anymore.

There’s also the significant increase in I/O to consider.

As a result, the industry is beginning to move away from legacy packaging and to organic packing and flip-chip packaging for space-grade products. In addition to being able to support the larger die size and I/O needed, organic packaging reliability has been proven in the commercial market and has a much wider ecosystem of support.

Of course, there are still challenges to overcome: Space development will not shift overnight. It takes years to qualify space-grade products, and the many legacy ecosystems in place will continue to need support. However, the defense sector is interested in having access to the latest technology, and the players understand that innovation means change.

Continued innovation in space-based design and systems The defense and aerospace industries – as well as any company considering spacebased applications – need technology that can provide the necessary performance, adaptability, and reliability for Space 2.0 applications. New technology alone is not enough, however. As systems become more complex, the difficulty in integrating components becomes more challenging. Even evaluating a simple ML platform can take weeks when developers must integrate components from multiple vendors themselves.

It’s critical to understand the demanding requirements developers face while building reliable systems for space.

True innovation and on-orbit reconfigurability will be possible with: 2.5/3D die integration and packaging technology Chiplet and chip-to-chip (C2C) interconnect technology AI engines and domain-specific architectures Next-generation routing to eliminate congestion ASIC-like clocking with flexible clock placement and skew balancing Intelligent 3D analytical placing tools to optimize timing, congestion, and wire length › Soft-core processors supported by tools for ML-centric applications › › › › › ›

Space 2.0 promises an exciting future. The ability of the private sector to launch its own systems brings new vision to the industry. On-orbit processing will extend the capabilities of space-based systems into viable commercial applications that improve quality of life around the world. True unlimited on-orbit reconfigurability provides the software and hardware flexibility these systems need to implement and accelerate real-time AI capabilities. The move to organic packaging will enable the industry to onboard the processing and I/O required for next-generation systems. OEMs will enjoy the many

40 June 2022

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

Rad-hard electronics design trends benefits of design agility as it becomes easier to evaluate, design, adapt, and reuse space-based IP. MES

In addition to being able to support the larger die size and I/O needed, organic packaging reliability has been proven in the commercial market and has a much wider ecosystem of support.

Inderjit Singh is the Senior Director of Assembly & Packaging Engineering Group at AMD. He has been in this role for the last 11 years as part of the Adaptive and Embedded Computing Group (formerly Xilinx). He has more than 31 years of assembly, manufacturing, package development, design, reliability, and chip-to-package interaction experiences. He holds a bachelor of applied science degree, majoring in applied physics, from University Science Malaysia.

Minal Sawant is the Director for Aerospace & Defense Products at AMD. As part of the Adaptive and Embedded Computing Group (formerly Xilinx), she is responsible for driving the business strategy for AMD A&D solutions and drives enablement of new-generation platforms and architectures. Minal has supported defense, aerospace, and high-reliability markets for over 20 years. Minal holds a master’s degree in electrical engineering from University of Oklahoma.

AMD • https://www.amd.com/en www.militaryembedded.com

d

p st ss e

DDR4, Flash and BGA More: Ruggedized Upscreened, Qualified with and Columns Off-the-Shelffor

Critical Missions

Ready to work with your Xilinx Versal® FPGA! Reliable service replaces solder balls with

Spirit Electronics OEM-level electrical compliant copperperforms wrap solder columns. testing, screening and qualification of DDR3, Reduces stress caused by CTE mismatch DDR4 and Flash devices to requirements between FPGA/ASIC packages and PC Board. for Aerospaceforand Defense Conversions ceramic andapplications. plastic BGA. Qualified for extended temperature Micro-coil Springs invented by NASA.range and designated enhancedforscreened, pedigreed Daisy Chainaspackages process devopment. with traceability, lot controls and lot specific data, they accelerate deployment to FEATURES market with done-for-you qualification or for CGA packages.

• Solder Columns PEM Quals.

• Turnkey column attachment tool-kits.

• Repair service for damaged FPGA. • 7 patents for novel solutions for CGA. • Cu Wrapped Pb80 / Sn20 columns.

• CCGA tray carriers boxes.

• Novel copper braided columns.

• NewDDR4 copper coreQualified columns for increased for heat transfer.

LEO Space • Extensive Catalog CGA & BGA. -40°C to 125°C • Daisy Chain CCGA & BGA packages for thermal profile and development.

FEATURES • Fully characterized and tested over extended temperatures at FULL SPEED, plus 4000 life tests – only available at Spirit Electronics • Screen, Qual and Radiation Testing to SCD customer specific application • Apply Spirit screening flow to any part number and density in product families that include DDR2, DDR3, DDR4 and Flash • Let Spirit’s lines build power and frequency control around your memory: o EPC Space high-reliability radiation hardened enhancement-mode gallium nitride power management solutions for space and harsh environments o Texas Instruments o Renasas Intersil o Taiyo Kogyo high copper printed circuit cards for power management at board level

CGA Column Grid Attachment Service FPGA & ASIC

Are Your Missions and Components Rad Hard Ready?

Radiation Test Solutions, Inc. Full service radiation effects testing and analysis to assure device survivability in harsh radiation environments.

SERVICES • Full range of test options • Experienced, industry recognized radiation effects engineers • Solutions based design support to work with your design team • Specialized equipment and 35,000 sq. ft. lab facility • DLA approved test methods, standards and guidelines • Risk Mitigation Design Consults • Turnkey solutions or source use availability • Data driven, on-time reporting

Ultimate SWAPc* Profile 256x the density in less than 50% the area of Legacy Space MRAMs

Avalanche Technology’s Tornado Family of High-Rel Non-Volatile RAM

To the Moon & Back!

Serving Space Space Serving Community Community via via Partners: Partners:

1-800-776-9888 480-998-1533 info@TopLine.tv info@SpiritElectronics.com www.CCGA.tv www.SpiritElectronics.com

719-531-0800 Sales@radiationtestsolutions.com www.radiationtestsolutions.com

*Size, Weight, Weight, Power Power & & Cost Cost *Size,

www.avalanche-technology.com

INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT

Rad-hard electronics design trends

Properly evaluating ADCs for harsh conditions

By Jonathan Harris

High-precision analog-to-digital converters (ADCs) are an integral part of many satellites and other systems used in space. It is important to understand how such devices respond in the harsh environment of space, where heavy ions may repeatedly strike.

A detection algorithm can adequately identify single-event effects (SEE) – namely, single-event transients (SET) and single-event functional interrupts (SEFI) – in low-speed precision SAR [successive approximation register] ADCs without user-configurable registers. This information can be used to adequately determine the suitability of an ADC for space applications.

The use of a detection algorithm to evaluate how a high-precision analogto-digital converter (ADC) will fare in space places the ADC into a set of realworld operating conditions to test the device in a manner in line with its actual usage. Applying this method requires that the ADC operates with an analog input in the middle of its input voltage range. This format enables detection of transient events in both the positive and negative directions. Operating the device in the middle of its input voltage range is in line with normal operation of

42 June 2022

the part in a real-world application, since most applications require maximum input signal range.

Observation of the ADC digital output codes can be performed by a logic analyzer or an FPGA [field-programmable gate array]. The examples provided here focus on the execution of this method using a logic analyzer. The method is designed to detect any event where the digital output code(s) is/are beyond a specified threshold.

Depending upon the length of such an event, it can be determined if these events are SET or SEFI [single-event transients or single-event functional interrupts]. The threshold used for event detection is device-specific and is dependent upon a number of factors. Some of these factors include resolution and inherent ADC noise as well as environmental noise factors. A calibration run must be performed at the SEE testing facility prior to applying radiation to determine the expected code and the appropriate detection threshold range.

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

At a minimum, SEE testing should be performed using at least four heavy ions across a range of LET [linear energy transfer] values from 1 to 86 MeV•cm2/ mg. Testing with at least four heavy ions provides enough data points to generate a suitable Weibull fit curve (to show probability). At the lowest LET value where no SEEs are observed, there is no need to test at any lower LET values.

The method here can have multiple implementations. The primary focus here is on utilizing a logic analyzer but the detection algorithm can also be implemented in an FPGA. The output data from the ADC is input to a logic analyzer in parallel format. Since most low-speed precision SAR ADCs use a SPI [serial peripheral interface] bus for data output, each data bit must be collected and put together to form the sample word. An on-board complex programmable logic device (CPLD) or similar logic device can provide the conversion start signal and serial data clock to the ADC as well as perform the serial-to-parallel conversion.

window should be set such that it is just above the inherent noise level of the ADC and any noise from the test environment. In the following examples, the window is set to ±8 codes centered at the average midscale code of 8200. Setting the ADC input to a mid-scale code enables transient excursions to be observed in both positive and negative directions. To set up the logic analyzer appropriately the advanced trigger feature of the Keysight 168161 logic analyzer is utilized and can be accessed as shown in Figure 2.

Figure 1 | Pictured: a single-event transient (SET) detection window.

What is used to test?

Logic analyzers offer from one to four parallel port input buses, which is sufficient for most test cases. A 14-bit precision SAR ADC and the Keysight 16861A logic analyzer is used in this example.

This logic analyzer offers two 16-bit parallel bus inputs each with a clock input.

The logic analyzer is set up to detect code deviations (SET) outside a specified window on a per sample basis. This SET detection algorithm identifies single sample transients as well as consecutive sample transients. Figure 1 shows the full output code range for an ADC with an example plot of output codes in green and an example SET threshold in blue. Example transient events are highlighted in red. (Figure 1.)

The logic analyzer software is set to automatically record the time when an SET event is detected. Additional separate software is required to perform post-processing of the data to determine the number and magnitude of single and multiple sample events based on the recorded data and times.

Prior to any SET run, each device should be observed with no radiation applied to find the appropriate SET window. The www.militaryembedded.com

Figure 2 | Pictured: the advanced trigger feature of a Keysight logic analyzer.

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS June 2022

43

INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT Selecting the advanced trigger menu It is important to note that each step number in the advanced trigger operation corresponds to one input clock cycle. This limits processing of the sample to simple detection in the logic analyzer, but external software is used to process the data as mentioned previously. The advanced trigger menu is set up in the detection window.

When a sample is within this specified range, the logic analyzer does not store the sample. A counter function is used that can be programmed to the desired maximum number of SET. (Figure 3.)

At any point during the operation of the test, the execution of the algorithm in the logic analyzer can be stopped and at this point the stored samples are saved to a file; that is, if the maximum fluence has been reached but the maximum count has

Figure 3 | Pictured: the advanced trigger menu setup on the Keysight 16861A logic analyzer.

Figure 4 | Pictured: the run/stop menu selection.

44 June 2022

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

Rad-hard electronics design trends not been reached. This step is accomplished by clicking “stop” under the run/ stop menu. (Figure 4.)

The logic analyzer must be configured to capture the appropriate data and save it into a known location. This is selected under the run/stop menu as shown in Figure 5. From the run/stop menu the run properties selection is chosen to specify what is captured when the advanced trigger detects a sample outside the specified threshold. In this window the logic analyzer is specified to save after every acquisition, to increment the file name between runs, and to stop running after 10 acquisitions (this stop is mostly just a precaution since only one acquisition is necessary). In addition, the file location and file type for the data is specified. The data recorded includes all the data in the waveform including samples that violate the threshold along with the time stamps of each data point.

Saving the time stamp along with the data provides the length of each SET. This step enables identification of singleand multiple-sample events by using software to calculate the time delta between time stamps to find the number of sample periods between recorded SET events. (Figure 5.)

A SEFI event can be identified if the counter reaches its maximum. In the event this occurs, then a secondary read of the ADC output code is performed using a standard data capture in the logic analyzer. If the ADC output code remains at a value outside of the expected window, then a SEFI may have occurred. Once this condition is identified a reset of the device if available should be performed. Upon resetting, another standard data capture is performed to see if the condition has remedied. If not, a power cycle should be performed followed by another standard data capture. If the ADC output code still does not return to the expected range, then the ADC may have permanent damage.

What this testing accomplishes This test method provides detection of SET and SEFI for precision SAR ADCs, which means that single-sample transient www.militaryembedded.com

events, multiple-sample transient events, and SEFI can be identified. This test method exercises and observes the full range of the ADC to mimic the experience of a real application. The results of testing with this method enable the SEE performance of the ADC to be projected in an application by plotting the Weibull fit curves for the saturation cross section and using the CRÈME96 model for the appropriate orbit. MES Jonathan Harris is an applications engineer in the space and hi-rel products group at Renesas in Palm Bay, Florida. He has over 15 years of applications experience with more than 10 of those years supporting ADC products. He enjoys a good game of table tennis, tinkering with car audio, and riding motorcycles. He can be reached at jonathan.harris.yn@gr.renesas.com.

Renesas https://www.renesas.com/us/en

Figure 5 | Pictured: the run properties menu selection.

Active Optical Cables — T he best of both worlds: The space-saving, distance, and weight of fiber & the ruggedness, dirt-tolerance, and ease of copper — Built with high-speed verSI connectors, operating at 12.5 Gbps/channel — Multiple points-of-contact, optimal material tensile strength, & metal backshells ensure durability

a

i

www.militaryembedded.com

r

b

o

r

n

.

c

o

m

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS June 2022

45

www.militaryembedded.com

CONNECTING WITH MIL EMBEDDED

By Editorial Staff

GIVING BACK | PODCAST | WHITE PAPER | BLOG | VIDEO | SOCIAL MEDIA | WEBCAST

GIVING BACK Each issue, the editorial staff of Military Embedded Systems will highlight a different charitable organization that benefits the military, veterans, and their families. We are honored to cover the technology that protects those who protect us every day.

This issue, we are highlighting Our Military Kids, an organization that recognizes the sacrifice made by children of deployed National Guard, deployed Reserve, or post-9/11 combat-injured service members and offers extracurricular activity grants that strive to build the child’s self-confidence, enhance family wellness, and strengthen a shared sense of community.

Our Military Kids was cofounded on a limited basis in Virginia in 2004 by Linda Davidson and Gail Kruzel Fertel in response to the September 11 attacks and the repeated, lengthy overseas deployments experienced by members of the Army National Guard.

The organizers knew that these families were often too far from a military base to take advantage of programs offered there and many lived in communities without the traditional support that families would receive if they were on base.

What began as a pilot program with Virginia National Guard families quickly expanded to include deployed and Reserve families throughout the U.S. According to information from the organization, it has expanded several times and to date has served more than 74,000 military children across the country. The donations are sourced entirely from private donors, foundations, and corporate sponsors. In addition to receiving support for an activity of their choosing, the children also receive a letter thanking them for their service and a “Top Secret” packet of items to both recognize and help the children connect with their military parent.

For additional information, please visit https://www.ourmilitarykids.org.

WEBCAST

WHITE PAPER

JADC2 and Data-Centricity: Creating a Joint Posture of Deterrence Sponsored by RTI The U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) created the Joint All-Domain Command and Control (JADC2) strategy to bring focus to the effort to create a military posture that positions the U.S. and its coalition partners in a constant state of readiness with real-time information and decisionmaking, In part, the strategy describes the urgent need to empower joint force commanders with required sensor to command and control (C2) to kinetic and nonkinetic weapons capabilities across all warfighting domains.

FACE 3.1 Enhancements: What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

By Collins Aerospace, LDRA, and Lynx Software Technologies As a testament to the celebrated success of The Open Group’s FACE [Future Airborne Capability Environment] Technical Standard, mandatory conformance requirements have flowed down for nearly every applicable military program since the publication of FACE 2.0. The standard has been enhanced still further, and there are strong reasons for OEMs to migrate to version 3.x of the specification

This webcast covers the current state of the JADC2 strategy from the public viewpoint of military leaders, updates the status of joint operational environments, and lays out the requirements for creating a datacentric framework for JADC2 that enables real-time data sharing and the rapid insertion of innovative technologies to maintain information and decision advantages to joint force commanders.

In this white paper, read about how the enhancement of the FACE standard with an additional Hardware Specification Segment aims to enable virtualization to deliver on core FACE principles, especially where hard real-time control must be accommodated alongside less time-critical applications. Additionally, learn how virtualization enables the simplified analysis of worst-case execution times while maintaining the ability to host applications with less demanding timing and integrity requirements on the same platform.

Watch this webcast: https://bit.ly/3MKBIFB

Read this white paper: https://bit.ly/3NMCZxm

Watch more webcasts: https://militaryembedded.com/ webcasts/archive/

Read more white papers: https://militaryembedded.com/ whitepapers

46 June 2022

MILITARY EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

www.militaryembedded.com

TECHNOLOGY MAKING YOUR HEAD SPIN? WE CAN HELP YOU MAKE SENSE OF IT ALL

Military Embedded Systems focuses on embedded electronics – hardware and software – for military applications through technical coverage of all parts of the design process. The website, Resource Guide, e-mags, newsletters, podcasts, webcasts, and print editions provide insight on embedded tools and strategies including technology insertion, obsolescence management, standards adoption, and many other military-specific technical subjects.

Coverage areas include the latest innovative products, technology, and market trends driving military embedded applications such as radar, electronic warfare, unmanned systems, cybersecurity, AI and machine learning, avionics, and more. Each issue is full of the information readers need to stay connected to the pulse of embedded technology in the military and aerospace industries.

militaryembedded.com

BREAKTHROUGH PERFORMANCE WEIGHT NO MORE WIDEBAND RF SIGNAL RECORDERS

RUGGED ½ ATR

BUILT FOR SWaP

Designed for harsh, space-constrained environments and weighing only 18 lb, the COTS Talon RTX SFF series captures real-time RF bandwidths of 1 GHz or more.

These units offer flexible I/O options and sustained recording rates up to 4 GB/sec.

You’ll get high dynamic range, exceptional recording speeds and ample storage capacity for extended missions—all in this compact solution.

pentek.com/go/messff

[Features] Sealed, rugged, ½ ATR chassis Multi-channel recording Removable 61 TB SSD drive Ideal for UAVs, military vehicles, aircraft pods Operating temperature -40° C to +60° C