Design For Airborne Electronics
By Ann Steffora-Mutschler, Semiconductor Engineering
The Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen), an FAA-led modernization of America’s air transportation system meant to make flying more efficient, predictable and safer, is currently underway as one of the most ambitious infrastructure projects in U.S. history.
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“One key challenge is independent verification of design transformations, like synthesis,” said Sergio Marchese, technical marketing manager at OneSpin Solutions. “A way to reduce risk is to use old, ‘proven’ versions of implementation tools and switch off optimizations. This leads to additional design effort, as hardware engineers cannot make the most of the available technology. But what is worse is that nobody really can measure how this approach reduces risk. Gate-level simulation can provide additional confidence, but is slow, effort-intensive, and provides very little coverage. Lab tests are fast to run, but debugging is tricky and iteration loops are very slow.”
