Microchip Technology has announced the certification of its SAMRH71 Arm-based MPU and the availability of SAMRH707 MCU, both of which use Arm Cortex-M7 SoC anti-radiation technology.
"The complexity of spacecraft and satellites continues to expand, providing commercial and military operators with powerful new communications and data capabilities, higher reliability and faster speeds, while operators continue to seek to reduce cost, size and weight," Vice President Bob Wampola said. Microchip's aerospace and defense business unit. "In this environment, reducing system development costs while achieving greater capabilities and spatial system integration becomes more and more important."
The equipment was developed with the support of ESA and the French space agency CNES for further research and planning.
CNES VLSI component expert David Dangla said: "The introduction of Arm technology into space applications allows consumers and industrial sectors to use the same ecosystem, thus opening up new prospects. "SAMRH71 is the first Arm-based on the market today. Cortex M7 radiation resistant microprocessor. It provides developers with the simplicity of a single-core processor and the performance of an advanced architecture without the need to implement the extensive mitigation techniques required by non-spatial components. "
ESA’s airborne computer engineer Kostas Marinis said: “Integrating digital-to-analog converters and analog-to-digital converters with powerful processor cores is a key requirement for meeting new challenges in aerospace applications. “With SAMRH707, Microchip’s Easy-to-use functions are provided in the Radiant MCU. "
Relying on the standard Arm Cortex-M7 architecture and the same peripherals as automotive and industrial processors, these devices provide system development cost and schedule optimization by using standard software and hardware tools from consumer devices.
To speed up system design, developers can use the SAMRH71F20-EK and SAMRH707F18-EK evaluation boards. The company's complete ecosystem supports these space processors and integrates the MPLAB Harmony tool suite and third-party software services for space applications.
