Year: 2017
Type: article
Abstract: The signal processing firmware that has been developed for the Low Frequency Aperture Array component of the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) is described. The firmware is implemented on a dual FPGA board, that is capable of processing the streams from 16 dual polarization antennas. Data processing includes channelization of the sampled data for each antenna, correction for instrumental response and for geometric delays and formation of one or more beams by combining the aligned streams. The channelizer uses an oversampling polyphase filterbank architecture, allowing a frequency continuous processing of the input signal without discontinuities between spectral channels. Each board processes the streams from 16 antennas, as part of larger beamforming system, linked by standard Ethernet interconnections. These are envisaged to be 8192 of these signal processing platforms in the first phase of the SKA so particular attention has been devoted to ensure the design is low cost and low power.
Authors: Gianni Comoretto, Riccardo Chiello, Matt Roberts, Rob Halsall, Kristian Zarb Adami, Monica Alderighi, Amin Aminaei, Jeremy Baker, Carolina Belli, Simone Chiarucci, Sergio D’Angelo, Andrea De Marco, Gabriele Dalle Mura, Alessio Magro, Andrea Mattana, Jader Monari, Giovanni Naldi, Sandro Pastore, Federico Perini, Marco Poloni, Giuseppe Pupillo, Simone Rusticelli, Marco Schiaffino, Francesco Schillirò, Emanuele Zaccaro
Language: English
Subfield: Astronomy and Astrophysics
Field: Physics and Astronomy
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2599558696