Military Embedded Systems

Many defense and aerospace processing systems are upgraded or refreshed rather than replaced for cost efficiency and to reduce out-of-service time.

Today, with the increasing use of unmanned platforms to host intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance [ISR] sensor applications, system integrators need to ensure that the sensor systems and the critical data they collect and store are protected from falling into the wrong hands. By their very nature, unmanned platforms – whether airborne, on land, or at sea – pose more complex problems for security. All systems, regardless if deployed on manned or unmanned platforms, are now required to adhere to the Department of Defense (DoD) mandate for a Modular Open Systems Approach (MOSA). The good news for unmanned ISR system designers is that The Open Group’s SOSA [Sensor Open System Architecture] Consortium recently released Technical Standard for SOSA Reference Architecture, Edition 1.0, which defines many aspects of trusted computing for sensor systems. The SOSA standard combines MOSA principles with security to enable the rapid and affordable deployment of secure sensor systems on unmanned platforms.

In the global defense-electronics market there is a growing demand for trusted computing solutions that carry effective protections against cyberattacks. Users want to be confident that when they power up their deployed embedded system, the code that their system is running can be trusted. In this sense,"trusted" means that the system is running only the software code that the system integrator intends it to, and that no other code - malicious or otherwise - has been added to it.

The armed forces of the United States and its allies around the world rely on critical military technology that is under constant threat. These threats range from the reverse-engineering of systems lost on the battlefield to the accidental introduction of counterfeit components on the factory floor. In response, commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) suppliers are more frequently being called upon to help users address rapidly expanding requirements for anti-tamper (AT) and cybersecurity or information assurance (IA) capabilities.

System architects face many challenges in designing the next generation of ISR systems. They must keep up with the ever increasing amount of sensor data, follow an open systems approach, and make sure that the technology has a future road map.

The U.S. Army's VICTORY architecture leverages COTS to combat SWaP, costs, and share data in real time.

As the DoD takes advantage of reductions in SWaP, smaller enclosures, such as 3U VPX, are reaping the benefit. However, today's 3U VPX backplane topologies will need to be retrofitted to fully capitalize on modern processing capabilities.

The U.S. Army's VICTORY program looks to COTS to secure a win in defense vehicle networking.

Digital electronics take DSP into High-Performance Embedded Computing (HPEC) systems to optimize the fuel/data communications and system functionality/SWaP envelopes.

Reports, standards, best practices, and solutions are being generated in regard to the reliability concerns of lead-free electronics in A&D applications.

The COTS industry is positioned perfectly to meet the DoD?s changing demands for affordable and mature technological alternatives that ensure reliability and product road maps.

Advantages in cost, design risk, and time-to-market, plus the ability to leverage LRUs into a packaged subsystem, have PCOTS on the rise; even as fully integrated systems.

As FMCs continue to increase in popularity it is important to be familiar with the differences between different classes of FMC cards.

AVX delivers doubled performance over AltiVec, and leaves the door open for a long future in DSP applications.

Multiple threats demand innovative security measures: Ethernet security technologies provide multifunctional, multi-layered responses that offer a more dynamic defense than software-based security methodologies.

RADHARD COTS double as an earthbound fallout shelter for ground vehicle sensors, displays, control systems, communications, and other electronic applications.

Gaining video sensor data interoperability combined with open standards and a common infrastructure network will allow COTS vendors to keep up with sensor growth in military platforms that provide critical missions support and save lives.

The issue of counterfeit devices is highly problematic in mission-, life-, and safety-critical applications, but strategies can be employed to ensure components are exactly what they appear to be.

The embedded military market is poised to take the next big leap in improving time to deployment through the adoption of Open APIs to speed system application development. Open APIs can ease heterogeneous hardware technology integration, drastically cutting time, cost, and complexity for building larger multimode systems.

The High Definition (HD) video commercial market has increased the number of camera and sensor types and the resolution of flat-panel displays. In turn, this has motivated designers of video distribution systems for military ground vehicles to seek ways to deliver 360? Situational Awareness Systems (360? SASs) while respecting the Size, Weight, and Power (SWaP) limitations of existing ground-vehicle platforms.