Remote HW-SW reconfigurable Wireless Sensor nodes

Reconfigurable HW, like FPGAs, can improve the processing systems performance as it has been demonstrated by several research groups. Usually, the inclusion of such elements in HW platforms for Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) has been rejected by designers, mainly due to the power consumption penalization. A reconfigurable device allows not only performance improvement but also remote HW reconfiguration of the WSN node. In this paper, a entire working flow for generate, remotely configure and reconfigure the HW in a target custom reconfigurable platform developed at CEI (Centro de Electronica Industrial) is presented. The custom platform includes a microprocessor and an FPGA (Xilinx partially reconfigurable) to carry out all the processing tasks. The current reconfiguration process works with the JTAG interface, which makes the solution portable to other FPGAs, especially those new less power consuming devices that are appearing in the market nowadays.