Silent Data Corruption and Embedded Processing With NASA´s SpaceCube

Author

Zick, Kenneth M. ; Yu, Chien-Chih ; Walters, John Paul ; French, Matthew

Author_Institution

Univ. of Southern California Inf. Sci. Inst., Arlington, VA, USA

Volume

4

Issue

2

fYear

2012

fDate

6/1/2012 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

33

Lastpage

36

Abstract

Dramatic increases in embedded data processing performance are becoming possible using platforms such as the NASA SpaceCube. With a flexible architecture and commercial devices, selected computations can be tuned for the highest performance while giving up perfect data reliability. More needs to be known about the nature of silent data corruption in this paradigm. When it occurs, how pervasive is it? To what extent can it be mitigated while near-optimal performance is maintained? This paper provides new insights into these questions, via a fault emulation-based study of two disparate applications running on a hard-core embedded processor. Two very low-cost methods of data error detection reduce the worst type of silent data corruption (SDC) by 89-97% with a performance overhead of <; 1%.

Keywords

aerospace computing; data analysis; embedded systems; fault tolerant computing; NASA SpaceCube; SDC; data error detection; data reliability; embedded data processing; fault emulation; hard core embedded processor; silent data corruption; Built-in self-test; Circuit faults; Detectors; Emulation; Field programmable gate arrays; Performance evaluation; Registers; Onboard processing; radiation hardening-by-software; radiation-induced upsets; silent data corruption (SDC);

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Embedded Systems Letters, IEEE

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

1943-0663

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/LES.2012.2192413

Filename

6176201