Design of an FPGA-based full-state feedback controller using high level synthesis tools

Digital control has significantly advanced in the last decade enabling the implementation of higher performance controllers using digital devices such as microcontrollers, DSPs or FPGAs. The design and implementation of controllers using FPGAs is often a challenging and time-consuming task. In order to improve this process, high level synthesis tools allow the use of high-level programming languages, easing the design and simulation process and enabling a straight-forward design space exploration. This paper details the overall design process using high level synthesis tools and presents as a representative example a full-state feedback controller for a buck converter using single-precision floating point representation. The main implementation and experimental results are summarized, highlighting the main benefits and drawbacks of this approach.