New approaches to spaceborne computing

NASA´s aggressive plans for extensive deep space exploration with a new generation of unmanned space craft requires a dramatic increase in responsibilities for onboard computing to reduce size, weight, and power to drastically reduce mission costs. No longer will all raw sensor data be transmitted back to Earth but rather only the results from extensive preprocessing to decrease total link capacity by one to three orders of magnitude. A new approach to on board data processing is necessitated by this new expanded mission requirement. Processor-In-Memory (PIM) architecture combines logic and memory on the same integrated circuit to permit direct access to memory row buffers, greatly increasing effective memory bandwidth, reducing overhead and latency, and improving power efficiency. Organizing and managing the resources of PIM based systems is challenging. The PIM-MT architecture is an innovative approach to harnessing the physical resources of PIM technology through a message driven multithreaded virtual execution model. This paper describes the concepts of PIM-MT and its role in future spaceborne computing