Autonomous machines, robotics and artificial intelligence have been transforming daily life, making it more convenient, safe and efficient. These technologies are being applied to multiple applications in domains such as industrial, automotive, healthcare, smart city, smart buildings, and entertainment among others. The ever-evolving technology landscape and the increasing need for real-time data processing and inference at the edge is encouraging SoC/GPU manufacturers to build powerful edge computing devices that can run modern Deep Learning (DL) workloads. NVIDIA Jetson System on Modules (SoMs) – namely NVIDIA Jetson Nano, NVIDIA Jetson TX2 NX and NVIDIA Jetson Xavier NX are embedded AI computing platforms designed to accelerate edge AI product lifecycle. These high-performance, low-power compute engines are built to run complex computer vision, robotics, and other low-power applications. In addition, NVIDIA offers CUDA-X libraries, a set of highly optimized, GPU-accelerated libraries. CUDA-X offers a robust programming environment that works seamlessly with all Jetson SoMs, enabling customers to seamlessly use their application across various Jetson Platforms.

Advantages of NVIDIA Jetson Platform

Versatile Hardware – The NVIDIA Jetson portfolio provides a wide range of high-performance, low-power system on modules, that feature multi-core ARM cores, NVIDIA GPU, AI computational performance up to 275 TOPS and a host of high-speed interfaces, ideal for complex DL pipelines.

Unified Software offers Ease of Development – NVIDIA Jetson System on modules and Development Kits are supported by a unified software architecture that helps developers to expand or enhance their product portfolio on different Jetson modules without further coding. This unified approach helps enterprises to create product portfolios with a significant return on investment.

Cloud Native Support for Scalable Deployments – Cloud-native technologies and workflows like orchestration and containerization are supported by all NVIDIA Jetson platforms, which accelerate edge AI product development, agile deployment, and management throughout the product lifecycle. Frequent updates and constant upkeeps are imperative to rapidly improve AI efficiency.

Here’s a sneak peek of the hardware capabilities of various Jetson Modules:

The Jetson AGX Orin is the latest incorporation from NVIDIA among all Jetson Modules. This SoM is one of the most powerful embedded processors currently in market, with up to 275 TOPs performance. The Jetson AGX Orin offers a giant leap forward in Edge AI and robotics. Jetson AGX Orin offers 8x performance over Jetson AGX Xavier with configurable power between 15W and 50W, making it ideal for autonomous machines and advanced robots. It will also help developers to deploy complex and large AI models to solve problems such as 3D perception, natural language understanding, and multi sensor fusion. This SoM supports multiple concurrent AI inference pipelines with onboard 64GB eMMC, 204 GB/s of memory bandwidth, and high-speed interface support for multiple sensors.

The NVIDIA Jetson Orin NX provides high-speed interface support for multiple sensors, offers twice the CUDA cores, 5x performance of NVIDIA Jetson Xavier NX and 3X the performance of Jetson AGX Xavier for power-efficient autonomous machines. This module offers up to 100 TOPS of AI performance, 1024-core NVIDIA Ampere architecture GPU with 32 Tensor Cores, power configurable between 10W and 25W, supports external NVMe, shares the form factor compatibility with NVIDIA Jetson Xavier NX, and can give a tremendous performance in an amazingly compact package.

With the launch of the new Jetson Orin Nano SoM, NVIDIA Jetson is setting a new standard for entry-level edge AI and robotics. Orin Nano comes in two variants, and it can deliver up to 80x the performance over the previous generation, up to 40 TOPS of AI performance, and comes with 5W and up to 15W power options. Jetson Orin Nano includes a video decode engine, 6-core Arm Cortex-A78AE CPU, ISP, audio processing engine, video image compositor, and video input block. This new SoM series also features up to 1024-core NVIDIA Ampere architecture GPU with 32 Tensor cores, supports FP16 and Int 8, and comes with 4GB and 8GB. This SoM comes with a strong Ecosystem, better software support, enhanced encoding capabilities, and memory bandwidth and supports external NVME for data storage directly as it has no eMMC.

The NVIDIA Jetson AGX Xavier is a power-efficient module designed for autonomous machines
that delivers up to 32 TOPS of AI performance. This compact module includes high-speed I/O and hardware acceleration for the entire AI pipeline enabling developers to come up with the latest AI applications. The Jetson AGX Xavier also provides an extended temperature range, vibration and shock specifications, making it one of the best choices for safety-certified and industrial-grade products. This SoM comes with NVIDIA Volta architecture GPU with 512 CUDA cores, 8-core NVIDIA Carmel Armv8.2 64-bit CPU and support up to 6 CSI cameras in addition to the host of the display, connectivity and networking interfaces.

The NVIDIA Jetson Xavier NX is a small form-factor module, in the size of a credit card that offers up to 21 TOPs of accelerated AI computing. This module can process data from various high-resolution sensors and run multiple advanced neural networks in parallel, which is critical to modern embedded systems. The 384-core NVIDIA Volta™ GPU with 48 Tensor Cores offers high computing power for compact, intelligent machines like autonomous drones and portable medical devices. The module comes with 6-core NVIDIA Carmel ARMv8.2 CPU, dual DLA engines, 8 GB memory, 6 CSI camera and support a host of display, connectivity, and networking interfaces.

The NVIDIA Jetson TX2 NX is a power-efficient (7.5W) embedded AI computing device that offers up to 2.5x the performance of Jetson Nano. The module features a variety of standard hardware interfaces that makes it ideal for designing a wide range of small form-factor products that run advanced machine learning applications. The Jetson TX2 modules integrate NVIDIA Pascal™ GPU architecture with 256 NVIDIA CUDA cores, dual-Core NVIDIA Denver 2 64-Bit CPU, 8GB 128-bit LPDDR4 memory, and 32GB eMMC 5.1 storage. In addition, TX2 offers USB 3.0 Type A, USB 2.0 Micro USB (supports recovery and host mode), HDMI, M.2 Key E, PCI-E x4, Gigabit Ethernet, full-size SD, SATA Data and Power, GPIOs, I2C, I2S, SPI, CAN, TTL UART with flow control, display expansion header, and camera expansion header.

The NVIDIA Jetson Nano is a small, power-efficient, high-performance AI computing device to run AI applications, process data from high-resolution sensors and run multiple neural networks in parallel. This module is an ideal entry-level option to add advanced capabilities to embedded products and elementary solutions like intelligent gateways or entry-level NVRs. The Jetson Nano has an integrated 128-core Maxwell GPU, quad-core ARM A57 64-bit CPU, 4GB LPDDR4 memory, and support for MIPI CSI-2 and PCIe Gen2 high-speed I/O.

NVIDIA Jetson Modules _ Spec Comparison

Conclusion

The NVIDIA Jetson System on Modules are power-performance-optimized edge devices that can
transform every industry, including healthcare, retail, manufacturing, transportation, construction, logistics, agriculture, robotics, surveillance, and more. AI-based embedded product companies and developers are using NVIDIA Jetson SoMs to enhance and accelerate product development, demonstrating how cutting-edge technologies can facilitate new levels of success every day. Mistral is a Member of the NVIDIA Partner Network, and our solutions facilitate accelerated product development, prototyping and reduce time to market. Our team has unparalleled expertise and design competency in offering custom Carrier Boards, NVIDIA jetson nano developer kit and Development Platforms and Application Boards based on Jetson System on Modules.

Mistral also offers feature-rich, performance-oriented off-the-shelf nvidia jetson nano developer kit, Carrier Boards and AI-Sensor Fusion platforms compatible with the Jetson Nano, Jetson Xavier NX and Jetson TX2 NX SoMs. To know more, visit mistralsolutions.com/neuron. Stay tuned for the second part of the blog that features various use cases of Jetson platforms!

IoT applications greatly rely on wireless connectivity to communicate with IoT gateways and other devices in the ecosystem, especially applications wherein wired connectivity is practically impossible. This connectivity is enabled by a range of antennas that support various types of networks. Over the past decade, IoT platforms have tremendously evolved to shrink in size and incorporate advanced wireless technologies. These developments have made a huge impact in the evolution of antenna technologies and IoT Antenna design, bringing out ultra-compact antennas of high efficiency and performance. Embedding multiple antennas in high-performance, small form-factor IoT designs has become a standard requirement, creating significant challenges to IoT product developers. Some of the popular wireless technologies used in IoT applications are Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, WLAN and ZigBee, which operate in the frequency band of 2.4GHz to 5GHz. These wireless standards are capable of handling high data rates over short distances. Wireless standards such as LoRa (operates in RF bands of 169 MHz to 915MHz) and SigFox (operate in RF bands of 868MHz to 928MHz) are used in applications that need relatively longer range, and at much lower data rates.

The advent of LPWANs like NB-IoT that offer low bandwidth data connections and LTE Cat-M, higher bandwidth, high-throughput with low latency and battery use, are also making a large impact in IoT designs by offering a cost-effective solution. 5G, the fifth generation of wireless technology, is expected to further revolutionise the growth of IoT and related technologies. In this blog, we look at a few commonly used IoT Antenna technologies, their applications and a few key factors that influence the selection of Antenna for an IoT product design.

IoT Antenna Technologies

This section briefly describes various types of IoT Antenna that are commonly employed in IoT devices.

Chip Antennas

Chip antennas are compact and have relatively low bandwidth. They perform better with large ground planes, which may add to challenges while integrating a board of high component density. Chip Antennas have a limited range, making them optimal for small IoT devices that use low-frequency bands such as, computers, satellite radios, GPS devices, etc.

Wire Antennas

Wire antennas are more economical as compared with othertypes of IoT antenna such as Chip and Whip. The size of wire antenna is inversely proportional to its frequency, i.e., the size of the antenna increases as frequency decreases, which may invite challenges in designs. Wire antennas are either fixed to the PCB over a ground plane or connected over a coaxial cable offering good RF performance. These Antennas are available in various patterns and shapes such as Dipole, Loop and Helix and are commonly used in connected cars, smart buildings solutions, etc.

Whip Antennas

Whip antennas are one of the best performing IoT antenna and probably the priciest among commonly employed antennas. They are usually positioned outside the device enclosure, making a physical connection with the PCB over a coaxial connector. Whip antenna is a common type of monopole antenna, which is ideal for wireless connectivity in ISM, LoRa, LPWAN based applications. The whip antennas are ideal for designs that use multiple transceivers such as hand-held radios, routers, gateways walkie-talkies, Wi-Fi enabled devices, vehicles, etc.

Antenna on PCB

As the name indicates, Antenna on PCB (AoPCB) is the antenna or antenna pattern embedded on the PCB using modern fabrication technologies – typically copper traces on circuit boards. PCB antennas are cost-effective and offer great flexibility in designs as developers can incorporate the antenna design at an elementary level. One drawback of Antenna on PCB is that it uses space on the circuit board, which may bring in significant challenges in an ultra-compact or complex design with large number of sensors and components. These antennas are ideal for USB dongles, automotive and robotics applications.

Factors influencing the selection of IoT antenna

Several factors influence the selection of an antenna for an IoT design – frequency band, size, range, precision, the region of deployment, etc. Typically, the frequency band of IoT antenna fall in unlicensed ISM-bands (industrial, scientific, medical). Each antenna is designed for a specific frequency band, keeping certain applications in mind. For example, Wi-Fi or Bluetooth may be a good choice for portable devices, wearables, gaming gadgets, IP cameras etc, whereas Industrial applications such as smart cities, Industry 4.0 and smart agriculture among others need to use LPWAN, LoRa, SigFox or NB-IoT. The IoT antenna selected should aesthetically fit into the product packaging. A small size antenna, perfectly positioned, is more likely to offer optimal performance. However, it must provide the intended coverage at the least possible consumption of power. At times, it is not only the size of the antenna that matters but also the antenna topology. The antenna topology influences the bandwidth, radiation pattern, gain and overall efficiency of the antenna.

One question that might pop up in the reader’s mind would be, should one consider a standard off-the-shelf antenna or a custom-designed one! Off-the-shelf antennas, that meet the product performance requirements, certainly make a cost-effective solution, however, a designer may face challenges while packaging this antenna in an extremely tight design. The rigidity of the design may further affect the antenna performance. In such situations, a custom-designed antenna makes an ideal choice to ensure superior performance. Another important factor of consideration while selecting an IoT antenna is the regulatory standards in various regions across the world. Developers should keep a check on standards such as Radio Equipment Directive (RED), Electromagnetic Compliance, FCC Class A and B Rules in addition to the SAR requirements.

In short, the key parameters to consider during the selection of antenna are,

• Type of antenna
• Operating frequency band
• Coverage / Range and FoV
• Radiation pattern
• Gain of Antenna
• Shape and size of antenna
• Cost

A few design keys for antenna placement in an IoT device

The selection of the right antenna is crucial in an IoT design, however, that alone will not provide a solution for high RF performance. It is imperative here to state that, the antenna performance is a key factor that decides the battery life of the device. Factors such as the closeness of other electronic components, use of a ground plane, signal interference, packaging material and proximity to a human body (Know more about the impact of the human body on antennas in a blog on Wearable Antennas) greatly influence antenna performance. Hence, developers must pay utmost attention to these factors during the process of design.

Here are a few design keys to antenna placement in a wireless IoT design,

• Place antenna in a corner of the PCB to ensure adequate keep out area for the antenna on the PCB
• Use a ground plane of ideal width and ground clearance for achieving maximum antenna efficiency
• Avoid placing the antenna nearby plastic (Plastic ID) during packaging. The higher dielectric constant of plastic compared to air may affect the resonant frequency of the antenna
• Antennas must not be covered by a metallic enclosure
• Antenna orientation should match the orientation of the end product to ensure maximum radiation in the desired direction.

Conclusion

Ultra-compact, high-gain, super-efficient antennas are revolutionising the way wireless IoT devices are designed and developed. Nevertheless, IoT antenna design or the selection of the right antenna type remain one of the key design challenges. A great antenna ensures superior performance, great range and low power consumption. Though a wide range of off-the-shelf antennas are available in frequencies suitable to IoT applications, developers may have to look at custom antenna designs to achieve optimum size and performance parameters. Designers should also be aware of the effect of other components in the design, Industrial Design (ID), ID material, antenna tuning, positioning and EMI/EMC regulations among others. With over two decades of experience designing embedded products featuring technologies such as Bluetooth, RFID, NFC and LoRa to multi-band GSM, 3G, 4G/LTE, Wi-Fi and UWB systems, Mistral has the expertise to provide antenna designs that cater to myriad product needs.

Write to us to learn more about custom IoT antenna design, the selection and integration of antenna suitable for small form-factor IoT devices.

According to a study conducted by IEEE, by 2040, three of every four vehicles will be autonomous. While most of the major players’ focus is on Autonomous passenger vehicles or semi-autonomous vehicles, there is a huge void in utilizing the relevant technologies for security and surveillance applications.

The article unreels various open-source tools and technologies that come handy while designing a cost-effective and reliable unmanned ground vehicle or an Autonomous Navigation Vehicle Design based on an electric platform, conforming to various safety standards and ruggedness needs of the vehicle. Here the focus is on building a multi-terrain vehicle rather than a design that suits just roads. The article also discusses about the surveillance payload that can be integrated into this vehicle.

What is an Unmanned Ground Vehicle [UGV]?

A simple definition for UGV or an Autonomous Navigation Vehicle Design is a ground vehicle that can runs independent of a human operator. It uses a set of sensors to observe and cognize the environment around it, while various drive by wire actuators and motors perform the operational part.

SOFTWARE FOR UGV

This section outlines how to build a high-quality software package using various open-source software tools in the market.

ROS: Robot Operating System (ROS) is a flexible, opensource platform for developing Robot software. It provides several tools and support for various sensors, algorithms, visualization and simulation to develop a robust software. ROS allows developers to reuse various modules and build application use cases on Python, C++ and Java.

Maps and Navigation: Various open-source Maps and Navigation tools help to integrate dynamic maps in vehicle web application. It is very easy to customize the open-source platforms by accessing the APIs or using 3rd party libraries. Developers can also build a Web based GIS system and integrate it with the ROS, along with various algorithms to identify & define the path of the vehicle and turn by turn navigation support. There are open-source tools that provide free geospatial data, which help developers to generate and define a path for the vehicle.

LAMP: LAMP represents Linux, Apache, MySQL and PHP/Python – the four opensource components. LAMP is a reliable platform for developing an Autonomous vehicle web application. LAMP makes the developer’s life easy by minimising the programming efforts that a complex autonomous platform or a robot ask for.

Autonomous Navigation System Algorithms: Autonomous vehicles rely on navigation technologies, sensors and cameras to navigate through a terrain. Autonomous Navigation Algorithms help identify obstacles, avoid them, calculate best routes and define a new path for the vehicle by understanding the surroundings based on the data from various sensors. There are three important algorithms in Autonomous Navigation – Geo-localisation, Path Planning and Navigation.

HARDWARE FOR UGV

The vehicle platform is one of the key components of the UGV. An electric vehicle platform makes it suitable for an unmanned ground vehicle, as it helps surmount several mechanical customization challenges of a standard platform and allows easy access to vehicle network for obtaining data such as engine status, fuel status, gear level, clutch, and so on. Drive by Wire also known as X-by-wire is transforming vehicles. Drive by wire rely on electronics and various sensor inputs to control the vehicle operations such as steering, acceleration and braking.

Look at the various hardware components that constitute a UGV.

AC Motor: The prime concerns of an autonomous vehicle designer while considering an AC motor for the Unmanned Ground Vehicle or Autonomous Navigation System include torque, power and efficiency of the motor. While choosing the motor and evaluating the power requirements, a developer should consider its terrain of deployment.

Wheel Hub Motor: Hub Motors power each wheel and provide thrust and launch power to the vehicle. Integrating powerful Hub Motors to an autonomous vehicle make it efficient and capable for tough and demanding environments.

Steering Control: Another key component is the automatic lateral control of the vehicle. An EPAS (Electric Power Assisted Steering) system, with a Controller integrated into the steering column, in addition to the electric motor and a torque sensor is ideal for Autonomous vehicles. The EPAS Controller unit receives inputs from the computer, which in turn controls the Steering to achieve the desired lateral movement.

Braking: A Linear actuator based braking control system is ideal for service brakes and ACME based Linear Actuator for parking brakes. For electrics platforms, regen (re-generative) brakes have an advantage. They make use of the Kinetic Energy generated while braking and convert it back to stored energy in the vehicle battery.

Vehicle Communication Networks: The Vehicle Communication Network connects the in-vehicle electronics and devices as well as the vehicle itself to the external world using various technologies such as CAN, Ethernet, WIFI, Mesh Network, etc. A reliable and redundant communication network structure is key as it handles huge amount of high-speed data from several sensors and processors. A gigabit-speed network is ideal as it provides high-bandwidth, low-latency, and high-reliability links, paving the way to real-time autonomous operations.

SENSORS FOR UGV

An autonomous vehicle basically relies on GPS & IMU for localization and navigation, and the Perception Sensors to perceive surrounding environment. While GPS and IMU provides vehicle position, speed, directions, etc. sensors like Camera, Radar, LiDAR, etc. are very crucial to generate perception of the surrounding environment to facilitate in decision making.
Take a look at the Sensors that are key for an unmanned ground vehicle.

mmWave Radar: Radars provide crucial data for safe and reliable autonomous vehicle operations such as obstacle detection, proximity warnings and collision avoidance, lane departure warnings and adaptive cruise control, among others. One big advantage of Radars over other sensors is that they work accurately in any weather condition – viz., rainy, cloudy, foggy or dusty, or low-light, etc. In the recent past, 77GHz Radar Modules have been gaining popularity as they generate better object resolution and greater accuracy in velocity measurement. These modules come in ultra-compact form factor and provides superior processing power.

LiDAR: LiDAR helps in generating high-resolution 3-D maps of roads or target objects with detailed information of road features, vehicles, and other obstacles in the terrain. Using a LiDAR provides quick information of the objects and helps the autonomous vehicle to build a better perception of the surroundings.

Camera: Camera is probably one of the first sensors to have been deployed in vehicles for driver assistance applications. With the introduction of advanced image processing technologies and vision analytics, cameras have become one of the key sensors in any ADAS and Autonomous vehicles. Camera helps in object identification and classification, moreover, it provides depth perception of surrounding area including the position, distance and speed of objects.

Ultrasonic Sensors: Ultrasonic sensors play a major role in obstacle avoidance. These sensors detect the distance to obstacles and assist in safe maneuvering. Ultrasonic sensors are comparatively economical and work perfectly in bad weather – lowlight conditions, fog, rain, snow, dust, etc.

GPS-INS: GPS aids in identifying the vehicle location accurately on the ground. In autonomous vehicles a highly accurate and precise GPS receiver system is required. The position errors should be contained within sub-centimeter or millimeter levels. The accuracy of the GPS system can be improved by combining GPS with an Inertial Navigation System (INS) and RTK (Real-Time Kinematic) base station which send periodic position correction messages to the GPS receivers.

Surveillance Payload For Autonomous Navigation Vehicle Design

Identifying the surveillance payload needs is critical to an Autonomous Surveillance vehicle. Based on the system requirement one can consider IR Cameras, PTZ cameras or a 3600 a bird-eye view cameras to survey the surroundings and communication systems, communication network, control consoles, etc. for command and control.

Teleoperator Console

Surveillance is never completely independent of human intelligence. There is always a human eye to it. The operator console acts like a command center and facilitates the gathering of surveillance intelligence. The console should be equipped with reliable, communication and control systems, wherein the operator can take a remote control of the vehicle at any point of time, control the surveillance payload, make an emergency announcement, start or stop the vehicle, and so on. The teleoperator console can be integrated to an existing command and control center or it can be a portable kit. The portable console should be lightweight, easily deployable and can be designed around a powerful Touch Panel that runs an intuitively designed Web application for configuring missions and teleoperating the vehicle.

eStop and Telemetry Data: In case of an emergency, a user should be able to shut the vehicle down remotely from the teleoperator console. An e-Stop feature helps the users to safeguard the vehicle, and its electronics from getting tampered or to protect it from an unexpected technical failure. A dedicated wireless network such as radio network in ISM or Non-ISM frequencies or a long-range Wi-Fi is recommended for implementing the eStop functionality.

CONCLUSION

A state-of-the-art Autonomous Navigation Vehicle Design or an Autonomous Surveillance Vehicle can be developed using the technologies discussed above. A rugged all-terrain autonomous vehicle can be deployed for a wide range of applications such as perimeter surveillance, 24×7 patrolling of critical infrastructure, first response vehicle in hostile environment, and more.

To realize an Autonomous Navigation Vehicle Design, product developers need to have experience in design, development and & integration of hardware, electrification, mechanical design, power management, various sensors & actuators, software, mechanical outfits and component selection ensuring high protection from shock and vibration. Knowledge of tools such as HTML5, CSS3, Python, MySQL, Bootstrap, jquery, ROS Kinetic and Melodic support will help the developers kickstart the project immediately. Knowledge on DBW Algorithms, navigation, obstacle avoidance, path planning and visualization provides an added advantage.

This Blog is a condensed version of the Article titled ‘How to get started with designing a cost-effective UGV for security and surveillance’ published on The Robot Report in November 2020

We live in a world driven by technology and use them in nearly every aspect of our daily lives. We tend to depend on smart electronic devices to make our lives easier, organised and better connected. Needless to say, all these electronic devices are designed over a Printed Circuit Board (PCB). PCB Design Services is a product design process involving high-level engineering tools for board design.

PCB Design is the point in a design stage at which all the design decisions made earlier come together and where unforeseen problems related to performance, power distribution analysis, signal integrity, thermal analysis and noise mismatching make themselves known and have to be resolved.

What is a PCB or printed circuit board?

Printed Circuit Board is a critical component in electronics that enables and integrates all the electronic circuits/components of a design. These boards are used in various electronic products – from Smartphones, Smart Tabs, Gaming Devices, Infotainment Systems to Medical devices, Industrial equipment, Automotive Electronics, Radars, Defense, Military and Aerospace equipment and all other computing systems.

Printed circuit boards were initially developed during World War II for military applications. Over the years, this technology was adopted by electronic manufacturers enabling them to offer cost-effective, compact, and power-efficient solutions.

The printed circuit board is made up of a thin layer of conducting material, usually copper films printed over a non-conducting layer known as substrate. These substrates are made up of special materials which do not conduct electricity. The most commonly used substrates are Resins, Fiberglass, Epoxy Glass, Metal Board, Flame retardant (UL94-V0, UL94-V1) and Polyimides.

Fundamentally PCBs are single layer, double layer, and multi-layer. The layer classification of Printed Circuit Boards is based on the number of conductive layers present in the PCB. The below figure shows the cross-section of various types of PCBs.

Typically, there are two different methods for mounting components on a Printed Circuit Board – through-hole and surface-mount. In the through-hole method, the components consist of thin leads that are pressed through tiny holes in the board on one side and soldered on the other side. The through-hole method is mostly used because of the mechanical stability it provides to the components. In the surface-mount method, the terminals of every component are soldered to the same surface of the Printed Circuit Board directly. Mostly surface-mounted components are small and have a tiny set of solderable pins or Ball Grid Array (BGA) on the component.

PCB Material Classifications

A PCB is broadly classified into three different categories:

1. Rigid PCB
2. Flex PCB
3. Rigid-Flex PCB

Let’s have a look at these categories in detail:

1. Rigid PCB

Rigid PCB, as the name suggests, is a solid, inflexible PCB which cannot be twisted or folded to fit into a specific mechanical enclosure. The Rigid PCB which is also known as the Standard PCB is made up of resin and glass along with copper foils which are generally known as Laminates. These laminates come with specific thicknesses to form a standard double-sided PCB, i.e., 0.4mm, 0.6mm, 0.8mm, 1.2mm, 1.6mm, 2.4mm, etc. Multiple sheets of these laminates are used along with pre-preg to form a multi-layer design.

Rigid PCBs are the cheapest PCBs. These are also known as the traditional PCBs and are more widely used in various electronic products. The best example of a rigid PCB is the computer motherboard. Some of the solid PCBs that we see in our daily lives are washing machine, refrigerator, telephones, and calculators.

A simple construction of the double-sided PCB and multi-layer PCB are shown below:

Benefits of Rigid Printed Circuit Boards:

• Cost-Effective solution
• Rugged and reliable
• High-density circuits

2. Flex PCB

As the name suggests, the Flex PCB is a flexible PCB that can either be folded or twisted to form a specific shape. The flexible nature of these PCBs helps in accommodating a complex PCB in a smaller form factor thereby reducing the product size. The clutters within a given frame, replacing a wires/cables with a simple flex PCB. The substrate in the Flex PCBs is made up of thin insulating polymer films or polyimides similar to the Rigid PCBs. The key objective of Flex PCBs is to improve the bend and make the product compact and flexible with a lesser layer count. The thickness of the copper foils and the polyimides are made thinner to achieve the flexibility of the product. . “The thinner the copper foil, much reliable is the Flex PCBs.” A Stiffener/Backer is attached to the Flex PCBs to prevent plate buckling and support for components.

Ideally, Flex PCBs are a great choice for designing PCBs of high speed and controlled impedance. These PCBs are widely used in aerospace, military, mobile communications, computers, digital cameras and more.

Benefits of Flex PCBs:

• Allows bending and folding to fit into an arbitrary shape
• The thin and lightweight enables a substantial reduction in packaging size
• Flexibility makes it easier for installation and service
• Effectively reduce the volume of the product
• Suitable for miniaturized and high-reliability electronic products.

3. Rigid-Flex PCBs

Rigid-flex PCBs are circuit boards that use a combination of both Rigid and Flexible board technologies in a given design. Typically, Rigid-Flex boards consist of multiple layers of Rigid and Flex on a PCB, that are interconnected within a 3D Space. This combination enables efficient space utilization as the flex part of the circuit can be bent or twisted to achieve the desired shape of the mechanical design.

Similar to the Rigid PCBs, standard FR4 layers merged along with polyimide layers, usually in the centre, are used to form a Rigid-Flex PCB. Rigid-Flex PCBs are most commonly found in devices were space/weight are major concerns, such as smartphones, digital cameras, USB, CT Scanners, Pacemakers, and automobiles.

Benefits of Rigid-flex PCBs:

• Rigid-Flex PCBs enable design freedom, space minimization, weight reduction, that will eventually reduce the packaging requirements significantly
• Integrates both rigid and flexible circuits to minimize interconnects
• Dynamic and flexible and fits into smaller spaces
• Suitable for high-density, miniaturized and high-reliability electronic products
• Flex circuits eliminate wire routing errors

So, there you have it. The basics of PCB and it’s classification. In the next blog, we will talk about the design and cost simplification. Till then, stay tuned!

If you’re looking for custom PCB Design services, board design or PCB Layout and Analysis services, drop an email to info@mistralsolutions.com

Installation and use of CCTV Cameras for security & surveillance is a no-brainer. Cameras are considered a fundamental commodity for setting up any surveillance infrastructure, but at the same time, 24×7 monitoring of hundreds or thousands of video feeds by operators doesn’t serve the purpose of providing proactive surveillance and quick response to breaches.

Software-based Video Content Analytics (VCA) provides a certain level of reprieve by raising real-time alerts for a few standard breaches like left baggage, motion detection, etc., but the in-accuracy and false-positives far outweighed the potential benefits, to an extent that most of the operators disable these analytics to avoid the innumerable false alarms.

With the advent of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Deep Neural Networks (DNN), VCA software is being trained to detect, identify, and distinguish various objects in video by exposing them to a large number of tagged examples. In addition to AI-based object classification, computer vision algorithms are also being used to extract data such as absolute speed and size, direction, colour, path, and area. This data can then be searched to concentrate the video analytics effort on relevant information.

In the last decade, with the availability of a significant amount of data and increased computational power, experts have been able to take the theoretical ideas of deep learning and put them to practical use, specifically in the domain of computer vision.

AI in Video Content Analytics

The objective of VCA software is to analyse the video stream, one frame at a time, and create a structured database of information out of the unstructured video data. The VCA engine accepts the raw video stream and converts it to a comprehensible format. It then processes the same using computer vision & deep learning technology. As part of this processing, it performs the following critical tasks:

• Object Detection
• Object Segmentation
• Object Tracking
• Object Recognition
• Object Classification

In addition to the above operations, the various object attributes like timestamp, colour, size are also extracted and saved as part of the metadata. Deep learning classification & recognition algorithms are used here to ensure higher accuracy. This metadata is then processed to perform various kind of analytics.

Face Detection, Recognition and Alert

Accurate face detection and recognition are very critical to law enforcement agencies. It helps in identifying people of interest and is also helpful in post-incident investigations. Broadly, some of the benefits of Facial Recognition application are:

• Automatic attendance
• Automatic recognition of authorized individuals or re-identification of unknown people
• Automatic alert for blacklisted/barred people or no-go zone breach
• Customizable MIS reports (alerts / movements / area-access / area-usage)

Precise face recognition rapidly pinpoints people of interest in real-time using digital images extracted from the video, external image sources and pre-defined watchlists.

Unique face features are extracted and coded into a feature vector that represents a specific face. This feature vector is stored in the database and is used to compare it to the watchlist when faces are searched for. With the advancement of AI-based deep learning algorithms, FR Systems can now be trained with DNN models with many sample faces. In addition, the advancement of GPU technology has ensured that facial recognition can be done at a large scale and in real-time.

Traffic and Road Safety

AI technology has enabled VCA applications to detect traffic violations accurately and automatically. The availability of a large set of video data and computational resources have enabled the respective DNN models to be trained effectively. Here are some of the VCA uses cases for Traffic & Road Safety:

• No-Helmet and Triple riding detection
• Wrong-way Driving or Illegal turn detection
• No-Parking violation detection
• License Plate Detection
• Stop-Line Crossing detection
• No-Seatbelt or Mobile Usage detection
• Over-Speeding Detection

Object Tracking

During post-incident analysis, object tracking facilitates tracking a vehicle in case of a hit-and-run or to track a person who may have left a suspicious package at the incident site. Using computer vision algorithms, once the object in a frame is detected and segmented, it can then be matched against a set of defined categories: a car, bike, truck, man/woman with a cap, jacket, or backpack, etc. The VCA software can be trained to identify these categories by using DNN models. Once the object of interest is detected and matched, the object segmentation defines the pixels used by the object and the movement of those pixels across the video frames can be tracked from multiple CCTV Cameras, thereby giving the entry/exit route of the object.

Video Forensics

AI-based deep learning can also help in solving crimes if captured on CCTV cameras. Machine learning techniques can be used for colour conversion, regeneration, and comparison between two video backgrounds, which will help forensic teams to identify vehicles or objects during the post-incident investigation.

AI-based machine learning algorithms can help in other forensic activities such as:

• Vehicle model detection
• 3D face reconstruction
• Video enhancement by Image Super-resolution
• Video De-hazing and noise reduction
• License Plate De-hazing
• Predictive Image searching

Conclusion

Artificial Intelligence is the next evolution in Video Analytics. Owing to the advent of high-performance GPU hardware, Deep learning-based AI techniques are being widely adopted by various VCA software OEMs. This improves the detection accuracy without increasing the hardware cost exponentially. For end-users, it greatly reduces the workload of security staff and brings significant benefits by detecting unusual incidents and solving a lot of video forensic problems. Moreover, it enables them to use the massive amount of CCTV video data generated for system training purpose instead of getting overwritten over a period. In future, the quality of detection will continue to improve thereby improving the adoption of AI in Security and Surveillance.

This blog is a condensed version of the article titled “Role of Artificial Intelligence” published on “Security Link India”

An IoT testing process to check the functionality of connected IOT devices. With the increasing acceptance of IoT devices there is an increasing need to deliver better and faster services. In this article, we will cover the various IoT testing process required to test connected IoT devices. 

Internet of things (IoT) as we all know is an ecosystem of systems, sensors and devices which are connected over a network enabling communication among them. IoT devices not only include computers, laptops, tablets, smartphones, but all the devices that incorporate chips that can connect to the internet to communicate and gather information. IoT is a platform which allows users to manage data and control the connected devices remotely. According to Gartner, approximately 8.4 billion things were connected in 2017, and the figure is expected to rise to 20.4 billion things by 2020. And, according to IDC, there will be 41.6 billion connected IoT devices, or “things,” generating 79.4 zettabytes (ZB) of data in 2025. The range of existing and potential Internet of Things devices is enormous.

With the current focus on smart cities, smart homes, and smart gadgets, it is expected that people, businesses, and the government will be tremendously impacted by IoT. Enroute to integrating more than 20+ billion devices into various verticals such as Agriculture, healthcare, smart homes, manufacturing, retail, etc., within the next few years, IoT development is expected to increase the scope of Internet of Things testing significantly. As the number of connected devices increases the challenges for software developers and testers also increases; so does the need for a defined IoT Testing Process. It is also expected that the smart devices such as coffee machine, toasters, toys, washing machine, automated smart doors, refrigerators, smart switches, and many others will be connected to the network and communicated via smartphones. All of these devices are enabled with either via Bluetooth, WiFi, RFID or Z-Wave to connect with each other seamlessly. Here are a couple of scenarios on how IoT could change your life:

Example 1 – When you return from a jog and park your bicycle in the garage, the sensors available inside the garage detects the opening of the door and sends a notification to turn on a coffee maker and microwave via IoT.

Example 2 – On parking your car in the allocated area of office space, the sensor sends the notification through IoT to turn on the air conditioner, cabin lights and enables a perfect start of the day.

IoT Testing Process helps to check the functionality of connected IOT devices. With the increasing acceptance of IoT there is an increasing need to deliver better and faster services. The thrust is to provide greater insight and control, over various interconnected IOT devices. Hence, IoT testing process is important and critical for development of IoT enabled Devices.

IoT Testing Process

In this article, we will cover some of the IoT testing process required to test connected devices. Before releasing any product in the market, it is of utmost importance to test the function of all devices according to the standards set for it. IoT systems, taking up the center stage in the consumer space, have to go through many important phases of testing. The IoT testing process for a product can vary based on the system/architecture involved. The IoT Testing process broadly revolves around Security, Analytics, Device, Networks, Processors, Operating Systems, Platforms and Standards. IoT product testers should concentrate more on the Test-As-A-User [TAAS] approach rather than following an IoT Testing process based on the requirements. Below listed are few components of the IoT testing process.

1. End-user application testing

It is essential to ensure that all the connected devices such as smartwatches, automated doors, vending machines, industrial robots, etc., work seamlessly to provide a gratifying user experience. With a myriad of devices connected through the internet of things, usability testing becomes at most important.

2. Security Testing

This is the top priority area in IoT testing process as all the devices are provided with IP addresses and can transfer data over the network. The spread of the IoT has been a boon for hackers who can easily target these devices. Hence, it is crucial to test all the devices to eliminate vulnerabilities and maintain the integrity and security of data. The prime area of focus in security testing includes data protection, device identity and authentication, data encryption/decryption and data storage in the cloud.

3. Connectivity Testing

As all the devices in an IoT system are connected through the network, they must be available constantly and also ensure seamless connectivity with the user. There are chances of any of these connected devices going offline. Thus, it becomes crucial to check the behavior of the device during offline mode.  A warning message has to be sent to the end-user if the device is offline or does not have a unified communication with the user.

4. Performance Testing

IoT devices continuously generate a huge amount of data. Performance testing ensures that these devices can work seamlessly without any interruptions. IoT performance testing is a complex and time-consuming process that ensures the development of a robust IoT system. This IoT testing process involves testing of multiple components and endpoints, network communication, internal computation, timing analysis, load testing, data volume, velocity, variety, and accuracy and scalability.

5. Compatibility Testing

An IoT eco-system has a complex architecture as there are numerous devices which can be connected through it. All of these devices are configured with various hardware and software systems. This makes it important for a tester to perform a compatibility test between all the combinations of these connected devices to ensure seamless performance.

6. Pilot Testing

Verifying the IoT system before the full deployment of the system is important as it helps the tester in identifying defects in the early state. In this IoT testing process, the entire system or a single component is tested under real-world operating conditions to check if it is ready for full-scale implementation.

7. Regulatory/Compliance Testing

When it comes to IoT and IoT testing, regulatory and compliance challenges are likely to grow. In this IoT testing process, compliance of IoT applications for OFAC, HIPPA, GDPA, FDA, FCC, etc is determined. A regulatory test is done on the internal and external system to check if all the specified standards set by IEEE or W3C are met. The main objective of this test is to ensure that the system meets the standards, laws, policies, procedures, and guidelines after every development phase.

8. Upgrade Testing

All the Firmware, Hardware, OS, Devices used in the IoT systems will need to get upgraded as the technology advances. So, it becomes important for testers to perform a thorough regression testing of all the connected devices in real-time before releasing upgrades to the end-users, keeping all the above IoT testing process in mind.

9. Data Integrity Testing

Devices in the IoT system interact with each other and a lot of data exchange takes place. Hence, one of the aspects of the IoT testing process is to check the data integrity of IoT systems where the quality of data, accuracy, format, compatibility, and sanctity of data is tested. The data is validated from various devices, database, gateways and IoT servers.

Conclusion

IoT Testing Process can be different based on the system/architecture involved. An IoT system consists of Sensors, Applications, Network and Datacenters. Therefore, it becomes very important for the Testing team to determine the various type of testing required to test different IoT elements. And, depending on the system or architecture involved, the IoT testing process approaches might vary. It is very important for a tester to test the system using a Test-As-A-User (TAAS) approach, rather than testing based on the defined requirement. Using a TAAS approach helps to deliver a bug-free solution with improved UX to the end-user.

Mistral is a trusted IoT Service Provider, and over the past 27+ years, has offered a range of Internet of Things services to help you design and implement IoT device designs and IoT Gateway Devices to help realize your strategy. By ensuring interoperability, connectivity, scalability, and stability among various IoT components to form a healthy IoT ecosystem, Mistral, your IoT service provider offers a range of Internet of Things Services and IoT Testing Process that shorten the time-to-market for our customers.

What makes passengers air travel interesting? Window seats? Delicious meals and snacks? Or a full-fledged In-flight Entertainment solutions? Today’s generation of passengers crave for a great experience on-board which makes them feel satisfied and happy during their long-haul journey.

Today’s generation of passengers crave for a great experience on-board which makes them feel satisfied and happy during their long-haul journey. This is where in-flight entertainment  solutions play a significant role! IFE a key factor of the enjoyable passenger experience, is progressing as the technology advances. These advancements in technology have given birth to the era of “trickle-down in-flight entertainment” systems which has let airlines to provide benefits of premium entertainment content to their passengers. In-Flight Entertainment Design Services has evolved right from offering a traditional form of entertainment such as movie, music, radio for selected cabins to embedded seat-back In-flight Entertainment systems to every individual. In-flight Entertainment is one of the most exciting features in long-haul air travel, with most of the airlines equipping seats with seat-back screens or displays.

What is In-flight Entertainment (IFE)?

In-flight entertainment or IFE refers to the design & development of entertainment systems provided to airlines passengers. In-flight Entertainment Solutions can either be watching movies, entertainment channels, business, and news, listening to music or playing online games. In-flight entertainment solutions also facilitate and provide a wealth of information that could be of benefit to passengers, like, information on the travel route, onboard menu and procedural guidelines and other informative inputs. In-flight entertainment solutions have come a long way an occasional projector movie to sophisticated seat-back computers loaded with movies, games, maps, music and much more. IFE is often what gets many of us through the tiresome, long-haul flights. This service has been adopted by many airlines over the years and airlines are continuing to evolve & innovate new ways to keep the passengers entertained.

How has In-flight Entertainment industry evolved ?

The modern in-flight Entertainment solutions was born in the early ’60s when Trans World Airlines (TWA) installed a 16mm film system on a black and white TV monitors capable of holding the entire film, developed by David Flexer for the first time. Later, Avid Airlines product developed a pneumatic headset which was then absorbed by TWA. Throughout the early to mid-1960s, some in-flight movies were played back from videotape, using early compact transistorized videotape recorders, and played back on CRT monitors. These bulk-head displays in In-Flight Entertainment systems were commonly placed in the aisles above the passenger seats after every few rows. More than twenty monitors were installed in an aircraft, and passengers viewed movies on this unique closed-circuit system. This was an era far before the days of solid-state circuit boards and light-weight systems. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, CRT-based projectors began to appear on newer wide body aircraft, such as the Boeing 767. Some airlines upgraded the old film In-flight Entertainment solutions to the CRT-based systems in the late 1980s and early 1990s on some of their older wide bodies. In 1988, the Airvision company introduced the first in-seat audio/video on-demand systems using 2.7 inches LCD technology which were run by Northwest Airlines on its Boeing 747 fleet. It received overwhelmingly positive passenger reaction and as a result, it completely replaced the CRT technology.

Current In-flight Entertainment Solutions

The advancement in the Consumer electronics industry with smartphones and display technologies had made the display screens get thinner & lighter. This revolutionized the In-flight entertainment solutions and lead to the concept of personalized screens for each passenger. In the past decade, as Android became the mainstream of technology life, airlines and in-flight entertainment solutions OEMs started to migrate their in-flight entertainment system to run on Android. According to Virgin America, “using Android makes the system easier to maintain and upgrade”. With Android-based in-flight entertainment solutions, passengers will be able to play games, watch movies, listen to music, order meals right from their comfort seat.

Many ODMs and product development companies offering In-flight Entertainment Design Services also provide support for USB ports, audio jacks, and a credit card reader. The current In-flight entertainment solutions consist of a crew control system, seat-back display units, the system and content server, satellite antenna, infrastructure components, the Wi-Fi in the aircraft, the data and power cabling and the wireless access points to link to passenger’s personal electronic devices.

Key design criteria for any In-flight Entertainment system includes system safety, cost optimization, software reliability, hardware maintenance, and compatibility with user devices. The current decade’s innovations have focused on customizing In-flight Entertainment Solutions to suit passenger needs. A sharp trend shaping the travelers In-flight Entertainment experience is the option to plug-and-play with their own devices. The latest In-Flight Entertainment solutions with Android-based architectures are fully scalable and highly customizable. It enables passengers to make payments through secured apps, order services via apps and also enjoy a wide range of entertainment applications.

 Features of In-flight Entertainment Solutions

In-flight Entertainment Solutions can provide various features for different parties such as airline companies, cabin-crew members, and passengers. These features are enabled through software and hardware components. The In-flight Entertainment systems also create a dynamic link between passengers and crew members.

• Audio and Video in In-flight Entertainment

The next-generation In-flight Seat Video Display unit provides passengers with access to broadcast video programming, navigation through menus, browsing web pages and access to Video-on-Demand (VOD) and Audio-on-Demand (AoD). Some airlines provide personal televisions (PTVs) for every passenger with channels broadcasting new and classic films, as well as comedies, news, sports programming, documentaries, children’s shows, drama series, video games as part of the video entertainment system.

This can be customized for each passenger, who can watch the program of their interest on the Seat Video display unit. A passenger using the in-flight entertainment system can also enhance the PTVs service by using subtitles of the running dialogue, along with the details of the characters. This special service helps viewers who have hearing difficulties. Furthermore, they can be written in a different language to help people who cannot understand the spoken dialogue.

• Air Maps

The air map in an in-flight entertainment solutions provides passengers with up- to- date information about their travel. It has become the most popular element of IFE systems, capturing passengers’ attention by posting live updates about their journey. In addition to displaying the position and direction of the plane, the map also displays the altitude, airspeed, outside temperature, travel distance travelled, elapsed time, and remaining time to give passengers the sense of movement.

• E-magazines

At the outset, all the airlines provided a free paper-version of a magazine to all their passengers which were placed at the seat-back. Most airlines are now distributing their magazines digitally via tablet and other software applications. These e-magazines are not limited to just text; they provide various information either in the form of video or images. Some airlines also provide e-books as a value-added feature to their systems. Using an electronic version of printed media can change their importance by adding interactive features such as e-commerce services where a passenger can choose his products and buy them instantaneously.

In-flight Entertainment Trends

The future and growth of In-flight entertainment Design Services depend on several factors. The need to enhance the passenger experience, technological developments and an increase in aircraft deliveries with advanced In-Flight Entertainment solutions are factors expected to drive the market. However, the regulatory framework and certification and an increase in the overall weight of aircraft are expected to restrain the growth of the market. The need for personalized entertainment has contributed to the increasing demand for In-Flight Entertainment design services. Various airlines are competing with one another to keep up with the continuously evolving expectations of passengers.

• Wireless In-flight Entertainment

Wireless IFE is a wireless content distribution system to passengers’ devices. The Wireless IFE systems are light-weight compares to the traditional conventional In-flight Entertainment Solutions. Most passengers favor their own devices for inflight entertainment.

Besides, the wireless IFE systems allow hassle-free internet access, browsing, video streaming, and more on passenger’s devices. Airlines are also jumping on the BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) bandwagon and replacing their existing In-Flight Entertainment solutions by turning passengers PEDs into a comprehensive entertainment solution.

• WiFi and Connectivity

Various airlines services have installed routers to provide free Wi-Fi to their passengers. In several aircraft, data communication via satellite system allows passengers to connect to live Internet from the individual IFE units or their laptops via the in-flight Wi-Fi access. Using Wi-Fi, passengers can access movies, music, games and other entertainment media from their own devices and enjoy their journey.

• Consumer VR

Most of the airlines and ODMs are now looking at IFE devices that offers Virtual Reality entertainment experience on-board where a passenger can just pop on the immersive glasses and watch movies or play games. These immersive headsets present a viable way of improving passenger comfort and satisfaction.

Conclusion

Technological advancements in consumer electronics have contributed to the development of advanced IFE systems to enhance the passenger experience. For instance, Virgin America is presently testing the new EcoV2 monitors developed by Panasonic. Various airlines are collaborating with In-flight Entertainment Solutions manufacturers to introduce jazz seat concept that offers several benefits such as improved touch sensors and display, integrated passenger control unit, and programmable attendant call buttons. With the increasing frequency of travel and the number of options available, the passenger will be more discerning in choosing an airline. Airlines will have to differentiate on the quality of experience they offer to passengers and IFE systems and in-flight entertainment design services will play a crucial role.

Passengers will expect the In-flight entertainment Solutions to provide them with the same experience as their smart devices. It is imperative for the suppliers of these systems to consistently innovate and keep pace with emerging technologies, to stay ahead. By combining creativity, technical expertise, and refined processes, Mistral offers cutting-edge embedded hardware and software design services or In-flight Entertainment Design Services, home/ automotive infotainment solutions to ODMs. Our in-flight entertainment design services keep up with the latest trends and include seat-back and portable IFE units that integrate audio, video, wireless technologies and DSP Algorithms and HMI paving the way for intelligent, connected in-flight entertainment solutions.

Overview

Analog to Digital Converters (ADC) and Digital to Analog Converters (DAC) act as a bridge between the Analog and Digital Domain. For years, these devices have remained the interface between analog and digital world. However, in higher Radio frequency (RF) range (Giga Hertz), the speed offered by ADC/DACs becomes a bottleneck.

The Traditional Approach – Heterodyne Conversion

Here’s a quick look into how an ADC/DAC is using in the traditional approach. An input RF signal is down converted to an Intermediate Frequency known as IF. The carrier wave is shifted to IF as an intermediate step by mixing the signal with a local oscillator. Once the signal is in IF range, simple analog circuits are used to filter, fine tune and amplify or attenuate the signal as required. Such processed analog signals are then taken to the digital world through ADC for digital signal processing.

Similarly, in Digital to Analog conversion, the processed signal data is taken from digital world to Analog world through DAC, and from IF to RF through UP Convertors. This approach is called Heterodyne Conversion (IF)

A typical Radio Receiver design based on Heterodyne Conversion (IF) is shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1

The modulated RF carrier is passed through a low-noise amplifier (LNA) and a band-pass filter (BPF) before converting to IF as shown in the Figure. After passing through anti-aliasing filter (AAF) the IF is digitized by ADC. Demodulation is carried out at baseband level.
The above approach is mostly due to the limitation of the conversion speed of ADCs. If we were to break the ADC speed barriers, would it be feasible to think of direct sampling?

Now, let’s look at the transmitter path for Heterodyne approach. Here, the baseband data is modulated in the digital domain & applied to DAC to convert to IF. The IF is upconverted to RF using a mixer & LO as shown in Figure 2.

Figure 2

Direct Conversion or Zero IF

Direct Conversion or Zero IF is an alternate to Heterodyne (IF) approach of handling RF signals using High-speed RF ADCs. In this, the RF carrier is down-converted directly to baseband instead of IF. The RF carrier is converted to baseband (I&Q) using IQ mixer as shown in Figure 3. Two ADCs are used to digitize I&Q data. Here too, demodulation is carried out at baseband level.

Figure 3

RF ADC

New high-frequency ADCs known as RF ADCs can directly sample wideband signals beyond 6.0GHz. In addition, these RF ADCs have built-in signal processing capabilities. An RF system designer, using the latest RF ADC, needs to design only the hardware platform and use software to configure the hardware to suit the application. An RF ADC with signal processing capabilities is shown in Figure 4.

Figure 4

Now, let’s look at the transmitter path. The baseband data is modulated in I&Q modulator and applied to two DACs, which is further upconverted to RF using IQ mixer and LO as shown in Figure 5.

Figure 5

RF DAC

The high frequency DAC, known as RF DAC, can generate frequency up to 6GHz directly, thereby eliminating the need for IF to RF conversion. RF DAC includes signal processing as shown in Figure 6.

Figure 6

Conclusion

Zero IF systems reduce component count and complexity of the design and bring in a lot of advantages. The System Noise Factor is minimised, and the out-band RF blockers can be attenuated by the RF front-end filters. Overall Zero IF systems are compact and provide better performance. At the same time, since High-speed ADCs are new in the market and expensive, a cautious approach is required before finalising the design.

The trends for Zero IF systems are further moving towards System on Chip concept. High-speed ADCs and DACs integrated with programmable logic eliminate the need for complex digital interfaces between converters and digital circuit. Such devices can be placed with the antennas and digitally interfaced to the processing world.

Wearable Electronics are smart gadgets and/or accessories with specific functionalities and applications. Wearable Technologies focus on the efficient and brilliant use of internet, various sensors, trackers and latest communication technologies to design intelligent devices that enable or facilitate people in their daily professional and personal routine/activity by improving the productivity, efficiency and overall quality of their output. Wearable Electronics App Development (Wearable Electronics Application Development) are bringing these positive trends in the fields of Medical, Health/Fitness, Industrial, Consumer and entertainment sectors. Wearable electronics devices include but are not limited to Head Mounted Computers, AR/VR Glasses, Smart Watches, Fitness Trackers, and Smart Clothing. The earliest examples of wearable electronics technology and related Wearable Electronics Application Development are the spectacles and pocket watches that were invented centuries ago. With the advancement in technology, Internet of Things (IoT) and Ubiquitous Computing have combined to provide advanced high-performance gadgets that are capable of multitasking and communicate in real-time. Popular wearable devices that have made it to the market over the past decade include Google Glass, Apple watch, Samsung Galaxy Gear and Fitbit Health Bands. During this period, a larger interest and need for Wearable Computers, AR/VR Glasses have been fostering realizing tremendous opportunities in Industrial and Medical Applications. With the need for intelligent solutions on-the-go, Wearable electronics technology and related Wearable Electronics Application Development will observe massive developments in the near future, giving it an edge over other technologies among technology enthusiasts and product developers.

Wearable Electronics App Development

• Industrial: Wearable Electronics devices and Wearable Electronics App Development are set to play a major role in an industrial environment, Head mounted computers and Intelligent Headsets that work as an accessory to Smartphone enables technicians and floor managers with greater efficiency, by providing hands-free operation along with instructions, maintenance schedules and inventory information in real-time. Wearables and Wearable Electronics App Development are thus becoming a key enablers in Industrial Floors, large Warehouses, Repair & Maintenance sectors saving time and millions of dollars for the Manufacturers. Such wearable devices play vital role in real-time information capture and gateway of information to the operator in the Industrial Internet-of-Things.
• Medical, Health and Fitness: Devices like Health Bands that come in the form of wristbands are one of the most sought-after smart gadgets for athletes and fitness conscious people, which help them track their heart rate, calories burnt during a work-out session, distance covered, etc. These devices are paired with user’s smartphone over Bluetooth to provide various health, fitness related updates to the user. Smart jewelries are another concept which is gaining popularity now a days. Smart bandages are some of the also being used in hospitals to take better care of patients. Wearable Smart Glasses with the appropriate
  Wearable Electronics App Development could become a quick enabler in the Medical industry, by assisting the practitioner to quickly access the complete history of a patient, previous medications, etc. and assisting during the surgery by enabling access to instruction videos and video calls to experts for real-time assistance.
• Infotainment: Wearable Electronics is extensively used in gaming and entertainment industry. Wearable Electronics App Development includes interactive augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) headsets, smart joysticks, smart goggles, etc.

Key Components 

MCUs and sensors [IMUs, Accelerometer, Gyroscope, Magnetometer, Barometric pressure, Ambient temperature, Heart rate monitor, Oximetry, Skin conductance, temperature, GPS] form the basic hardware of a typical wearable electronics device. Depending on the functionalities and features to be realised on the device, developers may include displays, pedometers, keypads, etc.

Key Design considerations:

• Small Form Factor Hardware
• Battery and Power Management
• Thermal Management
• Interfaces and Connectivity
• Video Streaming
• Multi-sensor integration
• Size, Weight and Ergonomics
• Library/Algorithm Integration
• Wearable Electronics Application Development
• EMI/EMC Regulations

Wearable Electronics Designs and Wearable Electronics Application Development must be user-centric, aesthetically pleasing, complying with environmental regulations and easily adoptable in real life scenario where in it can solve crucial problems.

Challenges and Risks

• Design: Packaging massive set of functionalities and features into these advanced devices require a lot of design thinking. User’s convenience and comfort is critical and this demands for high performance/features, longer operating time while ensuring low weight, compact size, thermally safe. It can be challenging for product engineers to design a device that is universally compatible and suitable for different body types. There is lack of a common standard.
• Privacy & Security: Securing the personal data of the user is one key aspect. These devices collect real-time data on health, user’s behavioral patterns, his preferences, etc. which needs to be secured against any kind of cyber threats.
• Health Risks: Wearable electronics technology poses health risks and hazards to certain extend due to constant radiation exposure. It is important to keep SAR (Specific Absorption Rate) in these devices to the lowest. At the same time, it is also essential that wearable electronic devices pass all mandatory safety, environmental standards.

Conclusion

Wearable Electronics Design and Wearable Electronics Application Development company have invested considerable amount of time and effort in the R&D of futuristic wearable devices to understand the functional, technological and business needs of the modern-day devices. The ever-evolving embedded technologies have been successful in developing Small form factor, miniature, extended battery life, rugged and ergonomic, that are a key aspect of wearable designs. Wearable Electronics App Development along with IoT and AI is set to transform the current environment. The potential physical harm can be prevented through definition of standard, precautionary design and though testing measures.

It’s been an interesting decade and I remember clearly that it was sometime in 2007 when we actually started working on head-mounted glasses project for one of our customers. The customer had an interesting idea of showing whatever you were watching on your laptop screen into the glasses and that was to be controlled and operated by voice commands. On your head, you had a hands-free computer that was controlled by your voice commands and your “hands were free” to do other tasks. If you look back nothing much has changed from that basic concept in 2007 but in reality, everything has changed.

Today we are at an inflection point for the AR, VR, MR and whatever other ‘R’ you want to call it as. What exactly has changed in last 10 years? When we started working on the glasses in those good old days, the entire idea was to realize hardware that could fit on your head, function like a computer, operate by voice command, and have Windows on it. Yes, the very first glasses that we realized had Windows Embedded OS! Android was still not in the vogue. It was a great achievement for us to show something like this at the 2009 and 2010 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) where it attracted huge crowds when it was shown for the first time. It was a standalone piece of hardware showing some basic stuff like photos, videos and such.

One thing that definitely helped the world to take notice of this technology was Google Glass. Google Glass 1.0 may not have been a critical commercial success for Google but it definitely did a great service to the smart-glasses world by showcasing the technology to the common man in a way he could understand. That was one of the biggest contributions of the Google Glass.

Coming back to today, what has changed? I think for any technology or product to succeed many things have to come together including:

1. A good hardware platform
2. Software
3. Value for money
4. And most important, real-world use cases: It should make a difference in users’ lives. It could be for business or in the day-to-day life of the common man, addressing some critical issues. At the end of the day for a product and service to succeed, it should make a significant difference in quality of life and the problem it is trying to solve.

So what do we have today that wasn’t there ten years back? Let’s take a look.

1. The hardware has matured. Various ARM™-based platforms are giving PC-grade performance
2. The software has been hardened and field tested. We actually have everything that is there in PC on these glasses too.
3. And there’s more: The apps! Today there is a community out there writing apps for the AR, VR, and MR world.

But that’s not it. We actually have the real-world use cases that can impact or make a difference to the lives of people.

The advanced research in the areas of AI, machine learning and analytics has greatly contributed to the way these products are evolving; the seamless connectivity of these glasses to the cloud is making a huge difference in the way these devices and applications can be used in the real world to solve real problems.

So what is the real-world problem that these glasses are going to solve? The possibilities are countless. I can keep listing things like factories, technical support, advanced engineering support, supply chain management, aviation, medical and even in solving a great issue like blindness by actually giving an eye to a visually challenged person. Imagine what a great improvement it would make to visually challenged people if they can start leading a normal life without any support from anybody. This is not a fantasy and we will be seeing large scale deployment of these glasses in eradicating blindness as we know today.

So how is this really going to solve the day to day issues of the various things I have mentioned above? The scope is enormous but I want to look at couple of areas where it can make a real difference.

In today’s age of e-commerce, the supply chain is probably one of the biggest challenges. For the first time, Internet shopping exceeded in-store shopping during this Thanksgiving season in the US. E-commerce in general and Amazon in particular have changed the way we shop. The inflection point has already occurred as far as online shopping is concerned. So what’s the next frontier to capture? Second-day delivery is passé. I want to touch and feel the product on the same day that I buy. Is same day delivery possible?

Have you ever imagined the logistical nightmare that moving these huge inventories cause and the amount of manual labor that’s required to accomplish this? Giants like DHL and FedEx have already started pilot projects to assess the use of AR across the supply chain ranging from warehouse planning to transportation optimization and last-mile delivery.

Imagine huge warehouses measuring hundreds of thousands of square feet and you can only guess at the time you can save if you can direct the worker to the package directly instead of looking around all over the place. It has been demonstrated that visual picking using smart glasses can improve efficiency by as much as 25 percent over regular hand picking. In regular hand picking, workers search and pick packages in the warehouse using a paper list and a handheld scanner. But in vision picking, they wear smart glasses that provide them with visual instructions via AR on what to pick and where to place the goods.

Now look at the next stage, the RFID tag is prevalent and costs no more than a few cents. Having an RFID tag on each package accompanied by a RFID reader and combined with visual instruction on glasses provides a winning solution.

Advanced remote technical support is another area that has immense potential with a return on investment that can be realized in matter of days and not months or years. Specialized industries such as oil and gas and aviation face an aging workforce. It is estimated that the aviation industry is going to lose a large number of its experts due to retirement. These experts cannot travel to remote locations to troubleshoot and fix problems. Here is where the glasses can come in handy. If there is a breakdown of equipment or a technical glitch, a specialist in a remote location can assess the situation via AR devices worn by workers present at the site and help them resolve the issue using AR features such as voice instructions and images. This equips regular employees in the field to undertake assembly and repair tasks that would otherwise require specific training effort and time.

These are just a few examples. The possibilities offered by visual reality are countless and we are just seeing the tip of the iceberg!

*Published in embedded.com

Industrial automation systems typically require data acquisition and processing in real-time. These systems could range from a simple lighting control system to a large distributed control system comprising of sensors/actuators, industrial gateways, monitoring and processing units. Designing such an embedded system puts forth a lot of challenges for design engineers in terms of striking a balance between low-end micro-controllers to performance oriented processors. This can be addressed in an optimal way if the design is done keeping the complete system and its end goals into consideration.

I’ve put forth here a high level approach to overcome these challenges using various system resources to enhance the performance.

The System

We were designing an industrial data acquisition system and had constraints in terms of the total product cost. We opted to go with a TI-Sitara processor with ADC and DAC connected over the SPI bus. The system also has the Digital IO expander connected over I2C based IO expander.  The system runs on Linux Operating system (with RT patch) with standard BSP & Drivers for all on-chip peripherals.

The key aspects of the system are: –

• System running Modbus client responding to the MODBUS master for read/write of system configuration and real-time data
• System running Web-Server to allow the control/configuration of the system and monitoring of real-time parameters
• Capable of handling up to 16 Analog input & 16 digital input.
• ADCs capable of capturing the input signals with the sampling rate of 1 KHz for each channel.
• Digital input being monitored and state changes being responded within 10 milliseconds.

System challenges

The single largest challenge determined during the implementation and testing is associated with the capture of the analog input. To be able to capture the analog input at 1KHz for all channels, the ADC has to be configured for higher sampling rate of 16KHz. Since the ADC does not provide the buffering, all the captured data will have to be read immediately to avoid it being overwritten with new data corresponding to different channel.

The ADC provides an interrupt after completing the conversion for each channel. The standard driver implementation would register the interrupt and initiate the read of the SPI registers. Incidentally, for reading the SPI registers, there is a need to perform SPI register write (so as to generate the required clock). Due to interrupt latencies of Linux (even with the RT patch incorporated), the ADC capture is being missed.

Below is the representative summary of the flow of control and data.

1. ADC completes the conversion and asserts the End of Conversion (EoC) signal
2. The Sitara registers this EoC line as interrupt and invokes the Linux GPIO Interrupt handler
3. The kernel space interrupt handler determines the source to be ADC and then accordingly invokes the ADC drivers
4. The ADC driver in kernel space issue an SPI bus read and thus reads the conversion value
5. The value is then given to the user’s space application for further processing.

Owing to the large interrupt latencies, context switching time in Linux and the interaction between the kernel space and user’s space components, there was an overall delay. This limits the overall sampling rate.

Systems approach

Issues like the one stated above are likely to occur while various disciplines are working as islands; i.e., the hardware, BSP & applications are working disconnected with each other having fixed interface plans. Instead, if the design is done keeping the complete system and its end goals into consideration, such problems can be solved in much optimal way. This is Illustrated below.

The Sitara is a complex SoC having multiple features including DMA engines. These DMA provide multiple features including event based triggering and chaining. These features have been exploited to solve the above problem. Below is the outline of control and data flow.

1. The EoC signal from the ADC is configured to trigger the DMA for issuing the SPI Write (so as to generate the clock). The clock also causes the ADC to transmit the converted data into the SPI lines all the way into the internal receive shift registers of SPI controller in Sitara
2. Being full, the internal receive shift register triggers another DMA to read the data from shift register to the memory buffer
3. Steps 1 & 2 are repeated for 16 channels. After 16 channels data is transferred to system memory by DMA, the DMA generates transfer completion interrupt
4. The interrupt handler transfers the data corresponding to 16 channels and reconfigures the DMA for next transfer waiting for EoC
5. The hardware timer is separately configured to generate the required Start of Conversion signal to ensure the sampling interval is deterministic. The ADC is configured to carry out all the channel conversion and stop (waiting for subsequent Start-of-Conversion signal).

This approach yielded the following benefits.

• The system load (CPU Load) is reduced as the Sitara is no longer executing the interrupt handler for every channel conversion completion
• The reliability of the sampling rate is hardware timer controlled and thus immune to variations on the CPU load
• Able to achieve greater sampling rates reliably.

Thus, as showcased above, a thorough understanding of the SoC and its features and seamless integration between the hardware, BSP and application are key to a successful optimization of System performance optimization for a variety of embedded devices.

*Published in EE Times India

Over the past decade the embedded world has undergone tremendous change. With the advent of mobile phones, smart lifestyle gadget like wearables, health and wellness devices, on the consumer front, users are demanding smaller and thinner gadgets.

This has lead in turn to designs that increasingly need efficient memory architectures such as high memory capacity and high performance in small area and multiple bus issues that call for high scalability.  The designs demand compact and more densely populated electronic assemblies.

Package on package (PoP) is one of the techniques to address the demand for compact assemblies. PoP is a stacked packaging method to have two ball grid array (BGA) packages mounted one above the other with a standard interface to route signals between them. The most widely used integration components for stacking are the processor and memory. The combination of RAM & Flash memory in single chip BGA solution is also available, which allows a much higher component density on smaller form factor PCB design through the PoP assembly.

Stacking memory is one way to achieve the dual goals for enhanced functionality and greater packaging density of a product. It is fast becoming a promising solution, offering high integration that leads to product miniaturization.

Mobile applications can benefit from the combination of this stacked package, offering small footprint and minimal PCB space. Other portable electronic products such as

•      mobile phones (baseband or applications processor plus combo memory),

•       digital cameras (image processor plus memory),

•       PDAs, portable media players (audio/graphics processor plus memory), gaming and others also benefit from this design approach.

Benefits of PoP Technology

Using PoP technology in a design offers many advantages. The most obvious is the reduction in the PCB size or the small footprint of the PCB. Using PoP technology also ensures a reduction in the no. of layers of the PCB as the connection lines between the processor and the memory are minimized. This also improves signal integrity on the board by minimizing trace length between different interoperating parts, such as controller and memory. The direct interconnections between the circuit yields reduced propagation delay, noise and cross-talk.  Using PoP technology also makes for easy memory scalability on the hardware. This is because most of the memory modules for PoP design come in multi-chip packages (eg: Flash + DDR). Hence, both the Flash and DDR memory can be upgraded by replacing the single PoP memory package. And finally, there is the reduction in BoM cost achieve as a result of elimination of termination discretes on the PCB.

The ARM advantage

PoP technology is most popularly being used with ARM Processor Applications. Texas Instruments was one of the first semiconductor companies that adopted this technology. This is now being followed by other silicon vendors like Freescale etc. ARM chipsets are known for low power and are popular for small footprint, portable applications. The low power ensures less thermal radiation to the memory; when it is placed over the processor in the PoP technology. In comparison, Intel SoCs and other DSP are high power and have high thermal radiation. Therefore, there is a possibility of the memory to stall during operation, if the PoP technology concept is used for these chipsets.

An important point to note for product developers is that assembly of PoP PCBs requires special skillset and the need to follow a defined assembly process. The PCB manufacturer should follow the required methodology to ensure minimal yield issues for a successful implementation to take advantage of the benefits of such a design.

*Published in EE Times India