FLEXIRE: a flexible IR electronic system for reading out highly parallel output arrays

摘要

Abstract: The challenges associated with providing a commercial off-the-shelf infrared electronics system for reading out and controlling the next generation of highly parallel output focal plane arrays is examined. PolyCom's FLEXIRE$+TM$/ architecture is then shown to have the necessary flexibility and performance to meet the diverse needs of near and mid infrared imager and spectrometer type astronomical instruments. The FLEXIRE$+TM$/ architecture provides unique scalability features that allow the instrument designer to determine the compute power needed for their particular application and through software to reconfigure the system to interface to any number of off-the-shelf DSP boards that are based on industry standard bus architectures. The use of standard DSPs provides a well supported software environment for easy development of custom algorithms by the instrument development team. The open architecture and computer platform independence of the FLEXIRE$+TM$/ approach furthermore give the instrument designer enormous freedom in the design of his/her instrument. !7