Applying Reconfigurable Computing to Acoustic Sensors Using FPGAs

A novel microsensor processing architecture allows a field-programmable gate array (FPGA) to act as a reprogrammable preprocessor or coprocessor to a general-purpose processor (GPP). The FPGA does most of the computationally complex pieces of the algorithm, while the GPP is lightly loaded, performing control, communications, and housekeeping tasks (Figure 1). The flexible architecture supports a wide range of low-power applications, while still being able to leverage emerging commercial technology.