EE563 - Digital Signal Processing using FPGAs

Course Overview

The course will present and examine the use of FPGAs for DSP algorithms, applications, and architecture. The course will feature the entire software design flow from concept, to bit true simulation, to actual hardware implementation. The course projects and lab work will focus on applications in radar and Electronic Warfare (EW) applications.

This course covers the following topics:

• Review of VHDL
• Introduction to DSP hardware technologies
• DSP arithmetic
• FIR and IIR filters and implementation
• Multirate signal processing
• Fast Fourier Transform (FFT)
• Adaptive filters
• Time frequency transforms

References

This course will be is lab focused and uses the Digilent Nexys 3 FPGA development board due to its low cost and 32 DSP slices. The following is a list of references for the Nexys 3 and the Pmod cards used for signal conversion:

• Digilent Nexys 3 FPGA development board
• Pmod DA2 analog to digital converter
• Pmod AD2 digital to analog converter

The lecture material and assigned readings in this course primarily come from two texts: Digital signal Processing with Field Programmable Gate Arrays by U. Meyer-Baese and Advanced FPGA Design by S. Kilts.

Learning Plan

This course is application and hardware focussed, as a result most learning will occur through the implementation of DSP systems on an FPGA. To that end, the following labs will be conducted:

• ADC/DAC Pmod Interface
• Pipelined FIR Filter
• IIR Oscillator Implementation
• Fast Fourier Transform
• Fast Convolution
• Digital Radio Frequency Memory Jammer

Students will also be required to engineer a DSP system based upon the latest research in a given field, for example LPI radar signal detection or classification. This design must be taken from conception to hardware implementation, and result in an extensive report based on their design and test results.