Medical electronics applications become increasingly complex multi-core processors demand came into being (1)

Medical electronic world is undergoing fundamental change.

Equipment design has been renewed traditional 20 years behind each design are accompanied by inheritance and testing. Now requires more creative, to digital system as the basis of the new features and new version developed at an increasing rate. The biggest concern is the cost-effective implementation of the system to be more hospitals and operating theatres.

In order to develop the next generation security critical medical and industrial equipment, designers and system architects must combine hardware, reducing costs, reduce time to market, but does not affect platform stability, security and protection.

Today's security challenges for critical design

More and more system innovation steering software, software for safety-critical design has brought a major challenge.

Some parts of the software must remain fixed, offers proven security key features, and other parts to be able to add new features and innovation, and maintain hardware, to meet a variety of interference and risk assessment standards.

Address security issues and maximize inheritance is critical in the past, these areas have been isolated and segmentation, making them difficult to cheap and fast use of the electronic system performance and cost of extraordinary change, and on the situation of the market situation in slow time on maintenance costs.

Such as multicore processors and object-oriented embedded market optimized hypervisor software technology, and new methods, make it a reality in critical driving force.

This phenomenon has contributed to stimulating innovation in hardware and software integration, but also provides enhanced security requirements. This is not only important for medical equipment, but also spread to other areas, such as industrial control and traffic.

Historically, these market driven by functionality.

But in every area, security, protection, quality, maintainability, and cost-effectiveness of importance today is not what it was. In the apply to all sectors of fundamental functional safety standards IEC 61508 and its derivative standards, safety requirements poses new challenges to meet the functional requirements to comply with the standards.

Complex medical applications of nuclear equipment

In medical applications, used for diagnosis, x-ray shielding, CT scanning and dialysis machines and other complex devices use gradually increased, these devices must be added such as automatic report generation, and networking capabilities, while reducing costs.

Traditionally, these areas have separate hardware system provides innovative and upgrade, and in particular comply with medical standards such as electromagnetic compatibility standards IEC 60601 — to prevent device interference is critical — and the risk assessment standards ISO14971.

The schema uses a piece of plate for safety critical parts, often without software or just a small amount of software is hardwired, time-tested good design. The second piece plate used to add additional non-critical functions such as management and networking.

However this is only appropriate in the past, increases the new standards and features at the same time, based on cost and space reasons and consolidation system means double plate method is no longer feasible.

Today, added to the characteristics of the software must be validated and comply with the United States food and Drug Administration (FDA) or European related agencies rules of safety-critical standards such as 62304 standards define software life cycle process.

Multi-core devices is the key to meeting these requirements.

These devices are now pushing the embedded market, these industrial market requires 5 to 10 years of performance and support. However, they still use a commercial operating system and application software availability, and introduces the cost reduction and integration, this is from the PC and enterprise markets. Multi-core processor core can provide a method to convert an existing plate schema merge to a Board, in response to safety critical software using a kernel, the kernel used for other non-critical functionality.

System Integration Manager