Cypress Semiconductor Corp. introduced Monday a new PSoC programmable system-on-chip that simplifies the design of next-generation industrial, home appliance and consumer systems that require multiple sensors.
Several Internet of Things (IoT) applications require multiple sensors and can benefit from dedicated coprocessors that offload sensor processing from the host and reduce overall system power consumption.
The PSoC Analog Coprocessor integrates programmable analog blocks, including a new Universal Analog Block (UAB), which can be configured with GUI-based software components, to ease the design of custom analog front ends for sensor interfaces by allowing engineers to update sensor features with no hardware or host processor software changes, while also reducing BOM costs.
For instance, in home automation applications, engineers can easily configure the PSoC Analog Coprocessor to continuously monitor multiple sensors, such as temperature, humidity, ambient light, motion and sound, allowing the host to stay in a standby low-power mode.
The design of custom sensor interfaces is enabled by Cypress’s free PSoC Creator™ Integrated Design Environment (IDE), which simplifies system design by enabling concurrent hardware and firmware development using PSoC Components—free embedded ICs represented by an icon in the IDE.
The PSoC Analog Coprocessor enables designs to send aggregated, pre-processed, and formatted sensor data over serial communication interfaces to host processors. It features programmable analog blocks like opamps, comparators, ADCs to create custom Analog Front Ends (AFE) for sensor interfaces; introduces new programmable Universal Analog Block that can be configured as Analog Filters, high-resolution ADCs, and more; debuts a 32-bit ARM Cortex-M0+ Signal Processing engine with a DMA controller; and features embedded peripherals including Timer/Counter/PWM blocks and Serial Communication Blocks (UART/SPI/I2C).
Engineers can configure the programmable analog blocks in the PSoC Analog Coprocessor by dragging and dropping components on the PSoC Creator schematic and customizing them with graphical component configuration tools. The components offer fully engineered embedded initialization, calibration and temperature correction algorithms.
The PSoC Creator integrated design environment provides concurrent hardware and firmware co-design in the same tool, enabling rapid prototyping and design iterations in software while eliminating the need for hardware changes and multiple PCB spins.
The PSoC Analog Coprocessor is available in a 3.7-mm by 2.0-mm chip-scale package option. Based on a 32-bit ARM Cortex-M0+ signal processing engine, it delivers a low-cost, fully programmable analog front end with opamps, programmable gain amplifiers, analog multiplexers, analog-to-digital converters, analog filters and digital-to-analog converters.
The PSoC analog coprocessor is currently sampling with production expected in the fourth quarter of 2016. Parts will be available in 45-pin CSP, 28-pin SSOP, 48-pin QFN and 48-pin TQFP packages from Cypress and its authorized distributors.
Future design changes to support new sensor types can also be implemented by reconfiguring the programmable analog blocks. Cypress will demonstrate the PSoC Analog Coprocessor, along with its PSoC, FM Flexible MCU, Bluetooth Low Energy and Energy Harvesting Power Management IC solutions at Sensors Expo later this month.
