Design of an expandable real-time simulation (eRTS) platform for multi-level rapid prototyping

A real-time simulation (RTS) platform is a critical design and verification for rapidly designing and testing electrical and computing hardware as well as embedded software employed in real-time embedded applications, including an autonomous electric vehicle (AEV). We have developed a wirelessly expandable real-time simulation (eRTS) platform for mixed-level rapid prototyping of an AEV system. The eRTS platform consisting of a microkernel-based multi-core RTS and multiple monolithic-kernel console units is interoperable to FPGA-based virtual prototypes and further expandable to the real prototype via wireless (IEEE 802.15.4). The multi-core RTS and multi-console units are interfaced with high-speed wire/wireless (IEEE 802.3u/802.11g) for both software-/hardware-in-the-loops (SIL/HIL) simulations. In particular, the eRTS provides a mixedlevel of intuitively expandable HIL simulations with software models and virtual/real prototypes. The proposed eRTS platform swiftly handles different scale and complexity of AEV testing at various development stages while satisfying real-time constraints (i.e., 7 μs resolutions and 0.3% HIL simulation error) of the AEV software models and virtual/real prototypes.