A System-On-Chip platform for Earth and Planetary Laser Spectrometers

This paper discusses the building of a fully digital, Adaptive Tunable LAser Spectrometer (ATLAS) electronics/software platform for Earth and Planetary applications. Adaptive in this context refers to the real time analysis of the recorded spectra and using that information to continuously and autonomously optimize spectrometer performance if necessary/desirable. We discuss the results of rapid prototyping and how those results fed into design specifications for a new platform built with Zynq System-On-Chip (SoC) technologies from Xilinx. Existing TLS designs are limited to the extent that they employ analog implementations of filter, modulation/demodulation and phase sensitive detection circuitries. For our platform these functions are realized in the digital realm, allowing precise, reversible changes during instrument testing, integration and even after launch, all without the risk generally involved in physically removing hardware from a flight payload.