Development of High Speed Data Acquisition System using Multiprocessor Array

1989 Fiscal Year Final Research Report Summary

• Project/Area Number: 63460019
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for General Scientific Research (B)
• Allocation Type: Single-year Grants
• Research Field: 核・宇宙線・素粒子
• Research Institution: National Laboratory for High Energy Physics(KEK)
• Principal Investigator: WATASE Yoshiyuki KEK Computer Center, Prof., データ処理センター, 教授 (70018662)
• Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha): ARAI Ichiro Univ. of Tsukuba, Inst. of Physics, Lecturer, 物理学系, 講師 (50134440) ; KARITA Yukio KEK Computer Center, Ass. Prof., データ処理センター, 助教授 (10044744) ; NOMACHI Masaharu KEK Physics Department, Res. Ass., 物理研究部, 助手 (90208299) ; SAKAMOTO Hiroshi KEK Physics Department, Res. Ass., 物理研究部, 助手 (80178574) ; FUJII Hirofumi KEK Physics Department, Ass. Prof., 物理研究部, 助教授 (60013439)
• Project Period (FY): 1988 – 1989
• Keywords: Processor Array / Distributed Processing / TRANSPUTER / Real time Processing / Pattern Recognition

Research Abstract

In the recent years, high energy physics experiments are getting the size bigger and bigger as the energy goes up. The data acquisition and processing system must deal with the large data size and complex data format. It requires advanced method for the data acquisition other than a larger capacity of the data transmission. An intelligent data preprocessing system is required to cope with the large data in addition to the data correction and compression in real time. Along this aim, a multi-processor system was developed using the TRANSPUTER of INMOS. The microprocessor has a facility of four communication ports for each other; LINK which provides an easy connection between microcomputer nodes in the array. For evaluation of such system in the experimental environment, an array system was designed to apply for the track finding processing based on the hit wire information of the central drift chamber of TRISTAN VENUS detector.
In this research, we designed and built an interface circuit to squire the hit wire data from the CDC readout electronics. Also the software system for the parallel processing of the data in the array was developed. The interface is consist of the general control part and the dedicated part for this application which must be redesigned for the other application.
The multiprocessor array under test consists of 20 TRANSPUTER nodes, the number of which is expandable easily. Although, an improvement of the distributed processing software is still under way, the performance of the system under the current version of the software were measured by loading the real experimental data. The results show the average processing time for the data is about a few milliseconds instead of 20 msec by Fujitsu M-780. The result shows the performance is enough for the present application for the VENUS experiment.
A report of this development has been discussed. in the symposium on the Next Generation System of Data Acquisition in March 10-11, 1989, And the result is also reported at the conference of Computing in High Energy Physics '90 held at Santa Fe,New Mexico, April 9-13 1990.