ITC/USA 2011 Conference Proceedings / The Forty-Seventh Annual International Telemetering Conference and Technical Exhibition / October 24-27, 2011 / Bally's Las Vegas, Las Vegas, Nevada / The higher bandwidth capacities available with the adoption of Ethernet technology for networked FTI data acquisition systems enable more data to be acquired by the Data Acquisition Unit (DAU) from high-speed data busses, with higher channel densities, faster sampling rates, and sample resolution. Ethernet offers increased flexibility, interoperability, and simplicity in terms of the FTI system topology. However, the adoption of Ethernet has numerous implications for the design and operation of the DAU in terms of supporting network protocols for synchronization, configuration, and the transmission of the acquired data. This paper explores these issues and discusses the merits of adopting Ethernet.

Over the last decade, research into unmanned and autonomous vehicles has greatly increased. With applications ranging from science and exploration to humanitarian and military efforts, the rising need for autonomous vehicles demands constant innovation and growth. The Intelligent Dependable Embedded Architectures (IDEA) lab at the University of Kentucky is continually launching research oriented programs [1]. A few key projects focus on the development of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV). Through this research, at the University of Kentucky, the need to develop a reliable, lightweight, node based hardware for use in light UAVs and other unmanned and autonomous vehicles became apparent. This paper addresses the design and implementation of a network processing node for light UAVs. This system utilizes a Controller Area Network (CAN) noise tolerant communications bus, a low power ZigBee Wireless Network for expanded inner plane communications and Silicon Laboratories C8051F041 microcontrollers to provide the necessary inputs/output and data processing. The final result will be a flight ready light UAV featuring distributed processing nodes to handle the servo communications and controls.

ITC/USA 2013 Conference Proceedings / The Forty-Ninth Annual International Telemetering Conference and Technical Exhibition / October 21-24, 2013 / Bally's Hotel & Convention Center, Las Vegas, NV / With the advent of networked based data acquisition systems comes the opportunity to acquire, transmit and store potentially very large volumes of data. Despite this, and the increased size of the data acquisition networks, the use of tightly integrated hardware, and setup and analysis software enable the FTI engineer to save time and increase productivity. This paper outlines how the use of innovative bus packetizer technology and the close integration of FTI software can simplify this process. The paper describes how packetizer technology is used to acquire data from avionics buses, and how it packages this data in a format that is optimized for network based systems. The paper further describes how software can simplify the process of configuring avionics bus monitors in addition to automating and optimizing the transport of data from various nodes in the acquisition network for transmission to either network recorders or via a telemetry link.