Innovative Manufacturing Process Improvements

Target discrimination capabilities using advanced seekers and seeker image processing is one layer of providing for advanced threats such as multiple target clusters. Multiple Kill Vehicles addressing a cluster of potential targets is another significant layer in the overall BMDO arsenal. IBSi is collaborating with STI Electronics, Inc of Madison, AL. and MilliSensor Systems and Actuators, Inc. of West Newton, MA as critical team members in this proposed effort. The tasks defined herein lead to a significant improvement in advanced miniature kill vehicle seeker imaging system capability as well as vehicle Guidance, Navigation and Control. The MKV Kill Vehicle (KV) program, which is presently base-lining a MEMS IMU, is a good candidate for a very compact integrated avionics and signal processor with embedded MEMS based IMU. The short duration mission lends itself to an IMU that has relatively larger drift rates compared to FOG based solutions but at an extremely beneficial volume and mass reduction. The objective of the proposed effort is to develop a fully functional MEMS sensor suite utilizing an embedded digital control loop implemented in a high performance Xilinx Virtex-4 FPGA. The sensor readouts will interface to an IMU block internal to the same FPGA package.