SETI CW SIGNAL DETECTOR

A SPECIAL COMPUTER ARCHITECTURE FOR CONTINUOUS WAVE (CW) SIGNAL DETECTION IS PROPOSED AS A SOLUTION TO THE SETI CW SIGNAL DETECTION PROBLEM. THE ARCHITECTURE INCORPORATES PARALLEL SIGNAL PROCESSING WITH MATCHED FILTER COMPUTATION AND CONTENT ADDRESSABLE MEMORY (CAM) PATTERN RECOGNITION TO PERFORM ALL ASPECTS OF CW SIGNAL DETECTION. THE SETI PROJECT'S APPROACH FOR FINDING EXTRATERRESTRIAL ARTIFICIAL SIGNALS INCLUDES THE DETECTION OF WEAK NARROW BAND CW SIGNALS AMONG A LARGE NUMBER OF NOISY NARROWBAND CHANNELS. THE CW SIGNALS MAY DRIFT SLOWLY IN FREQUENCY, ANDTHE MANY CHOICES FOR FREQUENCY AND DRIFT MAKE COMPUTATION ANARDUOUS TASK AND CW DETECTION DIFFICULT. A KEY PART OF THE PROPOSED INNOVATION IS A MINIMAL PRECISION MATCHED FILTER PROCESSOR THAT IS IDEALLY SUITED FOR CUSTOM VLSI. THIS DEVICE WHEN USED AS THE CW DETECTOR COMPUTATION ENGINE ALLEVIATES THE COMPUTATION BOTTLENECK AND REPLACES ALL COMPETING ALTERNATIVES IN PERFORMANCE, SIZE AND COST. FABRICATION OF LARGE-SCALE SETI SYSTEMS, SUCH AS 500 MILLION CHANNEL SPECTROMETERS, NOW BECOMES PRACTICAL WHEN THE DESIGN EMPLOYS THIS NEW CONCEPT IN MATCHED FILTER COMPUTATION.