Sequential circuit implementation method for multi-context scrubbing operations on FPGAs

This paper presents a proposal for a sequential circuit implementation method for multi-context scrubbing operations that can treat soft-error and permanent failure issues simultaneously. Although multi-context scrubbing operations can treat permanent failure issues on field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), implementing sequential circuits is difficult because the flip-flop location must be changed while maintaining sequential operations. Therefore, no multi-context scrubbing operation including a sequential circuit has been demonstrated to date. As described herein, a multi-context scrubbing operation using a simple 8-bit counter circuit has been demonstrated perfectly on an Artix-7 FPGA (XC7A35TICSG324-1L). This paper presents experimentally obtained results of that demonstration.