Embedded processor system for controllable period-width multichannel pulse width modulation signals

TELKOMNIKA Telecommunication, Computing, Electronics and Control
Vol. 19, No. 1, February 2021, pp. 220~228
ISSN: 1693-6930, accredited First Grade by Kemenristekdikti, Decree No: 21/E/KPT/2018
DOI: 10.12928/TELKOMNIKA.v19i1.16432  220
Journal homepage: http://journal.uad.ac.id/index.php/TELKOMNIKA
Embedded processor system for controllable period-width
multichannel pulse width modulation signals
Mazin Rejab Khalil, Laith A. Mohammed
Engineering Technical College, Northern Technical University, Iraq
Article Info ABSTRACT
Article history:
Received Apr 19, 2020
Revised Jul 27, 2020
Accepted Sep 24, 2020
This paper proposes a sophisticated embedded processor system configured
on zynq-xc7z020 field programmable gate array (FPGA) device for
generating four channels pulse width modulation signals with variable duty
cycles and periods using embedded design techniques. The main advantages
of the technique are the high ability to perform a simultaneous control on
period and pulse width of the generated signals and a high system design
adaptation to choose the number of input/output channels. Controlling the the
period and the pulse width is achieved by injecting a digital signal to the
designed system to manipulate embedded timers’ operation. Vivado design
suite is used to develop the system hard ware in the integrated development
environment where the processing unit and peripherals are instantiated and
interconnected. A practical aplication program in C language is prepared to
make the system act according to the target. The designed system can be
used to drive multi-phase D.C to D.C convertors. The system performance is
verified by using vivado logic analyzer and chipscope windows. The
superiority of the proposed approach over other approaches is that it resulted
in a multi-inputs/multi-outputs pulse width modulation system with high
controllability on the pulse width and the period that ranges from 15 nsec to
60 sec.
Keywords:
Embedded design techniques
Processing system
Programmable logic
programming interfaces
Pulse width modulation
This is an open access article under the CC BY-SA license.
Corresponding Author:
Mazin Rejab Khalil
Engineering Technical College
Northern Technical University
Maj moah. Mosul, Iraq
Email: mazinrk56@gmail.com
1. INTRODUCTION
Pulse width modulation (PWM) signals occupy a wide scope of applications in electrical drives and
power electronics. Different algorithms and means were adopted for generating pwm signals according to the
type of application and available resources. Embedded design techniques are a brilliant tool to design an
embedded processor system, configure it on field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) slice and program it to
act according to the target that can be a pwm signal generator.
A PWM embedded module based on 8 bits 8051 microcontroller is proposed by [1], the PWM pulse
is generated by programming the control register and duty cycle register. FPGAs based variable and multiple
PWM signal is developed by [2] using comparators, counters and latching logics constructed by using verilog
hardware description language (HDL). Using Nois II processor a new type of PWM peripheral was designed
and accommodated by [3]. Trapezoidal modulated FPGAs based PWM controller is described by [4]. A
design of microblaze processor system accommodated to generate single PWM signal using embedded

TELKOMNIKA Telecommun Comput El Control 
Embedded processor system for controllable period-width multichannel pulse width… (Mazin R. Khalil)
221
design techniques was forwarded by [5]. A hard ware/software microblaze soft-core based system to generate
PWM signal using clock frequency to control the pulse width is presented by [6]. Sinusoidal pulse width
modulation system is constructed by [7] to act as AC voltage controller. An iterative reduction based
heuristic algorithm with closed loop and space vector PWM control of a Z-source inverter implemented in
hardware is discussed in [8]. A ratio based PWM technology in combination with proportional controller is
adopted by [9] to achieve a smooth mid point potential controller. Generating PWM signal by comparing
triangular wave with an adjustable direct current (DC) reference signal is performed by [10] to be used with
D.C to D.C converter. Phase shift angle digital PWM (DPWM) for Phtovoltaic inverters is developed in [11],
the proposed system is adapted to FPGAs platform. A PWM switching scheme for multiphase interleaved
converter using field Programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) is proposed by [12], the duty cycle is adjusted by
using assigned switches on Altera board. Space vector pulse width modulation (SVPWM) technique is
described by [13], the basic principle of SVPWM development depends on synthesizing a rotating reference
voltage vector. Different techniques were adopted in [14-17] to generate various types of PWM signals for
different applications.
The main target of the above-mentioned works was to generate single or multi-channels PWM
signals with constant period and variable pulse width. Alternatively, the goal of the work here is to generate
single or multi-channels pwm signals with variable period and variable pulse width, the period and pulse
width in each channel can be varied simultaneously in accordance with an external signal. This target is
achieved by using embedded design techniques to construct a processor system that includes two Arm®
Cortex™-A9 MP Core™ processors to be implemented on zync-xc7z020 FPGAs slice, the hardware is
programmed by preparing C language software application that adapts the system to act in accordance with
the target. The benefit of the suggested approach is that it results in a simple, applicable and reconfigurable
system. The designed system can also be accommodated to generate signals required by the systems
discussed in [18-20]. The remaining of the paper is organized as follows. In section 2, the research method is
explained to show the system hardware construction that includes intellectual property (IP) cores
instantiation, IP cores interconnection and FPGA slice configuration. In the second part of section 2, the
paper deals with system software development. In section 3, the results are displayed and discussed. The
conclusions and future works are given in section 4.
2. RESEARCH METHOD
The system design implies three stages. In the first stage the hardware part is constructed, while the
second stage includes programming the hardware to operate according to the target and the third stage is
specified for debugging the system performance. The zynq FPGA slice consists of processing system (PS)
with two ARM Cortex™-A9 processor cores, programmable logic (PL) and a number of intellectual
properties components (IPs) [21, 22]. The system hardware design depends on instantiating the intellectual
properties (IP) cores to PL and attaching it to PS to constitute the desired processor system. On chip
debugging schemes were used to display the generated signals [23-25].
2.1. System hardware construction
The hardware part of the system is developed by using the IP integrator tool available in the vivado
integrated development environment (IDE) [21, 22]. Figure 1 shows the block diagram of the zynq FPGA
device [26]. The hardware construction procedure implies three steps, IP cores instantiation, IP core
interconnection and FPGAs slice configuration.
Figure 1. The block diagram of of zynq FPGA device

 ISSN: 1693-6930
TELKOMNIKA Telecommun Comput El Control, Vol. 19, No. 1, February 2021: 220 - 228
222
2.1.1. IP cores instantiation
In the first step a processing unit, block RAM (BRAM) controller IP core, General purpose
input/output (GPIO) IP core, and four timers IP cores (timer_0, timer_1, timer_2 and timer_3) are
instantiated to the IP integrator diagram as shown in Figure 2. The processing unit in PS domain contains two
processor cores, each of them includes 32KB instruction cache, 32 KB data cache, floating point unit and
memory management unit (MMU) to provide access to the one mega byte dual data rate dynamic RAM
(DDR3) available on the evaluation board [21, 26-30]. The block RAM is 64 KB two ports memory, it is
mostly used as a boot memory. The GPIO unit is a custom input/output unit that deals with data width
ranging between (1-64) bits, the on-line data acquired by this unit is used to determine the duty cycle and
pulse width of each output control signal [31, 32]. The timers are used to generate the output control pulses,
each timer module consists of two 32 bits counters (counter 0 and counter 1) as shown in Figure 3, each
counter is associated with a load register (LR0 and LR1 for counter 0 and counter 1 respectively) that is used
to hold the count value of the counter and a control/status register (CR0 and CR1 for counter 0 and counter 1
respectively) to control the operation mode of the counter [33]. Each counter generates a single pulse at the
expiration of count interval, the two counters are used to generate the output signal in the form of pulse width
modulation (pwm) where counter 0 sets the period and counter 1 specifies the high time of the output
signal [31, 33]. The timer’s operation is controlled by programming the control/status registers by the
prepared software program. The data acquired by the GPIO is to be transferred to the load registers of the
counters via the prepared program to set the output signal specifications.
Figure 2. Hardware components of the designed processor system
Figure 3. The timer module

223
2.1.2. IP cores interconnection
In the second step the connection operation is performed in the IP integrator environment [21, 22].
Figure 4 shows the resultant system hardware, the processing system is connected to the peripherals by
AXI-interconnect unit [34, 35]. The resultant system contains four output channels (pwm0, pwmo_c1,
pwm0_c2, pwm0_c3), each channel is used to drive a DC to DC convertor with suitable control signal.
Figure 5 displays the address map of the designed processor system.
Figure 4. The designed embedded processor system hardware
Figure 5. The address map of the designed processor system
2.1.3. FPGAs slice configuration
The third step implies configuring the FPGAs slice with system bit stream through synthesis,
implementation, bit stream generation and down loading operations [21, 22]. Xilinx synthesis technology
(XST) tool is used in synthesis stage to generate an industry-standard electronic data interchange format
(EDIF) file. The implementation stage implies converting the generated (EDIF) file into a physical file
format. The physical information contained in native circuit description (NCD) file is used to create a bit
stream file that is necessary to program the FPGAs slice.

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2.2. System software development
The software part of the system is developed using the software development kit (SDK) tools
available in vivado IDE, the processor system is programmed to generate the required control signals using C
language [36]. The flow chart of the prepared program part that is responsible for generating the PWM
signals is shown in Figure 6. The load registers LR0 and LR1 of each timer are loaded with arrays A0 and A1
that holds the period and high time values respectively in a fashion shown in Figure 6. The data (A0 and A1
arrays) acquisition is performed via the input/output port GPIO_IO using certain application programming
interfaces (APIs) prepared for this purpose with C language [36]. The GPIO_IO port is composed of two
channels, channel 1 is specified for acquiring data of A0 array and channel 2 is specified to acquire data of
A1 array in the fashion shown in Table 1. Figure 7 shows the control/status register diagram for each counter
while Table 2 explains the used bits definition of the control/status register [33]. The control/status register is
set as shown in Figure 7 to generate PWM signal according to the register value (register value=0x214).
Figure 6. The flowchart of the prepared application for generating PWM signals
Table 1. Data acquisition mode
Read Cycle Acquired Data from Channel 1 Acquired Data from Channel 2
1
2
3
4
A0[0]→LR0 of timer_0

225
Figure 7. Control/status register diagram
Table 2. Control/status register bit definition
Bit Name Description
9 Pwm 0= Disable pwm, 1=Enable pwm
7 ENT 0= Disable timer, 1=Enable timer
6 ENIT 0= Disable Interrupt, 1= Enable nterrupt
5 Load 0= No load, 1= load timer with value in LR
4 ARHT Auto Reload/Hold, 0= Hold counter,
1=Reload counter with value in LR
2 GENT 0= Disable external generate signal,
1= Enable external generate signal
1 UDT 0= Up count, 1 = Down count
0 MDT Timer Mode, 0= Generate, 1= Capture
3. RESULTS AND ANALYSIS
Figure 8 displays a pulse width modulation signal (pwm0) generated by timer_0 on hardware
manager integrated logic analyzer (hw_ila) window, the generateout0 and generateout1 signals are one clock
pulses generated by counter 0 and counter 1 respectively. It is seen that the signal generateout0 sets the
period while the on time of the pwm0 pulse is specified by both generateout0 and generateout1signals. At the
expiration of the count interval of counter 0 a single pulse of generateout0 is released to initiate the on time
of pwm0 and at the expiration of count interval of counter 1 a single pulse of generateout1 is released to
terminate the on time of pwm0. The count interval of each counter depends on the number stored in LR0 and
LR1 registers that contain A0[0] and A1[0] respectively. As A0[0] and A1[0] are acquired by the
input/output port GPIO_IO, the data fed to the designed system via this port represents a control signals that
control the period and pulse width of the generated signal (pwm0). Figure 8 shows that the control signal can
vary the width of consecutive pulses resulting in a high controllability pwm generating system. The pwm
signals generated by the four timers can be controlled in the same manner as pwm0.
Figure 8. Pulse width modulation signal generated by timer_0
Figure 9 depicts four pwm signals (pwm0, pwm0_c1, pwm0_c2 and pwm0_c3) generated by
the system four timers with different pulse width displayed on ILA chipscope window. The period and high
time of each generated pwm signal is specified by the values injected in LR0 and LR1 registers of each timer
in a style shown in Table 1. Figure 10 shows a new set of pwm pulses generated by the designed system after

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226
introducing new data set of A0 and A1 at sample 3225 resulting in a four channels pwm system with high
flexibility to vary the period and pulse width of any pulse or set of pulses according to the data (external
control signal) acquired by the input/output port GPIO_IO.
Figure 9. pwm pulses generated by the by the system four timers (pwm0-pwm0_c3)
Figure 10. pwm pulses generated after introducing new set of control signals

227
Since the used counters are 32 bits counters, the achievable range of period can be between 15 nsec
to 60 seconds. Table 3 shows the high time and period for five consecutive pwm signals that are achieved by
the designed system at pwm0 channel, the periods are chosen deliberately such that their sum is 20 msec.
The obtained results indicate that the designed system implies high ability to realize a simultaneous control
on the period and duty factor of four pwm channels pulse by pulse in response to external effect. This is a
significant improvement over other to date pwm systems that offer a control on period or duty factor.
Table 3. Obtained high time and period for five consecutive pulses
Pulse Number High Time(µsec) Period (µsec)
1 2860 5146
2 162 4278
3
4
5
576
2286
4116
3436
2448
4692
4. CONCLUSIONS
The main goal of the current paper was to develop a new sophisticated method for designing and
implementing a processor system that can be configured on zynq-xc7z020 FPGA device to generate four
channels pwm signals with variable period and pulse width. According to the obtained results, it can be
concluded that; four pwm signals can be generated simultaneously with zynq-xc7z020 FPGAs slice using
embedded design techniques. As the number of generated signals depends mainly on the available resources
of the FPGAs slice, the number of the generated pwm signal trains can be extended accordingly. The period
and pulse width of each pwm signal can be varied in conformity with external signal that can be acquired
through an input/output port yielding a controllable pwm signal generating system with (15 nsec-60 sec)
achievable range of period. The pulse width and period can be varied pulse by pulse or group of pulses by
group for each train simultaneously resulting in a system with high controllability.
The results obtained from this paper enhances the ability to create a pwm signal controller whose
response is accommodated with an external effect to control converter circuits operation. The novelty of the
work is characterized by the designed system ability to perform a simultaneous variation in pulse width and
period, pulse by pulse. Further experimental investigations are suggested to generate 8-16 channels pwm
system using the same techniques adopted in this work.
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