Serenity: An ATCA prototyping platform for CMS Phase-2

Abstract

Serenity is an ATCA prototyping platform designed to explore alternative, novel design choices for CMS Phase-2. It uses a newly available interconnect technology from Samtec (Z-RAY) to mount a removable processing unit (FPGA) that should mitigate risk and provides significant flexibility in processing unit choice and connectivity. We explore the pros and cons of using an industry-standard Computer-On-Module running standard Centos Linux and a small service FPGA for low level control. Specially designed Kapton heaters have been used to validate the thermal design of the card and broader considerations of ATCA systems.