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arXiv · 1910.08804

Versatile firmware for the Common Readout Unit (CRU) of the ALICE experiment at the LHC

O. Bourrion·J. Bouvier·F. Costa·E. David·J. Imrek·T. M. Nguyen·S. Mukherjee
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Abstract

As from the run 3 of CERN LHC scheduled in 2022, the upgraded ALICE experiment will use a Common Readout Unit (CRU) at the heart of the data acquisition system. The CRU, based on the PCIe40 hardware designed for LHCb, is a common interface between 3 main sub-systems: the front-end, the computing system, and the trigger and timing system. The 475 CRUs will interface 10 different sub-detectors and reduce the total data throughput from 3.5 TB/s to 635 GB/s. The ALICE common firmware framework supports data taking in continuous and triggered mode and forwards clock, trigger and slow control to the front-end electronics. In this paper, the architecture and the data-flow performance are presented.

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O. Bourrion, J. Bouvier, F. Costa, E. David, J. Imrek, T. M. Nguyen, S. Mukherjee. 2019-10-19. Versatile firmware for the Common Readout Unit (CRU) of the ALICE experiment at the LHC. https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-0221/16/05/p05019

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