SAN FRANCISCO—Actel Corp. said Wednesday (Jan. 20) that its low-power ProASIC3 and ProASICPLUS FPGA families have been designed into flight-critical applications on the new Boeing 787 Dreamliner commercial airliner.

Flight computers, cockpit displays, engine control and monitoring systems, braking systems, safety warning systems, cabin pressurization and air conditioning systems, and power control and distribution systems all make use of Actel's flash-based FPGAs, the company said. The Dreamliner successfully completed its maiden test flight on Dec. 15, 2009.

Actel (Mountain View, Calif.) said its flash-based ProASIC3 and ProASICPLUS devices are low-power, single-chip, live-at-power-up solutions that combine high-performance and high-reliability with nonvolatility and in-system reprogrammability. Unlike SRAM-based FPGAs, Actel's flash-based FPGAs are immune to neutron-induced configuration upsets, the company said. For an avionic system designer, this immunity is essential because the occurrence of troublesome neutron radiation is approximately 150 times higher at commercial aviation altitudes than at sea level, according to the company.

Particularly detrimental in safety-critical aerospace applications, radiation-induced configuration upsets can cause SRAM-based FPGAs to lose vital configuration data and consequently behave unpredictably, Actel said.