Merging Theory And Implementation: A Framework For Teaching Dsp Hardware Design

In this paper, we present a framework for teaching DSP hardware design and provide the necessary technical infrastructure for enabling this convergence of theory and implementation. Even though many curricula include separate classes in both DSP theory and VHDL modeling, there are few opportunities given to students to combine these two skills into a working knowledge of DSP hardware design. We have developed a pedagogical framework whereby students can leverage their previous knowledge of DSP theory and VHDL hardware design techniques to design, simulate, synthesize, and test digital signal processing systems. The synthesized hardware is implemented on FPGAs, which provides a fast and cost-ee ctive way of prototyping hardware systems in a laboratory environment. This framework allows students to expand their previous knowledge into a more complete understanding of the entire design process from specic ation and simulation through synthesis and veric ation.