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Consolidating Safety-Critical Cockpit Displays on a Shared GPU

A startup that builds core avionics and control systems for eVTOL and low-altitude economy aircraft is putting several safety-critical cockpit applications on one processor and one GPU, with DAL A assurance as its target. Lynx supplies the GPU software stack that makes the sharing safe.

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 Use Case Snapshot

Item Detail
Customer Profile A startup building core avionics and control systems for eVTOL and low-altitude economy aircraft 
Application Cockpit display and avionics platform
Compute Multi-core Intel processor with integrated graphics
Operating Environment ARINC 653 partitioned real-time operating system
GPU Software Lynx CoreSuite 2.0: OpenGL SC 2.0 graphics libraries and GPU safety monitoring
Assurance Target  DO-178C and DO-254, DAL  A
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The Challenge

A pilot depends most on attitude, airspeed, altitude and navigation. Errors in these displays can have catastrophic consequences, so the platform that draws them is held to the highest assurance level. The same cockpit also needs other applications, including flight instruments, navigation, radio management and system pages. Giving each its own display computer adds weight, power and wiring, and in an eVTOL every kilogram counts. A new entrant faces one more pressure: with no legacy avionics to reuse, the platform choices it makes now will carry through the whole certification effort.

The Approach

 The customer hosts each application in its own ARINC 653 partition on a single multi-core processor. Lynx CoreSuite 2.0 supplies the safety-critical GPU stack. Its OpenGL SC 2.0 libraries let the partitions share the integrated GPU, so each one renders its own content without disturbing the others, and its TrueCore safety monitor continuously checks the integrity of the GPU’s output. Around this core, critical parameters can be cross-checked between display units and watched by an independent monitor, and the processor vendor supplies an airworthiness evidence package for the processor family.  

 

What it Enables

  • Fewer display computers, because several applications share one processor and one GPU.
  • Independence between applications: each can be developed and verified on its own schedule, subject to the agreed certification plan.
  • A clearer certification path that combines partitioning evidence from the platform, certification-ready GPU software from Lynx and processor evidence from the silicon vendor.
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Questions to Ask When Consolidating Displays

  • How is GPU access shared between partitions, and what evidence covers the driver stack?
  • How is interference between processor cores bounded, and how is that shown to the certification authority?
  • What evidence does the processor vendor provide, and at which assurance levels?
  • How are critical display parameters cross-checked, and by what independent means?

About Lynx

Lynx builds trusted software platforms for commercial aerospace, defense and space. Its portfolio includes LYNX MOSA.ic.AI framework for mixed-criticality systems and the CoreSuite 2.0 safety-critical GPU software.

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