MicroTCA-based data acquisition for APS radio frequency systems

A data acquisition (DAQ) system has been developed for Radio Frequency (RF) systems at the Advanced Photon Source (APS). The hardware is based on the MicroTCA platform and includes FPGA carrier boards equipped with FMC cards featuring RF ADC and DAC capabilities. These components interface with a Linux blade via PCIe over a backplane. The software, built on the EPICS framework, facilitates control and real-time DAQ of RF systems. The EPICS DAQ software streams data to distributed services on the APS network. The dataflow is presented, starting at the RF hardware, through the FPGA to the Linux blade, through the EPICS software, and finally to the network services. This project was a collaborative effort involving industry and multiple institutions.