A fast and versatile interlock system

In today’s large fusion or high energy physics experiments it is a common requirement to shut down a component quickly under certain conditions. These conditions can include a complex logic and timing as well as topologically distributed inputs. In addition, the shutdown should be as instantaneous as possible. The shutdown mechanism should be flexible enough to allow for the changing requirements of the daily experimental work. per presents an interlock system which meets these requirements. The system has a modular design consisting of an arbitrary number of identically distributed modules which are connected to a dedicated interlock bus. Each module monitors 10 analog signals for the up- or downward violation of a programmable threshold and triggers one or several programmable interlock signals with only the transmission line delay. Nevertheless, the configuration of these modules is done via software. This makes the system fast and flexible at the same time. The risk of a malfunction is minimized by redundancy and self-surveillance of the interlock bus.