Real-Time Filtering and ECG Signal Processing Based on Dual-Core Digital Signal Controller System

ECG devices are increasingly used in the monitoring and timely detection of cardiovascular abnormalities. One of the biggest challenges for ECG device designers is to eliminate noise from the surrounding environment to obtain high-quality and real-time ECG signals. A microcontroller usually has low processing speed, so it is not appropriate for real-time processing of ECG signals with high sampling frequency. Processing continuous signals requires a high processing speed or processor that can be used with many partial processing hierarchies. In 2018, Microchip Technology Inc. launched a new family of 16-bit digital signal controllers (DSCs) with two cores: the master core can be operated at 180 MHz and the slave core can be operated at 200 MHz. The new DSC family is suitable for mobile application systems, such as ECG devices, which can collect and process data in real time with a process hierarchy. In this paper, we present an application of the two cores of DSCs in collecting and processing ECG signals in real time. In addition, we implement an infinite impulse response (IIR) filter to eliminate noise from the surrounding environment. Specifically, the master core collects and implements a high-pass IIR filter with five poles, and the slave core implements the low-pass IIR filter with seven poles and sampling frequency of ECG signals up to 400 Hz.