Patent ID: 8712727

Claim:
A field device for determining or monitoring a physical or chemical process variable, comprising: a sensor, which works according to a defined measuring principle; and a control/evaluation unit, which, as a function of a safety standard required for a particular safety-critical application, conditions and evaluates, along at least two equivalent digital measuring paths, measurement data delivered by the sensor, wherein: said control/evaluation unit is implemented on an FPGA 1 , on which are provided at least a first section and a second section, in each section, a digital measuring path, which is composed of a plurality of software-based and/or hardware-based function modules, is dynamically reconfigurable; the FPGA 1 has global lines and long lines, which extend across at least two of said individual sections, and which are blocked and grounded, the individual sections are isolated from one another by permanently configured spacer regions, said spacer regions are embodied in such a way, that a temperature and/or a voltage change in one of said digital measuring paths has no safety-critical influence on the other section of said digital measuring paths, and, in the case of safety-critical malfunction, no electrical connection occurs between said sections; and said control/evaluation unit, as a function of the particular defined safety-critical application, partially dynamically reconfigures the function modules in said measuring paths, so that the field device fulfills the required safety standard.