Chaos in asynchronously clocked communicating digital systems

A digital equivalent to a non-retriggerable monostable is examined and its behaviour is shown to be chaotic in a limiting case. This digital monostable and its trigger source are implemented as two communicating processes based on an up/down counter. A mapping is derived that describes the behaviour of the system. Properties of the mapping are examined in cases where the external triggering is synchronous and asynchronous, and where the operation of the digital monostable approaches the continuous limit. Results obtained from both experiment and simulation confirm the theoretical predictions. The wider implications of chaos in asynchronous communicating digital processes are discussed.