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January 09 Issue - Employee Monthly Magazine Predicting chip reliabilityLANSCE offers ‘real world’ evaluation
Steve Wender of Neutron and Nuclear Science. Photo by Richard Robinson
One of the best places worldwide for chipmakers to test the reliability of their devices is at the Laboratory's Los Alamos Neutron Science Center. Every year, between 15 and 20 integrated circuit manufacturers and users perform accelerated testing of chips and other equipment using LANSCE's neutron beam. Behind the program is Steve Wender of Neutron and Nuclear Science. "It's a wonderful example of the Laboratory working with the private sector," said Wender, who holds a doctoral degree from the University of Iowa. He also was named a Fellow of the American Physical Society in 1995 and has worked at McMaster University, Duke University-Triangle Universities Nuclear Laboratory, and The Svedberg Laboratory in Sweden. Wender said that such companies as Intel, Honeywell, Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), Boeing, Texas Instruments have tested their equipment at LANSCE. Testing prototypes of devices at Los Alamos helps manufacturers identify and correct weaknesses in their design early on in the production process, Wender said. The greatest threat integrated circuit devices face is from neutrons, which are produced in the atmosphere by cosmic rays, Wender said. "Neutrons have been shown to cause a variety of upsets in semiconductor devices," he said. A single neutron can cause a failure in a brand new device. The neutron spectrum generated at the high-energy neutron source at LANSCE has energies similar in shape to the atmospheric neutron spectrum produced by cosmic rays at 40,000 feet, he said. Testing a chip for a minute in LANSCE's neutron beam allows manufacturers to evaluate how that chip will behave in the "real world" during a year of operation. Wender said he is looking forward to having more semiconductor manufacturers use the LANSCE facilities as a resource. "We're fully booked up at this time," he said, adding that his team is planning the construction of an additional flight path to allow for more testing. "We're writing the proposal right now." --Tatjana K. Rosev Other Headlines
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