NASA SBIR 00-1 SOLICITATION

FORM 9B - PROJECT SUMMARY

PROPOSAL NUMBER 00-1 16.04-8042 (Chron: 001959 )
PROJECT TITLE
Single Event Latchup Mitigation in Commercial Microelectronics

TECHNICAL ABSTRACT (LIMIT 200 WORDS)
Nanosat technology will require commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) integrated circuits (ICs) to meet the performance requirements. Single event latchup (SEL) triggered by energetic ions in the space environment is a reliability concern. Thinning the Si substrate material below the active region in the CMOS structure raises the threshold linear energy transfer (LET) threshold for energetic ions to trigger SEL because the thinner substrate region produces less charge when the ion penetrates. With a higher LET threshold, there are fewer ions capable of triggering SEL, rendering the IC more radiation-tolerant with respect to SEL. The innovation of this approach is that substrate thinning will be applied to unhardened ICs which are purchased from commercial vendors and post-processed (thinned and possibly ion implanted) and packaged as a radiation-tolerant product. This will enable use of a large class of high-performance ICs that would not otherwise be acceptable for use in the space radiation environment. The significance of this innovation is that it will reduce susceptibility of COTS microelectronics to SEL and enable their use in future NASA missions. In Phase I we will assess the feasibility of the approach and in Phase II we will demonstrate prototypes.

POTENTIAL COMMERCIAL APPLICATIONS
All commercial and government implementation of space systems is faced with the challenge of using unhardened commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) microelectronics in the radiation environments of space. This project will be performed with Space Electronics Incorporated (SEI) as subcontractor. SEI serves the space community by re-selling COTS microelectronics after making them more radiation-tolerant through various post-processing methods. The results of this project will feed directly into the commercialization plans of SEI and will become available to commercial and government spacecraft designers.

NAME AND ADDRESS OF PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR (Name, Organization Name, Mail Address, City/State/Zip)
James Pickel
PR&E Technology
24631 Ladera Dr.
Mission Viejo , CA 92691 - 5039

NAME AND ADDRESS OF OFFEROR (Firm Name, Mail Address, City/State/Zip)
PRE Associates (aka PR&E Technology)
24631 Ladera Dr
Mission Viejo , CA 92691 - 5039