JPL SEE TESTS
Donald K. Nichols
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
(818) 354-5787
Donald.K.Nichols@jpl.nasa.gov

JPL has conducted two SEE tests-- one at Brookhaven National Laboratories (BNL) in September and another at Texas A & M (TAM) in December, 1996. Two tests for "latchup only" were conducted; the ADI AD773A ADC showed no latchup for LET=120 MeV/mg/cm2, but the Telecom TC4428 MOSFET driver showed a small (10-6 cm2) device latchup cross section for TAM ions of LET=25 and 44 MeV/mg/cm2. The latter part burned out readily in spite of efforts to prevent it by reducing the automatic power shutdown current to 100 mA.

Two Lambda DCDC converters, ATR2815 and ATW2805S/CH were tested. Each had a threshold for reset errors (aka dropout) at LET = 24 MeV/mg/cm2. At LET=44, a cross section of 10-5 cm2 was determined for reset errors for each device. A permanent dropout was also observed for the ATR2815, however, in which spontaneous recovery did not take place. The permanent dropouts had a cross section of 10-5 cm2. They could be removed by power down, followed by power up.

A major study was conducted of the Intel 28F016SA and 28F016SV flash memories. These are single chips comprising an EEPROM and a microcontroller. The SV version is the SmartVoltage technology which is capable of automatically detecting whether 3.3V or 5V is present at the Vcc pins and adjusting the device operation accordingly. It was found that the device exhibited many unusual single event effects, such as various lockup conditions that suggest that the status register, control logic, and row and column bit line drivers within the microcontroller are sensitive to ion hits-- down to a LET= 7 MeV/mg/cm2. These and other SEE problems are discussed in a paper submitted to the IEEE

Conference, July, 1997 at Snowmass.

For further discussion, please call Don Nichols at 818-354-5787 or FAX 818-393-4559.