Speaker
Description
As part of the commissioning activity for the new SEREEL2 pulsed laser single-event effects test system being created at Radtest Ltd’s Harwell site, tests have been carried out on two types of component to compare heavy ion test data with the results of laser testing. These results are being used for a comparison exercise to demonstrate the applicability of laser testing for the assessment of components for use in space.
This presentation will elaborate on the scope and motivation of the testing, provide details of the parts tested and show the results obtained. A special focus will be applied to comparing the results from the two sources. One linear, analogue device (the well-known LM124 quad operational amplifier) and one digital device (a SDRAM memory) have been used, allowing several types of single-event effect to be investigated. Latch-up, transients, SEU and MBU have all been observed, using the new SEREEL2 system and heavy ions from HIF at UCL in Belgium. The presentation will show how event rates vary i) with LET from heavy ions and ii) with pulse energy from the laser and will use the results to illustrate the similarity of the two approaches.
Whilst a general, quantitative equivalence between LET and pulse energy remains elusive, the qualitative similarity provides an excellent approach for the screening of components. Other applications of pulsed laser test data include mapping SEE sensitivity across the area of a die, improving the radiation tolerance of parts, investigating deep charge collection phenomena and studying rare events that would require too much heavy ion beam time to be cost-effective. The sensitive regions of the LM124 have been explored in this manner and will be described in the presentation.
