THREE-DIMENSIONAL SOLID STATE MULTI-PORT MEMORY SYSTEM

IRVINE SENSORS CORPORATION (ISC) PROPOSES TO APPLY ITS 3-D PACKAGING TECHNIQUE TO DEVELOP A SOLID STATE, MULTI-PORT, HIGH-SPEED, HIGH-DENSITY MEMORY SYSTEM FOR SPACEBORNE APPLICATIONS UTILIZING MULTIPLE DATA RECORDING INSTRUMENTS. THIS SOLID STATE MEMORY SYSTEM WILL BE CONFIGURED TO BE AS GENERIC AS POSSIBLE. SINCE THE MEMORY SYSTEM IS SOLID STATE AND CONTAINS NO MOVING PARTS, IT CAN WITHSTAND SEVERE ENVIRONMENTS. THE SYSTEM CAN ALSO BE CONFIGURED WITH DIFFERENT MEMORY IC TECHNOLOGIES (SRAM, DRAM, EEPROM, FERROELECTRIC) TO BEST FIT THE SPECIFIC APPLICATION REQUIREMENTS. FOR EXAMPLE, A 64-MEGABYTE MASS MEMORY, BASED UPON 256K RADIATION HARDENED SRAM ICS, WOULD OCCUPY LESS THAN 4 CUBIC INCHES. USING MORE ADVANCED 1 MEGABIT ICS, IT WILL BE POSSIBLE TO PACKAGE A TERABIT OF DATA INTO LESS THAN ONE CUBIC FOOT. THE PROPOSED INNOVATION IS TO CONFIGURE A REPLACEMENT FOR OPTICAL RECORDERS BASED UPON THIS TECHNOLOGY. DURING PHASE I, THE UPPER LIMITS ON SIZE, BANDWIDTH, AND RADIATION RESISTANCE WILL BE EXPLORED, AND A LOW RISK PHASE II DEMONSTRATION UNIT CONFIGURED. IN PHASE II, A DEMONSTRATION WILL BE PERFORMED OF A HIGH DENSITY MEMORY DESIGN SUITABLE FOR NEAR TERM SPACE USE.