Radiation Hardened By Design (RHBD) Electronics Based on On-Shore 22nm FinFET Technology

This program will leverage the Intel 16 node on-shore production capability and its increased Total Ionizing Dose hardness by: 1) Developing RHBD mitigation approaches to known susceptibilities to energetic particle exposure to allow for long term design solutions across platforms, 2) Developing U.S. based Intellectual Property (IP) for the RHBD designs which allows for easy modification by various government programs depending on the intended application, and 3) Conducting additional hardening and testing of the RHBD Intel 16 technology for performance in hostile environments to provide an even greater depth of its use across platforms and applications. Phase II will continue to characterize survivability and operability in natural space and man-made radiation environments, and against standard military temperature cycling specifications. Identified RHBD designs will be optimized to improve baseline performance and increase survivability and level of operability in realistic natural space and man-made radiation environments. Alphacore will fabricate and test optimized parts in realistic natural space and prompt dose rate radiation environments and against standard military temperature cycling specification environments. We will work with a vendor, trusted foundry, fabrication house, and military prime contractors on parts manufacturability and producibility. The goal will be to incorporate hardened parts in a representative space avionic subsystem/system application and test in a realistic space radiation environment. Alphacore proposes initially to produce a 10-bit, 20GSPS Rad-Hard (RH) analog to digital converter (ADC) and later an assortment of low-cost, ultra-low power, and very-hard integrated circuit analog/mixed-signal IP blocks on an innovative FinFET technology known as the Intel 16. Such circuits will be both 1) tolerant to low energy particle exposure, and 2) suitable for detectors needing low noise charge amplifiers and filters, very high-rate imaging circuits, high-precision charge and timing measurement circuits, and low-power and small-area ADCs and time to digital converters (TDCs). IP blocks will be both 1) very rad-hard (RH) and resilient to space and military radiation environments, and 2) used in Alphacore’s analog/mixed-signal IP, like PLL, ADC, TDC, DAC, DROIC, PLL, serializers, preamplifiers, filters, voltage references, and I/O circuitry. Alphacore is already developing RH low power DROICs, ADCs and DACs through its Air Force Research Labs (AFRL) Spacecraft Electronics Technology program which requires multiple well validated process design kits (PDKs) in a SkyWater Technologies 90nm process. This PDK can be straightforwardly ported to the Intel 16 node for next generation space-borne ICs. Approved for Public Release | 22-MDA-11215 (27 Jul 22)