A radiation-hardened programmable read only memory for space applications

Abstract

A radiation-hardened 64-Kb Programmable Read Only Memory (PROM) fabricated by 0.18 um commercial technology is proposed. The Radiation-Harden-By-Design (RHBD) technique is applied in the design of the PROM. At the cell level, memory cells consisting of two high reliable antifuse elements are used. At the circuit level, robust sense amplifiers are designed with Dual Interlocked Cell (DICE) latches added to the radiation sensitive nodes. Furthermore, the enclosed NMOS and guard rings are applied at the layout level. As the measurement showed, the PROM could operate at the temperature between −55 and +125°C with 55 ns maximum address access time. The TID (Total Ionizing Dose) test showed that irradiation dose to 5M rad(Si) negligibly impacted standby current and access time. In the heavy ion test, no SEU (Single Event Upset) and no SEL (Single Event Latch-up) were observed up to LET (Linear Energy Transfer) of 64.4 Mev·cm²/mg.