Skip to main content
U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Survivability of spacecraft systems in space radiation

Conference · · Transactions of the American Nuclear Society; (United States)
OSTI ID:7269448
Space systems can be made to survive and operate in Earth's radiation belts. But to make them survive and operate, one has to understand them as systems, not just as a collection of individual piece parts. Whereas individual parts may upset or degrade in gain or even, in extreme cases, burn out, the system (properly designed) may continue to survive and operate. Space systems must, of course, be designed to survive and operate in the worst-case radiation environment in which they will be used. Achieving survivability for a space system is an iterative process. From the specified environment, simple, worst-case calculations of the dose in the electronics are made. Worst case means calculations made, often with many simplifying assumptions, that result in answers that are accurate or too high but not too low. A critical technique for achieving survivability is the selection of hardened parts. Parts are hardened for total ionizing dose, displacement damage, single-event upset/latchup, and dose rate effects. No space system hardening process can be considered to be complete without a significant amount of validation testing. Testing can be done at several different levels: piece part, circuit, box, and at the whole space system level.
OSTI ID:
7269448
Report Number(s):
CONF-911107--
Conference Information:
Journal Name: Transactions of the American Nuclear Society; (United States) Journal Volume: 63
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English