Combined effects of electrical stress and neutron irradiation of the last generation of commercial discrete silicon carbide power MOSFETs are studied. The Single Event Burnout (SEB) sensitivity during neutron irradiation is analyzed for unstressed and electrically stressed devices. For surviving devices, a comprehensive study of the breakdown voltage degradation is performed by coupling electrical stress and irradiation effects. In addition, mutual influences between electrical stress and radiative constraints are investigated through TCAD modeling.

Functional verification schemes at a level different from component-level testing are emerging as a cost-effective tool for those space systems for which the risk associated with a lower level of assurance can be accepted. Despite the promising potential, system-level radiation testing can be applied to the functional verification of systems under restricted intrinsic boundaries. Most of them are related to the use of hadrons as opposed to heavy ions. Hadrons are preferred for the irradiation of any bulky system, in general, because of their deeper penetration capabilities. General guidelines about the test preparation and procedure for a high-level radiation test are provided to allow understanding which information can be extracted from these kinds of functional verification schemes in order to compare them with the reliability and availability requirements. The use of a general scaling factor for the observed high-level cross sections allows converting test cross sections into orbit rates.

The mechanisms responsible for neutron-induced single-event burnout (SEB) in commercial silicon carbide power MOSFETs under atmospheric-like neutron spectrum were investigated and analyzed. The combined effect of applied reverse gate voltage and drain voltage was evaluated. First, local analysis of the packaged device at the wafer level is performed to reveal the failure mechanism inside the semiconductor lattice. Second, based on gate stress testing of surviving devices and looking at the influence of reverse gate bias during irradiation, an enhanced failure sensitivity especially for drain voltage values close to the safe operating area was demonstrated. In addition to support this assumption, TCAD simulations with damage sites were performed in order to address physical mechanisms related to gate leakage degradation and SEB.

Commercial Off-The-Shelf Charge Coupled Devices were irradiated with protons at energies ranging from 17 MeV to 200 MeV. Evolution of the dark current distribution during irradiation is discussed. A general method is presented to predict the increase of both mean dark current and associated non-uniformity after a monoenergetic proton irradiation. The results are found to be in good agreement with the experimental outputs. The model is then used to assess the dark signal degradation of a device exposed to a multienergetic proton beam. Again, the predictions are shown to be consistent with the experimental data. This makes possible the assessment of the dark signal distribution of a device exposed to a real space environment.