An assessment of complementary silicon-germanium BiCMOS technologies for extreme environment applications

Abstract

The objective of the presented research is to assess the potential of complementary Silicon-Germanium (SiGe) BiCMOS technologies for extreme environment applications, specifically, radiation-intense environments. We have investigated the single-event response of analog, RF, and digital circuits designed using only npn or only pnp SiGe heterojunction bipolar transistors (HBTs). All of the presented circuits designed using pnp devices showed an improved response to single-event transients, with tolerable reduction in performance. This work shows that pnp devices could be used to mitigate the effects of radiation on electronic circuits and systems.