Single event soft error in advanced integrated circuit

As technology feature sizes decrease, single event upset (SEU), and single event transient (SET) dominate the radiation response of microcircuits. Multiple bit upset (MBU) (or multi cell upset) effects, digital single event transient (DSET) and analogue single event transient (ASET) caused serious problems for advanced integrated circuits (ICs) applied in a radiation environment and have become a pressing issue. To face this challenge, a lot of work has been put into the single event soft error mechanism and mitigation schemes. This paper presents a review of SEU and SET, including: a brief historical overview, which summarizes the historical development of the SEU and SET study since their first observation in the 1970's; effects prominent in advanced technology, which reviews the effects such as MBU, MSET as well as SET broadening and quenching with the influence of temperature, device structure etc.; the present understanding of single event soft error mechanisms, which review the basic mechanism of single event generation including various component of charge collection; and a discussion of various SEU and SET mitigation schemes divided as circuit hardening and layout hardening that could help the designer meet his goals.     

基于四值脉冲参数模型的单粒子瞬态传播机理与软错误率分析方法

随着工艺尺寸的不断缩小,由单粒子瞬态(Single Event Transient, SET)效应引起的软错误已经成为影响宇航用深亚微米VLSI电路可靠性的主要威胁,而SET脉冲的产生和传播也成为电路软错误研究的热点问题。通过研究SET脉冲在逻辑链路中的传播发现：脉冲上升时间和下降时间的差异能够引起输出脉冲宽度的展宽或衰减;脉冲的宽度和幅度可决定其是否会被门的电气效应所屏蔽。该文提出一种四值脉冲参数模型可准确模拟SET脉冲形状,并采用结合查找表和经验公式的方法来模拟SET脉冲在电路中的传播过程。该文提出的四值脉冲参数模型可模拟SET脉冲在传播过程中的展宽和衰减效应,与单参数脉冲模型相比计算精度提高了2.4%。该文应用基于图的故障传播概率算法模拟SET脉冲传播过程中的逻辑屏蔽,可快速计算电路的软错误率。对ISCAS89及ISCAS85电路进行分析的实验结果表明：该方法与HSPICE仿真方法的平均偏差为4.12%,计算速度提升10000倍。该文方法可对大规模集成电路的软错误率进行快速分析。     

Design and simulation of novel TLG–SET based configurable logic cells

Single electron tunneling circuits seem to be promising candidates as basic circuit elements of the next generation ultra-dense VLSI and ULSI circuits for their ultra-low power consumption, ultra-small size, and rich functionality. In this paper, design and simulation of novel configurable logic cells (CLCs) using single electron tunneling (SET) technology based threshold logic gate (TLG) are presented. The proposed CLC can realize all Boolean logic functions by configuring the control bits without changing the structure of the circuit and the parameters of TLG–SET based design. The logic operation of the circuit is simulated using Monte Carlo simulation. According to the simulation results, the circuit operation based on the transfer of single electrons between adjacent islands is stable.     

Differential Cascode Voltage Switch (DCVS) Strategies by CNTFET Technology for Standard Ternary Logic

Differential Cascode Voltage Switch (DCVS) is a well-known logic style, which constructs robust and reliable circuits. Two main strategies are studied in this paper to form static DCVS-based standard ternary fundamental logic components in digital electronics. While one of the strategies leads to fewer transistors, the other one has higher noise margin. New designs are simulated with HSPICE and 32 nm CNTFET technology at various realistic conditions such as different power supplies, load capacitors, frequencies, and temperatures. Simulations results demonstrate their robustness and efficiency even in the presence of PVT variations. In addition, new noise injection circuits for ternary logic are also presented to perform noise immunity analysis.     

Soft Error Mitigation Through Selective Addition of Functionally Redundant Wires

We introduce a logic-level soft error mitigation methodology for combinational circuits. The proposed method exploits the existence of logic implications in a design, and is based on selective addition of pertinent functionally redundant wires to the circuit. We demonstrate that the addition of functionally redundant wires reduces the probability that a single-event transient (SET) error will reach a primary output, and, by extension, the soft error rate (SER) of the circuit. We discuss three methods for identifying candidate functionally redundant wires, and we outline the necessary conditions for adding them to the circuit. We then present an algorithm that assesses the SET sensitization probability reduction achieved by candidate functionally redundant wires, and selects an appropriate subset that, when added to the design, minimizes its SER. Experimental results on ISCAS'89 benchmark circuits demonstrate that the proposed soft error mitigation methodology yields a significant SER reduction at the expense of commensurate hardware, power, and delay overhead.     

Layout-based Single Event Mitigation Techniques for Dynamic Logic Circuits

Due to the intrinsic lack of restoring paths, dynamic logic circuits have significant single-event susceptibility, and thus, they are not preferred in applications requiring high reliability when compared to static logic. However, in high speed applications, this circuit family is still very attractive. This papers presents two layout-based single-event resilient dynamic logic designs. The resultant SET pulse is suppressed because of charge-sharing in the layout-level. Simulation results verify that they enjoy higher single event tolerance. Experimental results validate the fact that approximately 20?~?30 % of magnitude reduction in cross-section is achieved in both designs. On the other hand, the increase in single-event performance is achieved at the expense of power and area overheads of 10 and 15 %, respectively, using our layout style in 130 nm CMOS bulk technology.     

Single event crosstalk prediction in nanometer technologies

As CMOS technology continues to scale down, circuits become increasingly more sensitive to transient pulses caused by single event (SE) particles. On the other hand, coupling effects among interconnects can cause single event transients to contaminate electronically unrelated circuit paths which may increase the SE susceptibility of CMOS circuits. The coupling effects among interconnects need to be considered in single event hardening, modeling and analysis of CMOS logic gates due to technology scaling effects that increase both SE vulnerability and crosstalk effects. This work, for the first time, proposes an SE crosstalk noise estimation method for use in design automation tools. The proposed method uses an accurate 4-π model for interconnect and correctly models the effect of non-switching aggressors as well as aggressor tree branches noting the resistive shielding effect. The SE crosstalk noise expressions derived show very good results in comparison to HSPICE results. Results show that average error for noise peak is about 5.2% while allowing for very fast analysis in comparison to HSPICE.     

基于保护门的纳米CMOS电路抗单粒子瞬态加固技术研究

随着器件特征尺寸的缩减,单粒子瞬态效应(SET)成为空间辐射环境中先进集成电路可靠性的主要威胁之一。基于保护门,提出了一种抗SET的加固单元。该加固单元不仅可以过滤组合逻辑电路传播的SET脉冲,而且因逻辑门的电气遮掩效应和电气隔离,可对SET脉冲产生衰减作用,进而减弱到达时序电路的SET脉冲。在45 nm工艺节点下,开展了电路的随机SET故障注入仿真分析。结果表明,与其他加固单元相比,所提出的加固单元的功耗时延积(PDP)尽管平均增加了17.42%,但容忍SET的最大脉冲宽度平均提高了113.65%,且时延平均降低了38.24%。     

The impact of Miller and coupling effects on single event transient in logical circuits

With feature size scaling down, Miller feedback effects of gate-to-drain capacitance for transistors and coupling effects between interconnects will dramatically affect single event transient (SET) generation and propagation in combinational logic circuits. Two ways of ICs are arranged: linear and “S” types. For pulse width and delay time, SET propagations in two layouts of digital circuits are compared under considering the coupling effects between interconnects. An analytical model is used to describe the impact of Miller and coupling effects on SET propagation. A criterion for SET occurrence in digital circuits with effects of coupling and Miller feedback is presented. The influence of temperature and technology node on SET generation and propagation is analyzed. The results indicate that (1) the existence of these effects will improve the critical charge for SET generation and also reduce the estimated SER, and (2) the way of “S” type is more immune to SET than the scheme of linear.     

Mitigation for single event coupling delay

With advances in CMOS technology, circuits are increasingly more sensitive to transient pulses caused by single event particles. It has been predicted that the majority of the observed radiation induced soft failures in technologies below 65 nm will be because of transients that will occur in combinational logic (CL) circuits. Researchers mostly consider single event transients as the main source for CL related radiation-induced soft errors. However, for high reliability applications such as avionics additional sources need to be included in reliability analysis. In this work, we report a new error mechanism named ‘single event crosstalk delay’, investigate the vulnerability of recent technologies to these delay effects and then propose hardening techniques for single event crosstalk delay. Results are demonstrated using HSpice simulations with interconnect and device parameters derived in 130, 90 and 65 nm technology.     

电荷共享对于CMOS逻辑门单粒子瞬态响应的影响

随着CMOS工艺继续缩小,单粒子瞬态脉冲已经成为航天用数字电路的重要故障来源。同时,相邻晶体管之间的电荷共享也随之增加并导致组合电路中单粒子瞬态脉宽缩短,即脉宽抑制效应。之前的文献提出了PMOS到PMOS的脉宽抑制,而本文提出了三种新的脉宽抑制机理(NMOS到PMOS,PMOS到NMOS和NMOS到NMOS),并且通过90纳米三维工艺混合仿真进行了验证。本文的贡献主要有以下三点：1）除了PMOS到PMOS的情况,90纳米工艺下脉宽抑制在PMOS到NMOS和NMOS到NMOS中同样比较明显;2）脉宽抑制效应总体上与粒子入射能量关系较弱,而与粒子入射角度和版图结构(晶体管间距和N阱接触)关系较强。3）紧凑的版图和级联反向单元可以用来促进组合电路中的单粒子瞬态脉宽抑制效应。     

Soft Error Rate Reduction Using Circuit Optimization and Transient Filter Insertion

This paper describes a tunable transient filter (TTF) design for soft error rate reduction in combinational logic circuits. TTFs can be inserted into combinational circuits to suppress propagated single-event transients (SETs) before they can be captured in latches or flip-flops. TTFs are tuned by adjusting the maximum width of the propagated SET that can be suppressed. A TTF requires 6–14 transistors, making it an attractive cost-effective option to reduce the soft error rate in combinational circuits. A global optimization approach based on geometric programming that integrates TTF insertion with dual-V _DD and gate sizing is described. Simulation results for the 65 nm process technology indicate that a 17–48× reduction in the soft error rate can be achieved with this approach.     

On circuit techniques to improve noise immunity of CMOS dynamic logic

Dynamic CMOS logic circuits are widely employed in high-performance VLSI chips in pursuing very high system performance. However, dynamic CMOS gates are inherently less resistant to noises than static CMOS gates. With the increasing stringent noise requirement due to aggressive technology scaling, the noise tolerance of dynamic circuits has to be first improved for the overall reliable operation of VLSI chips designed using deep submicron process technology. In the literature, a number of design techniques have been proposed to enhance the noise tolerance of dynamic logic gates. An overview and classification of these techniques are first presented in this paper. Then, we introduce a novel noise-tolerant design technique using circuitry exhibiting a negative differential resistance effect. We have demonstrated through analysis and simulation that using the proposed method the noise tolerance of dynamic logic gates can be improved beyond the level of static CMOS logic gates while the performance advantage of dynamic circuits is still retained. Simulation results on large fan-in dynamic CMOS logic gates have shown that, at a supply voltage of 1.6 V, the input noise immunity level can be increased to 0.8 V for about 10% delay overhead and to 1.0 V for only about 20% delay overhead.     

A Timing-Aware Probabilistic Model for Single-Event-Upset Analysis

With device size shrinking and fast rising frequency ranges, the effect of cosmic radiations and alpha particles known as single-event upset (SEU) and single-event transients (SET), is a growing concern in logic circuits. Accurate understanding and estimation of SEU sensitivities of individual nodes is necessary to achieve better soft error hardening techniques at logic level design abstraction. We propose a probabilistic framework to the study the effect of inputs, circuits structure, and gate delays on SEU sensitivities of nodes in logic circuits as a single joint probability distribution function (pdf). To model the effect of timing, we consider signals at their possible arrival times as the random variables of interest. The underlying joint probability distribution function, consists of two components: ideal random variables without the effect of SEU and the random variables affected by the SEU. We use a Bayesian network to represent the joint pdf which is a minimal compact directional graph for efficient probabilistic modeling of uncertainty. The attractive feature of this model is that not only does it use the conditional independence to arrive at a sparse structure, but it also utilizes the same for smart probabilistic inference. We show that results with exact (exponential complexity) and approximate nonsimulative stimulus-free inference (linear in number of nodes and samples) on benchmark circuits yield accurate estimates in reasonably small computation time     

Skewed CMOS: noise-tolerant high-performance low-power static circuit family

In this paper, we present a noise-tolerant high-performance static circuit family suitable for low-voltage operation called skewed logic. Skewed logic circuits in comparison with Domino logic have better scalability and are more suitable for low voltage applications because of better noise margins. Skewed logic and its variations have been compared with Domino logic in terms of delay, power, and dynamic noise margin. A design methodology for skewed CMOS pipelined circuits has been developed. To demonstrate the applicability of the proposed logic style, 0.35 /spl mu/m 5.56 ns CMOS 16/spl times/16 bit multipliers have been designed using skewed logic circuits and fabricated through MOSIS. Measurement results show that the multiplier only consumed a power of 195 mW due to its low clock load.     

Fault-tolerant TMR and DMR circuits with latchup protection switches

The paper presents CMOS ASICs which can tolerate the single event upsets (SEUs), the single event transients (SET), and the single event latchup (SEL). Triple and double modular redundant (TMR and DMR) circuits in combination with SEL protection switches (SPS) make the base of the proposed approach. The SPS had been designed, characterized, and verified before it became a standard library cell. A few additional steps during logic synthesis and layout generation have been introduced in order to implement the redundant net-lists and power domains as well as to place the latchup protection switches. The approach and accompanying techniques have been verified on the example of a shift-register and a middleware switch processor.     

Noise constrained transistor sizing and power optimization for dual V/sub t/ domino logic

Dynamic logic is susceptible to noise, especially in the ultra-deep submicrometer dual threshold voltage technology. When the dual threshold voltage is applied to the domino logic, noise immunity must be carefully considered since the significant subthreshold current of the low threshold voltage transistor makes the dynamic node much more susceptible to noise. In the first part of this paper, we introduce a new keeper transistor sizing method to determine the optimal keeper transistor size in terms of speed, power, and noise immunity. With the use of data obtained by presimulation, it is unnecessary to simulate all the design corners corresponding to the feasible NMOS evaluation transistor size ranges to find the optimal keeper transistor size. HSPICE simulation results show that the proposed keeper transistor sizing method can be broadly applied to all the domino logic gates. In the second part of this paper, we propose a new dual threshold voltage domino logic synthesis with the keeper transistor sizing to minimize the power consumption while meeting delay and noise constraints. With the optimal keeper transistor size determined by the proposed keeper transistor sizing method, the dual threshold voltage assignment to domino logic can be simplified to the discrete threshold voltage selection. Experimental results for ISCAS85 benchmark circuits show significant savings on leakage power and active power.     

Domino logic with variable threshold voltage keeper

A variable threshold voltage keeper circuit technique is proposed for simultaneous power reduction and speed enhancement of domino logic circuits. The threshold voltage of a keeper transistor is dynamically modified during circuit operation to reduce contention current without sacrificing noise immunity. The variable threshold voltage keeper circuit technique enhances circuit evaluation speed by up to 60% while reducing power dissipation by 35% as compared to a standard domino (SD) logic circuit. The keeper size can be increased with the proposed technique while preserving the same delay or power characteristics as compared to a SD circuit. The proposed domino logic circuit technique offers 14% higher noise immunity as compared to a SD circuit with the same evaluation delay characteristics. Forward body biasing the keeper transistor is also proposed for improved noise immunity as compared to a SD circuit with the same keeper size. It is shown that by applying forward and reverse body biased keeper circuit techniques, the noise immunity and evaluation speed of domino logic circuits are simultaneously enhanced.     

A method to assess the robustness of cryptographic circuits at the design stage

This paper proposes the use of an FPGA-based fault injection technique, AMUSE, to study the effect of malicious attacks on cryptographic circuits. Originally, AMUSE was devised to analyze the soft error effects (SEU and SET) in digital circuits. However, many of the fault-based attacks used in cryptanalysis produce faults that can be modeled as bit-flip in memory elements or transient pulses in combinational logic, as in faults due to radiation effects. Experimental results provide information that allows the cryptographic circuit designer to detect the weakest areas in order to implement countermeasures at design stage.     

基于主方程法单电子晶体管的Verilog-A行为模型

 基于单电子晶体管的主方程算法,在简化Lientschnig的单电子晶体管模型基础上,建立了基于Verilog-A的单电子晶体管行为描述模型,并利用Cadence Spectre 仿真器对该模型进行了验证.通过单电子晶体管逻辑电路的设计和仿真,表明该模型具有合理的精确度,且速度快,为单电子晶体管电路及混合电路的仿真提供了一种有效的方法.