Heavy ion SEU immunity of a GaAs complementary HIGFET circuit fabricated on a low temperature grown buffer layer

Abstract

We compare dynamic SEU characteristics of GaAs complementary HIGFET devices fabricated on conventional semi-insulating substrates versus low temperature grown GaAs (LT GaAs) buffer layers. Heavy ion test results on shift register and flip-flop devices from the same process lot demonstrate that the LT GaAs layer provides immunity from upsets, even at an LET value of 90 MeV/spl middot/cm/sup 2//mg. This result is also consistent with pulsed laser measurements performed on the same flip-flop circuits used in the ion test.