Contribution of Thermal Neutrons to Soft Error Rate

Abstract

Boron-10 ( <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">10</sup> B) is present in a large number of memory and logic devices below 65 nm through contamination during fabrication process, and the reaction of low-energy cosmic neutrons with high concentrations of <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">10</sup> B in the device contributes to the soft error rate (SER). Based on the experiments at Institut Laue-Langevin facility, the thermal neutron contribution of three devices (one static random access memory, one field-programmable gate array, and one microprocessor) is investigated for both ground level and aircraft environments. We conclude that the thermal neutron-induced single event upsets could have a similar contribution to SER as the high-energy part in atmospheric applications.