Abstract
Radiation is defined as the emission or transmission of energy as waves or particles, which can be either ionizing or non-ionizing. The interaction between the radiation and the matter can generate different reactions, which may vary depending on the properties of the particle (type, kinetic energy, mass, and charge), and the target (semiconductors in this thesis scope). The exposition of electronics components to environments with a significant presence of radiation may lead to this kind of interaction and, consequently, to a variety of effects that can drastically affect the reliability of electronic systems.When designing electronic devices and systems, considering radiation effects is fundamental for applications in harsh environments. For instance, in avionics and space systems, these effects are extensively studied to ensure the high reliability of the components and provide the needed insight for design decisions. The concerns related to radiation started to be noted at the beginning of the space era.Ionizing radiation may induce effects in different types of devices, and many works have shown that memories are one of the highest contributors to soft errors in systems. Furthermore, due to their nature, memories have the intrinsic capability of storing radiation-induced fault tracks, e.g., Single-Bit Upsets (SBUs), making these devices the best candidate for studying soft errors.The first topic introduced by the thesis is a study on the heavy-ion induced effects on a Single-Level Cell NAND Flash. This study is based on several irradiation test campaigns with a wide range of heavy-ions energies. The results revealed different failure mechanisms, including Single-Event Upsets, small clusters of errors, data register upsets, and a column-wise failure mode. Cross section was calculated for each of these failure modes, and their causes were discussed.Then, a study on the effects of neutron irradiation (thermal and atmospheric-like spectra) on a self-refresh DRAM is presented. Static and dynamic test methods were used to define the response of the device under irradiation. In this manuscript, experimental results from two different test campaigns are presented, with the identification of SBUs, stuck bits, and block errors. These faults were investigated and characterized by event cross section, soft-error rates, and bitmaps evaluations. An analysis of the damaged cells' retention time was performed, showing a difference between the self-refresh mechanism and a read operation. Additionally, a correlation of the fault mechanism that generates both SBUs and stuck bits under neutron irradiation is also proposed. Furthermore, high-temperature annealing was studied in post-radiation tests.Following, this thesis presents a comparative study on the neutron-induced effects on SDRAMs produced with three different technology nodes. The results revealed the occurrence of SBUs and stuck-bits in the memories, showing higher sensitivity for the oldest generation and similar results for the other two models.Finally, a framework is presented to assess the reliability of Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) applications. In this light, this study proposes using realistic fault models retrieved from radiation tests as input for a software emulator that performs fault injection in the computing system in which the CNN is implemented.