Integrated circuit with automatic total ionizing dose (TID) exposure deactivation

摘要

Integrated circuits and methods for deactivating user circuit operation with one or more wide channel sensing transistors biased to an on condition for exposure to total ionizing dose and then to an off condition for measurement and comparison of a leakage current or threshold voltage parameter to a predetermined reference, and a deactivation circuit selectively disables operation of the user circuit if the sensed parameter is greater than or equal to the reference.

主权项

1. An integrated circuit, comprising:
a sensing circuit with at least one sensing transistor including a gate, a drain, and a source; a comparator circuit including a first input terminal connected to a reference, a second input terminal connected to the source of the at least one sensing transistor through a pass gate, and an output providing an output signal; a controller coupled with the at least one sensing transistor and with the pass gate, the controller being operative in a first mode to turn the at least one sensing transistor on and to turn the pass gate off, and the controller being operative in a second mode to turn the at least one sensing transistor off and to turn the pass gate on; and a deactivation circuit receiving the output signal from the comparator circuit and operative to selectively disable operation of a user circuit of the integrated circuit responsive to the output signal from the comparator circuit indicating that a total ionizing dose experienced by the integrated circuit is greater than or equal to a threshold value.