Assessing the impact of the space radiation environment on parametric degradation and single-event transients in optocouplers

Assessing the risk of using optocouplers in satellite applications offers challenges that incorporate those of commercial off-the-shelf devices compounded by hybrid module construction techniques. We discuss approaches for estimating this risk. In the process, we benchmark our estimates for proton and heavy-ion induced single-event transient rate estimates with recent flight data from the Terra mission. For parametric degradation, we discuss a method for acquiring test data and mapping it into an estimation approach that captures all the important variables of circuit application, environment, damage energy dependence, complex response to total ionizing dose and displacement effects, temperature, and annealing. Index Terms--Displacement damage, hardness assurance, optocouplers, single-event effects (SEEs), total ionizing dose.