Single-Event Characterization of Multi-Gigabit Transceivers (MGT) in Space-Grade Virtex-5QV Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGA)

The basic functionality of the Xilinx Virtex-5QV Multi-Gigabit Transceivers (MGT) demonstrates a variety of single event effects (SEE) while interacting with heavy-ions. In this work, we have attempted to measure, characterize, and then evaluate the various manifestations that SEEs have on the MGT functionality. Experimental results demonstrate that the large majority of the symptoms observed can either have a very small impact to the MGT communication system functionality, only causing a few data bit-flips, or can be easily corrected by the communication channel's resynchronization protocol, which is an integral part of all communications standards that make use of Serialize/De-Serialize (SerDes) technology.