Microbeam studies of single-event effects

The application of heavy-ion microbeam systems to the study of single-event effects is reviewed. Apertured microbeam systems have been used since the early 1980s to study charge collection. This has led to the development of the present models for the transport of charge following heavy-ion strikes in semiconductors. More recently, magnetically focused scanned microbeams have allowed direct imaging of charge collection regions with a technique called IBICC (ion-beam induced charge collection). Charge collection depth can be extracted from the pulse height spectrum from well-defined regions of the IC. When applied to single event upset, those regions sensitive to upset have been directly mapped with scanned microbeam systems. Damage effects due to total-ionizing dose and displacement damage are discussed. These techniques have removed uncertainty associated with broad-beam techniques, and improved our understanding of the mechanisms responsible for single-event effects in ICs.