Single Event Upset in FG memory arrays - Prompt and permanent data corruption in modern and future technologies

Radiation effects have been traditionally studied for niche applications such as the high energy physics or the satellite industry, but modern semiconductor technologies are becoming more and more sensitive to ground-level events such as those generated by atmospheric neutrons. Floating Gate memories are not exception: a single ion crossing a Floating Gate array can severely degrade the information stored in several contiguous memory cells. Further, the ion leaves a permanent damage to the oxide, resulting in degraded retention performances.