Altitude dependent failure rate calculation for high power semiconductor devices in aviation electronics

Abstract The electric power usage in aircraft has reached 1 MW. Therefore, use of high power semiconductor devices expected to increase in avionics. Single event burnout failure happens when power devices operating in blocking condition interact with the cosmic radiation. The failure rate in power devices is more in airplane altitude compare to terrestrial operation. In this paper, the failure rate of high power silicon PiN diode is evaluated when operating in airplane altitude due to the interaction of cosmic ray neutrons. The proposed formula has the unique feature of decoupling between failure cross section and cosmic ray neutron flux. This makes it possible to calculate the failure rate under any cosmic radiation environment using the proposed failure rate formulation.