IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NUCLEAR SCIENCE, VOL. 60, NO.
3, JUNE 2013
Overview of In-Orbit Radiation
Induced Spacecraft Anomalies
R. Ecoffet, Member, IEEE
Abstract—Spacecraft anomalies due to radiation effects on elec-
tronic devices have been known since the very beginning of the
space era. Today they represent a major part of on-board anom-
alies, mission outages, and unexpected workload on ground con-
trollers of operational systems. This text will first describe a few
known cases of cumulative or transient effects in Earth or plane-
tary environments. Then, it will discuss investigation methodology,
and issues such as the statistical aspects of probabilistic anomalies
in the assessment of cause to effects relationships, and the neces-
sity of multi-field experts in group root cause analysis, from radia-
tion effects, to satellite fault determination, to identification and re-
configuration strategy. A focus on some practical cases of anomaly
analyses will be made.
Index Terms—In-orbit anomalies, radiation effects, space envi-
ronment, spacecraft anomalies.
I. INTRODUCTION
R ADIATION-INDUCED spacecraft anomalies have been
known since the very first days of space exploration. The
measurement of radiation in space has been one of the very first
concerns of the nascent space community.
The first US artificial satellite, Explorer I, designed and built
by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and launched on January 31,
1958, carried a Geiger counter proposed by J.A. Van Allen. The
counter suddenly stopped counting cosmic rays when the space-
craft reached a certain altitude. It was later found that the counter
saturated due to an extremely high particle count rate. This was
the day of the discovery of the Van Allen belts, its existence
was confirmed by Explorer III (March 1958) and Sputnik III
(May 1958). The discovery—or confirmation of existence—of
the trapped radiation belts by the Explorer satellite, was one
of the outstanding discoveries of the International Geophysical
Year 1958. The evidence of the existence of trapped particles in
Earth’s radiation belts can be considered, in this respect, as the
very first scientific output of the Space Age.
The knowledge of the space radiation environment grew to-
gether with the development of space techniques and both are
still evolving. Better knowledge of the environment helped in
building better hardware which in turn allowed the development
of better instruments. Contrary to other disciplines involved in
Manuscript received September 17, 2012; revised February 27, 2013; ac-
cepted May 02, 2013. Date of publication May 31, 2013; date of current version
June 12, 2013.
R. Ecoffet is with the Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales (CNES), Toulouse
31401, France (e-mail: robert.ecoffet@ cnes.fr).
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this paper are available online
at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TNS.2013.2262002
0018-9499/$31.00 © 2013 IEEE
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spacecraft design, such as celestial mechanics or electromag-
netism, for instance, which pre-existed before the space era,
the knowledge of the space environment was a consequence of
space exploration itself.
A few years after the Explorer-I launch, Telstar was launched
on 10 July 1962, designed and built by the Bell Telephone Lab-
oratories with AT&T funds and NASA support. Telstar defini-
tively opened the era of satellite telecommunication with a live
television picture transmission from the USA to France on that
same day. It was the first satellite equipped with transponders,
and thus amplification, and thus the first active telecommunica-
tion satellite. On 9 July 1962, the day before the Telstar launch,
the USA carried out a high altitude nuclear test. The extremely
high radiation levels induced by electrons injected in the radi-
ation belts caused degradation of some electronic components,
(diodes in the command decoder) and finally, the early loss of
the satellite on 21 February 1963. This was the first spacecraft
loss due to radiation effects.
Although this particular failure was created by man-made
conditions, it inaugurated, from the very first days of space ex-
ploration, a long series of radiation induced spacecraft anoma-
lies.
A new class of effects came into play, starting from the first
observations in 1974 when unexpected triggering of digital cir-
cuits occurred wherein the primary suspect cause of these trig-
gers was interactions with cosmic rays [1]. These effects were
later called “single event effects” because they were triggered
by one particle alone. Rapidly, it was established that not only
ions, protons, and neutrons caused effects, but also alpha parti-
cles, produced by fission reactions of trace amounts of unstable
elements in the component’s package, could also produce single
event effects. Single event effects soon became recognized as
one of the major causes of component malfunction in space (see
[2] for example).
Since those early days, radiation induced spacecraft anoma-
lies have been regularly observed.
II. SPACE ENVIRONMENT AND RADIATION EFFECTS
A. The Space Environment
The natural radiation environment in space has been detailed
in many references, e.g., [3]. The main components constituting
this environment are summarized in Table I.
The South Atlantic Anomaly (SAA), created due to a tilt and
an offset of the magnetic dipole with respect to the Earth’s ro-
tation axis (see schematic representation in Fig. 1) constitutes
an important feature of the radiation belts for LEO (Low Earth
1792
TABLE I
MAIN SOURCES OF THE NATURAL SPACE RADIATION ENVIRONMENT.
Fig. 1. Schematic representation of the south atlantic anomaly (SAA) [4].
Orbit) missions. The SAA introduces a geographically defined
zone of increased hazard.
It is usual and useful to represent the Van Allen belts in mag-
netic coordinates using L — time diagrams for having an at a
glance overview of the radiation conditions in geospace. The
L—time diagram is a 3—D chart constructed using the Mc Ill-
wain parameter L, which is the number of Earth radii at which a
given magnetic field line crosses the magnetic equator, depicted
on the Y-axis. The X-axis depicts time, and the Z-axis depicts
fluxes in a thermal color (or gray) scales. L—time diagrams and
other environment restitution charts can be visualized using, for
example, the CNES/ONERA IPSAT space environment virtual
observatory and spacecraft anomaly analysis tool [5].
The L-time diagram has shortcomings and is reductive,
because North and South field lines and all longitudes are
folded, but it is useful for anomaly analysis. Maximum value
of L plotted for a polar orbit is usually around because
above this value, field lines are very close to each other and
subject to uncertainty due to field variations, so L is harder to
exactly define and loses some of its relevance. In an L-time
diagram, solar events appear as vertical lines and radiation belts
as horizontal structures or “bands”. Features of the diagram are
presented in Fig. 2.
Fig. 3 illustrates L-time diagrams for 3 electron energy bands
and 1 proton energy band as seen by the CNES ICARE instru-
ment on the polar orbiting satellite SAC-C
over the 2001-2004 period. In Fig. 3 we are plotting time vs.
intensity of electrons and protons. Note that the color scale on
the right goes low (blue) to high (red) intensity. One can clearly
see the dynamics of the outer electron belt in a period of solar
activity, and episodes when the slot region between the two elec-
tron belts, is temporarily filled. One can also observe the effect
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NUCLEAR SCIENCE, VOL. 60, NO. 3, JUNE 2013
Fig. 2. Features of an L-time diagram [4].
Fig. 3. L-time diagrams for 3 electron energy bands (top to bottom 220, 560
and 1420 keV), and 1 proton energy band (10.5 MeV) as seen by the CNES
ICARE instrument on the polar orbiting satellite SAC-C, 2001–2004.
of solar events on the extension and intensity of the proton belt
at the energy shown .
Examples of mission tracks in the radiation belts are shown
in Figs. 4 and 5 for five mission cases:
— SPOT 800 km 98 , representative of sun-synchronous
LEO Earth observation orbits
— JASON 1336 km 66 , illustrates telecom constellations
such as Globalstar
— GTO 180 km x 35870 km 0 ,
— GEO 35870 km 0 ,
— GALILEO 23258 km 56 , illustrates navigation constella-
tions such as GPS or Glonass
Those graphs are useful for seeing which zones a mission
passes through and to what space weather variability it will be
exposed. Those graphs are for illustration only because:
— Times and fluxes are not to scale
— Fluxes are measured on the SAC-C satellite (LEO) so ab-
solute values are not representative of other orbits, never-
theless flux variations will be roughly proportional.
B. The Main Classes of Effects on Components
The effects of space radiation on electronic components have
been described in greater detail in many references e.g., [6], [7].
We will review the main classes of effects in order to recall
elements for analyzing in-flight anomaly cases.
The basic effect of radiation-matter interaction is that energy
is deposited into the target object. Depending on the physical
ECOFFET: OVERVIEW OF IN-ORBIT RADIATION INDUCED SPACECRAFT ANOMALIES
Fig. 4. Examples of mission tracks (electron flux at 1420 keV,
SPOT) [4].
Fig. 5. Examples of mission tracks (proton flux at 10.5 MeV,
SPOT) [4].
processes involved in the target of interest, this energy will be
transformed with a variety of effects.
Energetic charged particles have two ways of depositing en-
ergy within the material constituting the electronic components
and the spacecraft structure. They can interact with the elec-
trons of the target atoms, pull them out of their orbits around
the nucleus, and release them in the surrounding medium. These
electronic interactions constitute ionization effects. In solid state
matter, the result is the creation of electron-hole pairs whose be-
havior will be governed, after the interaction, by the electrical
properties of the device of interest.
A second way of producing ionization comes from a sec-
ondary effect due to the sudden loss of velocity when particles
enter dense matter. When braking suddenly, particles convert
some of their kinetic energy into photons; this is the Brem-
strahlung, or “braking radiation”. These high energy photons
can in their turn induce ionization along their paths. They also
penetrate deeply into matter and can ionize strongly shielded
targets. Secondary radiation is also a prime concern for detector
noise.
Charged particles can also interact, although with a much
lower probability, with the nucleus of the target atom, either
through electromagnetic or nuclear interaction. A fraction of
the energy of the incoming particle is transferred to the target
nucleus, which is excited and can be displaced. This effect is
called displacement damage. The target nucleus may be frag-
mented in some cases of nuclear interaction. The consequence
is a local modification of the lattice structure and the creation of
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Fig. 6. Correspondence between radiation sources and effects on components
[4].
crystalline defects and interstitial-vacancies complexes. The ac-
cumulation of these defects, or clusters of defects, modifies the
crystalline and electronic properties of the crystal. The effects
range from changes in optical properties (transparency, color,
optical absorption) and mechanical properties (Young’s Mod-
ulus, oscillation frequencies), to changes in the electronic struc-
ture of the device. In semiconductors, these defects contribute to
the creation of additional trapping levels in the forbidden band
and these levels can modify device responses to electron-hole
pair creation through ionization processes.
When incident energies are high enough, the nuclear interac-
tions can result in one or many recoil atoms with sufficient re-
maining energy to travel considerable distance in the device, and
being able in their turn to ionize the matter along their tracks.
This secondary radiation can be considered as an ion source in-
side the device and can add an extra contribution to all effects
due to primary cosmic or solar heavy ions.
Depending on the local or diffuse nature of energy deposition,
and depending also on the orders of magnitude of the energies
involved, we come to two main classes of effects from a system
point of view.
The first class is a degradation of system lifetime through the
accumulation of ionizing dose and displacement damage over
time. These effects induce a gradual modification of the elec-
trical properties of the component, finally leading to component
failure [6].
The second class is composed of functional flaws, and some-
times destructive effects, they correspond to sudden and local-
ized energy depositions. These effects are related to system de-
pendability and performance, and are treated as a probabilistic
and risk estimation problem [7].
Fig. 6 shows the expected effects given the space radiation
sources.
The Earth’s radiation belts, which are composed of high en-
ergy electrons and protons, can contribute to all classes of ef-
fects, so do high energy protons from solar flares.
The galactic cosmic rays are composed of rare high energy
ions, capable of inducing single event effects, but not numerous
enough to contribute to accumulated degradation of electronic
components (but they do contribute to degradation of living
matter, which is much more sensitive). Ions can be responsible
for micro-dose effects (local dose deposition).
The exposure to the various radiation sources will depend on
mission profile (orbit or trajectory, period with respect to the
1794
Fig. 7. Continuity between charging and radiation environments.
solar cycle) and mission phases. For example let us imagine a
mission to a giant planet:
— In phase 1 the probe would move in Earth’s vicinity and the
dominant contribution would be from the radiation belts.
— In phase 2 the probe would cruise in interplanetary space
and the dominant contribution would be solar particles and
galactic cosmic rays.
— In phase 3 the probe would orbit the target planet and be
exposed to the planet’s radiation belts.
Let us note also that there is a continuum of energy between
the charging (low energy) and the radiation (high energy) en-
vironment. In the MeV range, for example, electrons may con-
tribute to either ionizing dose or deep dielectric charging, that is
useful for consideration in anomaly analysis. Fig. 7[4] schemat-
ically presents the energy domains involved.
C. Evolution of the Space Environment and Associated Risks
in the Recent Past
The space environment is strongly modulated by solar ac-
tivity. Having an overview of the evolution of the different envi-
ronment components over time is of prime interest for compar-
ison within any anomaly series and for understanding the par-
ticularity of a given period of time in terms of risks for a given
effect. Having the knowledge of this evolution can help in:
— Understanding why some anomalies become more or
less frequent: if well correlated, the anomaly rate should
roughly follow the evolution of the associated environ-
mental component.
— Examining the “no-event” question: for example, one
given anomaly appears correlated with some given envi-
ronment component. Does this anomaly occur in a much
more severe period of this same environmental compo-
nent?
— Examining the reverse problem of the above correlation
issues. In some active periods, there is a good chance that
a correlation appears with “something”. If we remove the
assumed cause or one of the assumed causes, i.e., we found
ourselves in a period when the incriminated environment
component is very low, do we still observe occurrences of
the anomaly?
Different cases of such questions will be described in
Section VII. Fig. 8, using information from [5], shows the
evolution of the main space environment components over the
period 2000–2010. One can note:-A period of frequent solar
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NUCLEAR SCIENCE, VOL. 60, NO. 3, JUNE 2013
flares around 2000–2002, followed by episodic flares down to
2006, leading to increased risk of local peak dose deposition
and SEE rates.
— A period of intense electron flux in the outer belt around
2003–2007, characteristic of the falling edge of the solar
cycle, with extreme episodes in 2004, leading to increased
risk conditions for ionizing dose and spacecraft charging
issues.
— A recent period, 2008–2010, with a historically deep solar
minimum, characterized by the near disappearance of the
outer belt at high energies, and a historical high flux of
galactic cosmic rays, leading to lower concerns with elec-
tron dose and charging, and an unusual higher probability
of GCR induced SEEs.
III. IN-FLIGHT ANOMALIES AND THE SPACE ENVIRONMENT
A. Sources of Data
Sources of spacecraft anomaly data are few, and it is difficult
to have a general overview of the extent of the problem. A large
part of the satellite fleet is comprised today of commercial and
defense spacecraft, and information about possible anomalies
may be classified or considered proprietary, for many reasons.
Space agencies such as NASA, ESA, CNES or JAXA are gen-
erally much less reluctant to give information, but even in this
case, it is not obvious that all information is known by all and
centralized somewhere.
There are some excellent public sources of spacecraft
anomaly information, such as: a NASA reference publication
written by MSFC (Marshall Spaceflight Center) [8] in August
1996, an Aerospace Corp. study [9] from September 2000,
and the outstanding internet reference, Satellite Digest News
[10]. For statistical comparisons trying to identify the weight
of different factors in spacecraft anomalies, there is always
a possible bias due to the sample of anomalies used for the
comparison. For example, an anomaly set consisting mainly
of problems encountered on geosynchronous satellites (i.e.,
particular environment conditions) may lead to a general clas-
sification of anomaly causes that would not be the same if the
set used was mainly comprised of LEO satellite anomalies.
It should thus be stressed that every spacecraft is a new case,
and that survivability efforts in the design phase should be done
with respect to an analysis of the particular environment of the
spacecraft compared with the expected mission performance,
and should not rely on general purpose statistical figures.
B. Classification Biases
Sample set classification biases on a given set of anomalies
may come from:
— Orbit/mission type distribution (GEO, LEO, non-Earth
missions) i.e., environment type distribution (outer belt,
inner belt, interplanetary, planetary)
— Position of the set in the solar cycle (the variability of the
above environments)
— Spacecraft lifecycle: young, mature or aging spacecraft
— The history of on-board/ground operations to circumvent
anomalies
— Recurrence of platforms, platform equipment (COTS),
payload or instruments
ECOFFET: OVERVIEW OF IN-ORBIT RADIATION INDUCED SPACECRAFT ANOMALIES 1795

Fig. 8. Overview of various space environment components in the period 2000–2010 on the right, left: risk tendency chart for 2008–2010. Data are from GOES-10,
NPOES-15, ICARE/SAC-C, and ACE/CRIS. Credits NOAA, CNES, NASA. IPSAT plot, and CNES/ONERA [4].

— Severity of the anomaly, from control or mission center (a

benign anomaly may simply not be recorded).

C. Statistical Comparisons
We will limit ourselves here to the results of two studies,
by NASA [8] and Aerospace Corporation [9]. In “Spacecraft
System Failures and Anomalies Attributed to the Natural Space
Environment”, NASA reference publication 1390 [8], MSFC
compares more than 100 anomaly cases attributed to the envi-
ronment of the satellite, and proposes the following classifica- Fig. 9. Spacecraft anomalies due to the space environment, from [4].
tions:
— plasma (charging)
— radiation (TID, SEE, DDD)
— meteoroids and space debris
— atmosphere (neutral thermosphere: satellite drag, effects
on surface materials)
— solar (effects of solar events, may fall in “plasma”, “radi-
ation” or “geomagnetic” categories)
— thermal (thermal conditions in vacuum—may be consid-
ered as a design problem) Fig. 10. Repartition of radiation spacecraft anomalies, from [4].
— geomagnetic (effects on magneto-torquers for example).
The chart in Fig. 9 uses these classifications. For classifying Although the results may differ from one study to another,
anomalies by their physical cause, we break out the “solar” cat- a general conclusion can be drawn: the two major sources of
egory into “plasma”, “radiation” or “geomagnetic” categories. environment related spacecraft anomalies are plasma and radia-
From this study, the two main environment-related causes of tion effects, i.e., effects related to the charged particles from the
spacecraft anomalies are radiation and plasma effects. If we now space environment.
break out the radiation part into the main radiation effects, we
come to the distribution shown in Fig. 10. The “upset” category D. Feedback From CNES Satellite Operations
should be understood in a wide sense, and may include SET ef- A survey was made at CNES in order to assess the weight
fects. of space environment and space radiation in the number of ob-
The set of anomaly cases used in the Aerospace study [9] in- served anomalies:
cludes more recent anomaly cases and has an overlap with the 1) Returns From CNES GEO Satellites: Since beginning of
set used by MSFC. This set is composed of 326 anomaly cases, a life (1992) and for the 4 geosynchronous TC2 satellites (total
large number of which is related to GEO satellites, thus empha- of 50 years in orbit), about 30% of anomalies were due to the
sizing the ESD issue. Table II from [9] gives the classification space charged particle environment (radiation and charging al-
used and the repartition of anomalies. together).
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TABLE II
REPARTITION OF CAUSES FOR 326 SPACECRAFT ENVIRONMENT RELATED
ANOMALIES, FROM [9].
Since 01/01/2006 on TC2C and TC2D, about 75% of
anomaly causes (equipment switch-off, loss of gain, Earth
sensor disturbances) where attributed to radiation or charging
effects.
A large part of those anomalies were attributed to ESD
risk conditions, nevertheless this point may be revisited, as
discussed in Section VII.
2) Returns From CNES LEO Satellites: Given all missions
together, space radiation causes about 90% of anomalies.
On the whole “fleet” of 15 LEO major LEO
payload this means about 1 minor anomaly per week and 1 more
serious one per month, on average. The types of problems en-
countered are (and this is not exhaustive):
— Swaps in safe mode (rare but serious): 57% due to envi-
ronment, heavy load on operations during the few days re-
quired to get back to nominal
— Memory corruptions (mass memory, EEPROM, software
pointers): important load on operations (memory remap-
ping,)
— Star sensor disturbances in the SAA, impact on platform
AOCS and some payloads, load on operations depends on
system affected, can be very complex (re-programming,
thermal reconfiguration)
— Aging due to environment (star sensor CCD, sun sensor,
thermal coatings): adjustment of survey thresholds, but
this is schedulable
In conclusion, the most significant contributor to LEO mis-
sions’ in-flight anomalies for CNES is space radiation.
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NUCLEAR SCIENCE, VOL. 60, NO. 3, JUNE 2013
Fig. 11. Overview of spacecraft disturbed by anomalies in the solar activity
period of october/november 2003, as quoted in [10]. Images credit NASA.
E. Example of the Effects of a Major Space Weather Event
The growing concern for space weather effects had a striking
confirmation when major solar flares occurred at the end of Oc-
tober 2003. At least 33 spacecraft anomalies have been reported
for this event. An anomaly list can be found in [10] and is re-
produced in Table III. Anomalies were recorded in Earth space
and on missions in various locations in outer space. The chart
in Fig. 11 illustrates the solar-system-wide extent of the event.
IV. CUMULATED EFFECTS
There are surprisingly few reports on satellite anomalies due
to total dose failures of electronic components (as illustrated in
Fig. 8). To find such records, we have to turn to situations where
spacecraft were exposed to extreme radiation environments, or
to situations where such failures did occur, but after a time
largely exceeding the original design lifetime of the on-board
systems.
This situation is most probably due to excessive design mar-
gins coming from radiation environment models, radiation test
procedures, component shielding estimates, and finally, addi-
tional design safety margins introduced in the parts procurement
selection.
The most important contribution to this excessive margin
is probably situated in shielding calculations. Shielding has a
strong impact on the level received, especially on the electron
contribution to total dose. The main problem with shielding
had been that, for years, complex mechanical structures were
difficult to take into account, so the effective shielding thick-
nesses were systematically under-estimated. They still are, but,
with the incredible evolution of computer power since 1990,
it became possible to cope with complex shielding structures,
and to quantitatively take into account component packages,
and equipment and satellite shielding. Now, it is even possible
to run representative Monte-Carlo simulations on complete
satellite structures in a reasonable time.
Table IV gives a simple example of shielding effectiveness
for instruments located on the ESA INTEGRAL gamma ray
space telescope [11]. The table compares the dose received
at various mm Al thickness given different geometrical hy-
potheses. The original general procurement specification for
this project was 120 krad(Si) (3mm Al sphere). The instruments
ECOFFET: OVERVIEW OF IN-ORBIT RADIATION INDUCED SPACECRAFT ANOMALIES
TABLE III
SPACECRAFT ANOMALIES ASSOCIATED TO THE INTENSE SOLAR ACTIVITY OF
OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2003, FROM[10].
studied could be simply simulated by cubes with 5mm thick Al
walls. When this cube was placed on the mechanical model of
the telescope tube, it turned out that the expected received dose
would be in the range of 6 krad(Si). Component procurement
was specified at 12 krad(Si) using a factor 2 design safety
margin. To change the procurement specification from 120 to
12 krad(Si) made a big difference such that high performance
commercial 16-bit ADCs could be used. With such margins,
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TABLE III Spacecraft Anomalies Associated to the Intense Solar Activity of
October/November 2003, From[10]
it is understandable that few total dose anomalies have been
reported.
Nevertheless, caution must be taken for future projects. The
very possibility of undergoing precise dose calculations leads
to consequent margin reductions, but there are still uncertain-
ties in the calculation processes. If we reduce the margin as far
as possible due to shielding calculations, then we still have the
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TABLE IV
EXAMPLE OF THE EFFECT OF SHIELDING DESCRIPTION ON ESTIMATED
MISSION LEVELS FOR AFEE/DFEE EQUIPMENT ON INTEGRAL—DOSES IN
RAD(SI) [11]
TABLE V
HISTORICAL ARTIFICIAL RADIATION BELTS. SOURCE AND CREDIT: WIKIPEDIA.
uncertainties related with space environment models and radia-
tion qualification tests procedures.
A. Artificial Radiation Belts
As quoted in the introduction, exo-atmospheric nuclear ex-
periments conducted by the USA and the USSR, before this was
banned by international treaties in 1967 (see Table V), created
dramatic consequences not only on the ground (the EMP effect
was detected as far as Hawaii after the Starfish test), but also
in space through long-term enhancements of the radiation belt
fluxes.
The most noticeable US experiment, because of the power
of the weapon and the altitude at which it was exploded, was
the Starfish Prime experiment which led to the formation of en-
hanced flux zones in the inner belt between 400 and 1600 km
and beyond. The USSR experiments are not well documented,
but it is believed that they contributed to flux enhancements in
the outer belt. These modified fluxes finally extended in all the
radiation belt regions and were detectable as late as the early
1970s. In some zones of the inner electron belt, fluxes increased
by a factor 100. Electrons from the Starfish blast dominated the
inner belt fluxes for five years. These artificial fluxes delayed
the issue of representative natural radiation belts models, and
Starfish artifacts might still be present in some zones of the AE8
and AP8 models in use today.
In the period directly following these tests in 1962, a series of
at least 10 satellites successively failed (7 in 7 months). Among
them were TELSTAR, TRANSIT 4B, TRAAC, and ARIEL, and
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NUCLEAR SCIENCE, VOL. 60, NO. 3, JUNE 2013
Fig. 12. Background noise in the L-time diagram for the hipparcos star mapper,
from [12]. Color scale from green to white is background noise intensity in
arbitrary units.
a number of other satellites were impaired such as OSO-1 (Or-
biting Solar Observatory).
On 9 July 1962, the day before the TELSTAR launch, the US
conducted the Starfish Prime experiment. The TELSTAR orbit,
942/5646 km 44.8 , took the satellite through the inner radiation
belt and parts of the outer belt. The radiation exposure was very
intense, and increased again after Soviet tests in 1962. It is be-
lieved that TELSTAR experienced fluxes 100 times higher than
those expected. Four months after the Starfish blast, some tran-
sistors failed, and finally the loss of the spacecraft (end of life
21 February 1963) was attributed to total ionizing dose degra-
dation of diodes in the command decoder.
ARIEL, the first international science satellite, designed and
built by NASA/GSFC to study the ionosphere and solar radia-
tion, was launched on 26 April 1962 and provided science data
until September 1962, after which it degraded rapidly because
of the degradation of its solar panels by the Starfish increased
radiation. It continued to function erratically and was cut off
in November 1964. TRANSIT 4B and TRAAC mission losses
were also attributed to solar cell degradation.
B. HIPPARCOS
The ESA star mapping mission HIPPARCOS was launched
on 8 August 1989 for a geostationary position, but
its apogee motor failed and the satellite ended in an initial
GTO orbit 498/35889 km, 6.5 . This caused the satellite to be
exposed to much higher radiation fluxes than it was designed
for. Furthermore, a major solar event in March 1991 caused
flux enhancements in the radiation belts. This event was one
of the major observations of the US CRRES satellite and has
revived the interest for understanding the dynamic behavior
of Van Allen belts. The event was observed by HIPPARCOS
itself through background noise increase in its instruments, as
depicted in Fig. 12 from [12].
The change in HIPPARCOS orbit lead to total dose expo-
sure levels 5 to 10 times more severe than those expected for
the nominal orbit. HIPPARCOS flew 5 gyroscopes, 3 of which
were active at a time. The five gyroscopes (one of which was al-
ready degraded) successively failed within a period of 6 months
after the mission lasted three years. For four of them, the spin
down and final stop were attributed to the total dose degradation
of the access times of the bipolar PROM which digitally stored
ECOFFET: OVERVIEW OF IN-ORBIT RADIATION INDUCED SPACECRAFT ANOMALIES
Fig. 13. Timeline of Hipparcos gyroscope failures.
the sinusoidal excitation of the fields spinning the wheels. The
dose received on the PROM was estimated to about 40 krad(Si).
Before the final spin downs, problems appeared when trying
to re-start the gyroscopes at cold temperature because of tran-
sistor degradation in the DC/DC converter. Noise and erratic
data were also due to the degradation of the 262 kHz clock of the
wheel motor power supplies. The last gyroscope, kept in cold
redundancy until the very last days of the mission, also failed
a few months after it was turned on. This time, the failure was
attributed to the radiation degradation of an optocoupler in the
thermal regulation system with an estimated received dose of 90
krad(Si). Finally, communications were lost with HIPPARCOS.
The timeline of the successive gyro failures is shown in Fig. 13.
During the last period of its life, HIPPARCOS was operated
with only two of the three gyroscopes normally required, and
schemes were drawn for operating it without gyroscopes at all.
The first gyro-less data were acquired when a communication
failure with the on-board computer put an end to the science
mission on 24 June 1993. Further attempts to restore operations
were unsuccessful and the mission terminated on 15 August
1993, 4 years after launch.
In spite of these problems, HIPPARCOS observed 118274
stars with an extreme precision. HIPPARCOS was designed for
an operational life of 2.5 years in a GEO orbit. It conducted an
extremely successful mission in the much more aggressive envi-
ronment of a GTO orbit (and even in enhanced flux conditions),
and accomplished all its scientific goals during more than 3.5
years.
The reason for such operational resilience probably lies in
known and unknown margins in the design. As stated before,
the few available cases of total dose anomalies all corresponded
to conditions far exceeding the original specifications.
C. The Galileo Probe at Jupiter
Extreme environments can also be found around other planets
of the Solar System. In this respect, the Jupiter environment is a
pandemonium of intense radiation fluxes trapped in the colossal
magnetic field of the giant planet. This environment has been
first studied by JPL’s PIONEER and VOYAGER probes, whose
results helped designing the JPL GALILEO spacecraft. Since
1799
Fig. 14. Timeline for some Galileo anomalies, compared with TID accumula-
tion, from [13].
then, JPL has produced excellent and careful studies of the ef-
fects of Jovian radiation belts on GALILEO systems [13], [14],
and [15].
GALILEO was almost entirely equipped with rad-hard com-
ponents and the radiation issue had been studied as carefully as
possible by JPL in the design phase. The use of rad-hard com-
ponents eliminated the SEL risk and most of the SEU problems.
For this project, SEE, in the “classical” sense, was not an issue,
but background noise in sensors had to be taken into consider-
ation. Cumulative effects (TID, DDD) were a strong challenge:
in its various orbits around Jupiter, Galileo was submitted to
doses between 10 to 50 krad(Si) at each periapsis. A character-
istic of these orbits, having a long period, one to three months,
was that this exposure was concentrated at periapsis passes, and
the components could anneal during the remaining part of the
orbit. This characteristic was used by JPL for extending the life-
time of some critical systems. This gave also time for the flight
team to work out circumvention solutions before the next pass.
Various effects (see cases in Fig. 14) were observed during the
GALILEO mission, and some examples will be given from [13],
[14] and [15].
The star scanner was sensitive to high energy electrons
, resulting in a radiation noise that could be
misidentified for a star. These misidentifications lead to erro-
neous celestial attitude estimates. At the periapsis of one of
the most exposed orbits (“E12”), the attitude estimate from
the star scanner was in strong disagreement with the inertial
attitude estimates from the gyroscopes (themselves affected by
radiation, see Figs. 14 and 15 ). The flight software thought
that GALILEO’s scan platform was not pointed where it had
been commanded. The fault-monitors commanded swapping
to redundant systems twice in 8 hours. Another problem was
related to the averaged radiation signal that increased the signal
to noise ratio and caused some stars to fall outside of the
expected brightness range, resulting in “missing stars” in the
scanner’s acquisitions. For passes inside 8 Jupiter radii, only
the 10 or 20 brightest stars could be distinguished.
The scale factor of the gyroscopes used for pointing instru-
ments was also affected. A discrepancy between the expected
pointing direction and gyro’s position estimates grew with mis-
sion time, adding its contribution to the hardware swapping in
orbit E12. After this orbital pass, the gyros gave unreliable infor-
mation, and the flight software thought that the spacecraft’s an-
tenna was no longer pointed at Earth. The AOCS fired thrusters,
1800 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NUCLEAR SCIENCE, VOL. 60, NO. 3, JUNE 2013

Fig. 15. Spin detector error compared in%to real spacecraft spin rate, from
[13].

maneuvering the spacecraft to a wrong attitude. Six unexpected Fig. 16. USO frequency shift during the orbit E11 radiation belt pass, from
maneuvers occurred before the flight team succeeded in taking [13]. Note the 0.29 Hz jump.
control. Fortunately, the antenna was still pointed sufficiently
TABLE VI
toward the Earth for receiving telecommands. The gyroscope SUMMARY OF GALILEO IN-FLIGHT RADIATION ISSUES, FROM[13].
problem was traced back [14] to leaking currents from a DG181
switch that resets the slew rate integrator to zero after the mea-
surements are performed.
On one of its last orbits, while recording data from the
Amalthea moon, data collection stopped abruptly just after an
encounter that had brought GALILEO deeper in the radiation
belts than ever before. The cause was a sudden switch of the
spacecraft to safe mode attributed to proton SETs in the four
phase lock loops of the command and data system. The data
from Amalthea had been recorded but could not be played back
to Earth. The problem was traced back to the tape motor drive
electronics, and more specifically, to three GaAs OP133 LEDs
used in the wheel position encoder.
Displacement damage was incriminated as the cause for the
drops in the LED’s light output. Knowing this, JPL derived a
circumvention strategy based on the current enhanced annealing
properties of the LED. They used a special operating mode al-
lowing current to be applied continuously to the LEDs without
trying to move the motor. The recorder began to operate for a
few seconds. After each annealing step, the recorder operating
period was longer, and finally JPL succeeded in retrieving all
the missing data [15].
GALILEO used also an USO (ultra-stable oscillator) for
tuning the telemetry 2.29 GHz download frequency. This
USO frequency was subject to gradual and permanent drifts
due to cumulated radiation. It was also subject to frequency
jumps during the passes through the radiation belts, some of
D. Ultra-Sensitive Systems
which were close to 1 Hz (Fig. 16). These drifts were precisely
measured because operators of the Deep Space Network had to Some systems are so finely tuned and depend so much on
find the signal by manually sweeping through the frequencies. general spacecraft environment stability that dose effects mani-
Sometimes, the spacecraft was already transmitting before the festations can be observed even in moderate radiation environ-
carrier wave was locked-up. ments. This is the case, for example, of the USO (ultra-stable os-
Other effects are described in reference publication [13]. cillator) of the DORIS positioning payload on board JASON-1.
Table VI from [13] gives a summary of the various systems JASON-1 is a joint CNES and JPL satellite devoted to altimetry
affected and how JPL found clever circumvention schemes. and positioning applied to ocean sciences. The satellite moves
These schemes could not have been derived without a detailed on a 1335 km, 66 orbit that makes it pass through moderate flux
comprehension of the radiation phenomena. regions of the proton belt. This orbit is still much more exposed
ECOFFET: OVERVIEW OF IN-ORBIT RADIATION INDUCED SPACECRAFT ANOMALIES
Fig. 17. DORIS on JASON frequency shifts, courtesy J.M. Lemoine, GRGS
[4].
Fig. 18. MISR on TERRA dark current increases, from [16], NASA image.
than more conventional LEO Earth observation orbits such as
800 km, 98 . To give an idea of the proportion factor in rough
numbers, the dose received on JASON behind a spher-
ical shield is about 10 times the dose on an Earth observation
satellite. Nevertheless, the order of magnitude of dose exposure
at each pass through the SAA is less than 1 rad(Si). Some very
sensitive systems such as USOs can be sensitive to dose incre-
ments of this order.
The effect of radiation on USO systems is to induce frequency
shifts related to the amount of dose received (see also GALILEO
effects in the previous paragraph). DORIS sensitivity is such
that even slight frequency shifts can have an impact on the final
system performance. In the case of the JASON application for
DORIS, the satellite passes through the SAA which leads to
tiny deposits of dose that can clearly be seen in the processed
data. The effect of ascending or descending passes through the
SAA can even be observed. Fig. 17 plots the frequency shift
amplitudes versus geographical position: the correlation with
SAA fluxes is clearly visible.
Other very sensitive systems are finely calibrated imaging
systems, which may record even a slight modification of their
pixels’ dark currents. Fig. 18 from [16] maps the dark current in-
creases for the MISR imager on NASA’s TERRA satellite when
the instrument shutter is closed. The effect of trapped protons is
clearly visible.
V. SINGLE EVENT EFFECTS
A. Galactic Cosmic Rays
Galactic cosmic rays (GCR) are the most efficient particles
for inducing single event upsets, but their flux is very weak.
Most of today’s technologies are sensitive to proton induced
1801
Fig. 19. PIONEER VENUS shift register upset count versus time [4].
upsets as well, but GCR anomalies are found in either “old”
satellites, or “new” ones situated in a proton free environment.
One of the very first upset observations was made on the Pi-
oneer 12 (Pioneer Venus) probe, in a 1024 bit PMOS shift reg-
ister. Fig. 19; using data from the NOAA Spacecraft Anomaly
data base [17] shows the cumulated upset counts from 1978 to
1985.
The CNES SPOT-1,-2 and –3 satellites (820 km, 98.7 )
were all equipped with a central processing unit (CPU) whose
memory array was made out of 1000 1-kbit HEF4736 static
RAMs. These memories, procured in 1986, were only sensitive
to GGR. Their LET threshold [18] was , so
they responded only to heavy ions from the group of Iron or
higher Z particles.
During the lifetime of these satellites, single event upsets
(SEUs) were regularly recorded in the CPU memory array [18].
About half of these SEUs lead to operational problems of var-
ious levels of importance, including switching the satellite to
safe mode. Later generations of SPOT satellites were equipped
with completely different CPUs, not sensitive to these effects.
As indicated earlier, SEUs are also now associated with
particles other than GCR, and associated in-flight anomalies
are harder to find. Nevertheless, there is a category of effects
which is still related to GCR and is beginning to become a
major contribution to operational spacecraft anomalies. This
category of effects is made out of single event transients (SETs)
in analog electronics. The typical SET effect is an unexpected
switch-off or reset, but other manifestations can occur. Such
unexpected switch-offs occurred on SOHO, along with various
other phenomena, and were studied by ESA-ESTEC [19].
Table VII from [19] summarizes these anomalies. For power
supply events SETs, PM 139 comparators and UC1707J dual
channel power drivers, were suspected. ESTEC proceeded to
ground test engineering models and confirmed this cause as the
origin of the anomalies.
Many private communications have convinced many that
SETs are a growing concern for geosynchronous telecommu-
nication satellites. Some cases of operational problems were
recorded and attributed to SET effects. These cases were not
correlated to the large solar events of the present solar cycle,
and seem to be GCR induced. The susceptibility of the world
telecommunication fleet in GEO is not surprising simply be-
cause these satellites constitute the bigger sample of spacecraft
in a GCR exposed orbit. The geosynchronous orbit is far above
1802
TABLE VII
SUMMARY OF SOHO UNEXPECTED EVENTS, FROM [19].
the Earth’s trapped proton belt, and, in the absence of solar
events, the only contribution to single event effects thus comes
from galactic cosmic rays.
B. Solar Particles (Protons, Ions)
1) Map Processor Reset: NASA MAP (Microwave
Anisotropy Probe) was launched on 30 June 2001 and was
injected in a stabilized orbit around the L2 Earth Lagrange
point. On 5 November 2001, the spacecraft AOCS system
switched MAP to a safe-hold condition caused by a reset of the
spacecraft’s processor. About 15 hours later, the ground control
succeeded in returning the spacecraft to normal operations.
NASA/GSFC attributed the root cause of the processor
reset to a single event transient (SET) on a voltage comparator
(PM139), which caused a voltage drop leading to the validation
of the reset signal [20].
This event is correlated to a large solar storm in the period
3 to 7 November 2001. All the available monitors showed an
increase in particle fluxes. In the MAP case, the SETs on the
PM139 in the processor reset circuitry can cause a reset only
if they correspond to high energy ions where the LET is larger
than . The occurrence of the event was thus
associated with both solar flare conditions and the presence of
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NUCLEAR SCIENCE, VOL. 60, NO. 3, JUNE 2013
Fig. 20. Cumulated number of upsets on SPOT-1,-2,-3 OBCs, from [18].
Fig. 21. TDRS-1 AOCS RAM upsets compared with GOES flux measure-
ments during October 1989 solar flare, from [21]. From top to bottom, GOES-7
X-ray flux, number of anomalies per hour, GOES-7 proton flux at various ener-
gies, Deep River monitor neutron counts.
high energy ions in the flare composition, so the investigators
looked for data showing that the flare was an ion flare.
These data were available through the DERA’s (now QinetiQ,
UK) CREDO instrument on the MPTB (Microelectronics and
Photonics Testbed) payload. CREDO measured an ion flux in-
crease in the range .
As a conclusion, all the available data supports the assessment
that the MAP reset event was caused by a SET induced by solar
flare ions.
2) TDRS-1 AOCS RAM Upsets: The Tracking and Data
Relay Satellite (TDRS-1) has experienced single event upsets
since its launch in April 1983. These upsets took place on very
sensitive bipolar 93L422 memories which are used in the RAM
of the Attitude and Orbit Control System (AOCS). These upsets
were mission critical because they could cause the satellite to
tumble. Heavy load was put on the ground control teams to
keep the spacecraft in the proper attitude.
Considering the extreme sensitivity of the 93L422 bipolar
SRAMs, all particle types could induce an upset. The compar-
ison of the upset rate and the environment conditions (Fig. 21)
have been very well documented in [21] and [22] for example.
The first anomalies, due to radiation belt protons, occurred
during the transfer of the satellite to its GEO position, between
April and July 1983. As soon as the spacecraft was in its GEO
position, the anomalies followed the cosmic ray modulation of
the solar cycle. Then, in 1989, during the maximum of solar
cycle 22, a series of large flares occurred. The later one, on 19
ECOFFET: OVERVIEW OF IN-ORBIT RADIATION INDUCED SPACECRAFT ANOMALIES
Fig. 22. SOHO SSR upsets versus time, from [19].
October 1989, the day after the GALILEO launch, was one of
the most powerful solar flare events ever recorded. The upset
count on TDRS-1 jumped from about 15 to 20 upsets/week, to
249 events in 7 days (19–25 October 1989).
Fortunately, the GALILEO Jupiter probe was still near Earth
and its ion counter instruments could measure the ion compo-
sition of the flare. The NOAA GOES-7 proton data could also
be used for proton flux estimations. Considering the sensitivity
of the 93L422 memories, the investigators concluded that about
30% of the upsets were due to solar protons and 70% were due to
solar ions. This balance depends on component sensitivity and
satellite shielding and should not, of course, be extrapolated to
other applications.
3) SOHO SSR Upsets: Another particularly well docu-
mented correlation between solar events and radiation effects
[19] is the case of single event upsets in the Solid State Recorder
(SSR) of the ESA/NASA SOHO spacecraft at the L1 Lagrange
point. Fig. 22 shows the evolution of the SEU rate between
1996 and 2001. The background rate is due to galactic cosmic
rays. The solar cycle modulation of this background rate is
visible in the plot. The various sudden increases in the SEU
rate correspond to solar events.
C. Trapped Protons
NASA/GSFC has carefully studied [23] the upsets observed
on some solid state recorders (SSRs) on SAMPEX
and TOMS/METEOR . (Fig. 25). The anomaly was studied by ESA [24], and ground
Figs. 23 and 24[23] very clearly show the correlation between
upset occurrence and the SAA. Note that due to the error detec-
tion and correction routines implemented on these applications,
these upsets had little impact on system performance. SAMPEX
was also a technology demonstrator using new up-to-date tech-
niques that had not previously been tried in space applications.
For example, it used a MIL-STD-1773 optical fiber data link
[23]. These data links use an LED as an emitter, fiber optics for
transmission, and a photoreceptor as a receiver. When an upset
occurs in a data transmission (mainly due to particle transients
on the photoreceptor), a bit is corrupted, and the system asks
for a retry. Fig. 23 shows again a clear correlation between
MIL-STD-1773 bus retries and the SAA.
1803
Fig. 23. SAMPEX and TOMS/METEOR-3 events. Upper chart, left:
SAMPEX SSR upsets. Upper chart, right: TOMS/METEOR-3 SSR upsets.
Lower chart: SAMPEX MIL-ST-1773 bus transmission retries, from [23].
Fig. 24. MYRIADE reaction wheel anomalies ‘[4].
Other recorded effects of SAA protons include single event
transients (SET) as experienced, for example, on the CNES
MYRIADE micro-satellite platform, on an on-the-shelf reaction
wheel as shown in Fig. 24.
Latch-ups have also been attributed to trapped protons. One
of the most famous cases, the first to show proton induced
latch-up, was the failure of the non-ESA PRARE altimeter
on-board the ESA Earth observation satellite ERS-1 (774 km,
98.5 ). At the moment of the switch-off event, an increase
in primary power of about 9 W, lasting between 16 and 32
seconds, was recorded by the housekeeping system of the
satellite. This event occurred after only 5 days of operation.
The failure location is right in the middle of the SAA zone
tests on engineering models proved that the origin of the failure
was due to a latch-up on one of the 64-kbit CMOS SRAMs
used in PRARE. Occurrence estimations from these tests were
also consistent with the in-flight observation.
Another well documented LEO case is the one of the joint
Swedish-German project Freja which expe-
rienced a number of single event effects including false com-
mands (0.5 to 1 per day, in the SAA), telemetry format er-
rors, memory SEUs, and finally latch-ups on the CPU boards.
The latch-ups shown in Fig. 26[25] were detected in the house-
keeping data through records of switches to redundant units.
The anomalies were studied by ESA [25]. The latch-ups were
reproduced on flight model spares using high energy proton
1804
Fig. 25. Location of the PRARE on ERS-1 latch-up failure, from [24].
Fig. 26. Number of latch-ups versus time on FREJA , from [25].
Fig. 27. Locations of HX6228 SEUs on IASI—METOP [4].
beams. The origin of latch-up events was traced back to CMOS
NS32C016 circuits in the CPU board.
Finally, proton induced upsets in HX6228 rad-hard devices
have recently been observed through anomalies on the CNES
IASI instrument on the EUMETSAT METOP polar orbiting
satellite. About half the upsets are located in the SAA as shown
in Fig. 27. Those upsets may be related to proton or ion induced
high-Z recoils within the device. The effect becomes observable
at system levels because the satellite uses approximately 130 of
those devices as a fast memory array.
VI. DISPLACEMENT DAMAGE
Optoelectronic components (LEDs, photodetectors, optocou-
plers, CCDs, APSs, etc.) tend to be very sensitive to displace-
ment damage, and so are, to a lesser extent, bipolar components.
The particular case of sensors (CCDs, APSs) will be developed
in Section VII. Also, solar cells are well known to be sensitive
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NUCLEAR SCIENCE, VOL. 60, NO. 3, JUNE 2013
to both ionizing dose and displacement damage. Those compo-
nents are external to the satellite so electron and proton contri-
butions have to be taken into account.
Few cases of displacement damage anomalies or failures have
been reported partially because noticeable proton fluence levels
are needed for observing such effects in equipment box com-
ponents such as optocouplers or bipolar devices. The lessons
learned come from proton-rich orbits such as TOPEX/Poseidon
(1336 km, 66 ) or GLOBALSTAR (1441 km, 52 ). On such
orbits, proton displacement damage levels (and ionizing dose
as well) roughly correspond to ten times the level received in a
more classical LEO 800 km, 98 polar orbiting mission. Those
accelerated conditions (3 years corresponding to roughly 30
years in “classical LEO”) have indeed revealed displacement
damage issues.
A. Optocouplers—TOPEX/poseidon
The JPL spacecraft TOPEX/Poseidon used 4N49 optocou-
plers in applications involving status signals, and in thruster
command circuits [26]. Status circuits had a required current
transfer ratio (CTR) of 0.5 whereas thruster’s circuits had a re-
quirement of 0.2. In the case of optocoupler devices, this made
the status circuits more sensitive than the thruster’s circuits.
Earlier failures were observed on status circuits, which were
not mission-critical, at a fluence corresponding to about
, and corresponded to the level which was derived
from ground tests.
The thruster valve optocouplers were predicted to fail
8.5–10 years after launch. First failures were observed after
a mission lifetime of 8.75 years, for an estimated fluence of
. Note that TOPEX was designed for a 3
year lifetime, met all its requirements and was operated well
beyond its design lifetime.
B. Bipolar Devices—GLOBALSTAR-1
The GLOBALSTAR-1 cellular phone telecommunication
constellation is composed of 48 operational satellites and 4
spares. The original deployment of the constellation took place
in the period 1998–2000. The radiation design lifetime of
individual satellites was 9 years. As soon as 2002, some type
of on-board receivers began exhibiting failures [27]. In the
period 2002-2004, 24 receivers on-board 21 satellites were
affected, 3 satellites failed. Later on, a strategy was developed
to circumvent this failure type and force signals through the
receivers.
The time-to-fail distribution over the impacted flight models
is shown in Fig. 28[27]. Note the large spread of this distribution
from 2.7 to 6.1 years as shown in Fig. 27.
The in-flight anomaly analysis [28] proved that the failures
originated in the proton displacement damage of LT RH1014
bipolar devices. Proton tests exactly reproduced the anomaly on
spare models.
The reasons for those earlier failures are:
— At the time of the receiver design , assessing the
effect of displacement damage on bipolar devices was not
an engineering practice in satellite design: nobody thought
ECOFFET: OVERVIEW OF IN-ORBIT RADIATION INDUCED SPACECRAFT ANOMALIES
Fig. 28. Time to failure distribution over the flight models in June 2004, from
[27].
Fig. 29. CNES ICARE/SAC-C L-time diagram of 10.5 MeV protons over the
period 2001–2004. Color scale is flux intensity. IPSAT plot [4].
that there could be an issue with space mission proton flu-
ence levels. The LT RH1014 were chosen because they
were hardened to ionizing dose.
— The first spacecraft to fly in such an elevated LEO orbit
was TOPEX and the optocoupler issue was not known at
the time.
— The design was a cutting-edge design with little margin to
cope with parametric drifts.
— The period 2001–2004 was subject to a solar activity in-
duced proton belt enhancement that may have accelerated
the degradation of the components, as illustrated in Fig. 29.
The lessons learned through these anomalies include:
— Device hardening against ionizing dose does not imply that
the device will be hardened against displacement damage.
— Displacement damage sensitivity can be very dependent
on the part lots and lot-to-lot variability can be important
( factor of 3 in the flight data).
— It is helpful to monitor the radiation environment on such
exposed missions.
For the GLOBALSTAR-2 constellation, those lessons
learned were implemented through:
— Systematic ionizing dose and displacement damage testing
of all procurement lots.
— Implementation of RADFET dosimeters on all the con-
stellation satellites for operational lifetime prediction, and
eventually, spare replacement strategy of the constellation.
1805
Fig. 30. Examples of transient signals on various CNES SPOT im-
ages—credits CNES, distribution Spot image.
VII. THE PARTICULAR CASE OF SENSORS
The various sensors used in a satellite platform or payload
are particularly sensitive to radiation effects because of their
exposition and the nature of their detectors which are, by design,
very sensitive to charge deposition. The sensors impacted may
be imaging sensors, attitude and orbit control (AOCS) sensors
such as star trackers, and finally all types of astronomy payloads
(gamma ray sensors, X-ray CCDs, UV, optical and IR imaging
sensors).
Current imagers for ultraviolet, optical and near-infrared
wavelengths mainly rely on CCD linear or matrix detectors.
Increasing use is being made of charge injection devices (CIDs)
and CMOS active pixel sensors (APSs). At other wavelengths
of the infrared spectrum, the major sensor material types are
InSb, InGaAs, GaAs/GaAlAs, HgCdTe, PtSi and extrinsic
silicon.
Space radiation effects on these various types of sensors may
be:
— Transient signals from proton or heavy ion prompt ioniza-
tion, these are single events. Depending on the arrival di-
rection of the particle, or whenever secondaries are cre-
ated, the effects can involve one or many pixels and can
appear as tracks in matrix detectors.
— Semi-permanent (because of annealing) or permanent ion-
izing dose or displacement damage degradation of pixel
properties.
A. Transient Signals
Transient signals are due to the collection of the charge gener-
ated by a proton or ion track. They can be seen in many space im-
ages, and are particularly associated with radiation belt (and es-
pecially the South Atlantic Anomaly for SSO satellites), or solar
flare protons. When first discovered on their images above the
South-Atlantic by the CNES SPOT-1 project team, they were
surnamed “UFOs“. Some examples of “UFOs” on SPOT im-
ages are shown in Fig. 30.
The transients can affect one or many pixels and their mani-
festation also depends on the nature of the read-out electronics.
The illustrations in Fig. 31 are part of SPOT images showing
such effects. The dashed appearance of some “UFOs” is due
to the odd/even scheme applied for the readout registers. The
proton has impacted a given pixel, and charge collection has
spread to nearby pixels, as shown by the dimming of pixel over-
current on both sides of the original impact. The read-out archi-
tecture relies on the separate readout of even and odd pixels.
The effect results in a dashed line of pixels.
1806
Fig. 31. Blurring of the VIS camera on NASA POLAR satellite during july
2000 solar flare—credits NASA.
Fig. 32. JPL GALILEO image of Io showing particle transients, image
PIA00593 [29]– credits JPL.
For Earth imaging satellites usually orbiting in SSO orbits
(600–800 km, 98 ), the transients are not such a critical issue
because their number remains low and they can be easily fil-
tered in image processing. For higher orbits, and space science
or astronomy imagers, more dramatic effects can be observed
during solar flares. For SSO orbits, solar flares would have an
effect only in the polar zones, where landscape uniformity and
reflectance, and also a lesser request for image acquisition, con-
tribute to minimize the impact of the phenomenon.
On occasions, the transients due to particle tracks can com-
pletely blur an image, as illustrated by Fig. 31 showing succes-
sive images of the Earth taken during the July 2000 solar flare
by the VIS (Visible Imaging System) on the NASA POLAR
satellite. Effects have also been observed on imagers on board
planetary probes, see for example the extraordinary GALILEO
image shown in Fig. 32 from [29] and quoted in [13]. The image
in Fig. 32 shows a Sodium volcanic plume on the Io moon and
its scattering of Jupiter’s light. White dots are impacts from par-
ticles of Jupiter’s radiation belts, whose flux is very intense at
the level of Io’s orbit.
The images in Fig. 33 shows the effects of flare protons on
SOHO’s images of the Sun itself. The proton tracks are seen
on the detectors a short time after the first images of the flare
itself were taken: the imagers are also “filming” the arrival of
the protons.
Sun, Earth and star sensors are commonly used on space-
craft for attitude determination. The growing requirements
for fine pointing accuracy, have tended to increase the use
of star trackers in the last generations of satellites. Similar
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NUCLEAR SCIENCE, VOL. 60, NO. 3, JUNE 2013
Fig. 33. Solar flare proton tracks on SOHO LASCO instrument—credits ESA.
Fig. 34. Close—up on image (A) inside the SAA—proton tracks are clearly
visible [4].
to imaging systems, these sensors use photo-detectors such
as CCDs (Charge Coupled Devices) or APS (Active Pixel
Sensor). A specific problem with star trackers is due to proton
or ion transient signals in the CCD or APS detector. The star
pattern recognition algorithm can think that the impacted bright
pixels are false stars, and get “lost” if the rate of events is
too high. This effect could severely impact the star tracker’s
dependability in regions and times of high proton fluxes.
As an example, the star tracker of the CNES/JPL JASON-1
satellite went out of the AOCS loop when the spacecraft passed
through the South Atlantic Anomaly. Figs. 34 and 35 show ex-
amples of close-ups of read-outs of the CCD matrix during ac-
quisitions inside and outside the SAA. Outside the SAA, the sky
is “clear” (Fig. 35), but inside the SAA, one could observe the
multiplication of white dots and also the diagonal tracks visual-
izing the travel of grazing protons through the detector (Fig. 34).
In the case of JASON (1335 km, 66 ), the outage duration was
short (a maximum of 20 min), and predictable, as far as the or-
bital passes were concerned. During these periods, JASON was
steered with its gyroscopes without any degradation of mission
parameters.
The JPL GENESIS probe uses the same star tracker as
JASON. During 21 April 2002 solar event, the star tracker was
blinded four times by high energy protons.
Switching to redundant units is not an applicable solution in
this case, because they will exhibit the same behavior as the
nominal ones. Hardening solutions consist in using radiation im-
proved or hardened CCDs or APS, and trying to design smarter
algorithms, but the signal to noise ratio may be so degraded that
this latter solution has limits.
ECOFFET: OVERVIEW OF IN-ORBIT RADIATION INDUCED SPACECRAFT ANOMALIES
Fig. 35. Close-up on image (B) – clear star field [4].
Fig. 36. Example of effects: right, “hot pixels”some pixels are saturated
leading to “white” columns, left: example of RTS leading to “white/black”
toggle—credits CNES, distribution Spot Image [4].
B. Permanent or Semi-Permanent Damage
The French Earth observation satellite SPOT 4 (830 830
km, 97 ) uses 3 MIR detectors (Middle InfraRed) based on In-
GaAs photodiodes. Since they have been launched, the MIR de-
tectors have shown an unexpected dark current behavior. Some
pixels have a dark current that increases suddenly. After such
a jump, the majority of affected pixels recover stable perfor-
mances without any degradation except in their dark current.
But, when the dark current jump is high (10 to 100 times the ini-
tial dark current level) the noise, and the temporal stability of the
dark current performance can be affected. The pixel becomes
“unstable” with the dark current level randomly switching be-
tween several discrete levels, the period varying from millisec-
onds to minutes. The same behavior has been observed on the
Indian Remote Sensing Satellite (IRS-1C) using the same In-
GaAs detectors [30]. Fig. 36 give examples of effects seen on
the pictures.
These phenomena have been studied by several authors
[31]–[35] in the case of silicon detectors. These works have
shown that displacement damage induced by protons can lead
to the appearance of dark current spikes (or hot pixels) and dark
current instability. In the last case, the dark current switches
between well-defined levels with the appearance of a random
telegraph signal (RTS).
Proton tests were done on spare parts. The tests showed that
the dark current behavior observed in-flight was consistent with
displacement damage induced by protons for extreme dark cur-
rent values as well as for the unstable pixels. It was also ob-
served that the mean dark current is correlated with the NIEL
calculated in InGaAs. Calculations lead experts to conclude that
these high values were due to inelastic interactions. RTS signals
were also characterized. This study resulted in proposing a semi-
empirical model prediction of the number of extreme values.
This model gives good results in the case of SPOT 4 [36].
1807
TABLE VIII
IASI SEU LOG, MAY 2011.
As far as star trackers are concerned, TID and DDD effects
on detectors will increase the mean dark current and alter dark
current non-uniformity during the mission time in orbit. This
would have two effects, modifying the uniformity of sensitivity,
and the global Signal/Noise ratio would also decrease. Thus, it
implies that lower magnitude stars would be harder to detect and
the barycentric center calculation perturbed. The sensor perfor-
mance in term of bias and noise would be degraded.
VIII. INVESTIGATION METHODOLOGY OF ROOT CAUSES
Here we will discuss some general issues about the interpre-
tation of radiation and space environment effects.
A. Statistical Aspects of Probabilistic Anomalies
1) Introduction: Single event phenomena (SEE: upsets,
latch-ups, ) observed in operational satellites or technolog-
ical payloads tend to show periods of high and low rates. These
periods may be associated with variations in the environment
conditions due to solar activity. They could also be due to the
mere probabilistic nature of SEE phenomena. In this section,
we try to assess the contribution of chance (or bad luck) in SEE
rate variation in space.
2) Observations:
IASI: The EUMETSAT METOP satellite carries the IASI
instrument (Infrared Sounding Atmospheric Interferometer)
developed by CNES. Upsets were observed on Honeywell’s
HX6828 radiation hardened 1 Mbit SRAMs of the on board
computer, which uses approximately130 of those devices.
Those upsets are due to trapped protons and GCR particles.
The observed time between two consecutive upsets varied
from 5 to 457 days, where the mean upset period was 121 days.
Note, the number of events was low in this case (11 records as
of May 2011, shown in Table VIII).
As shown in Section V-C., Fig. 27, upsets were found either
in the SAA (6 upsets to date) or in high latitude zones (5 upsets
to date) in about equal numbers. In this case, two independent
external causes (SAA protons and GCR) contribute to the upset
count.
In Fig. 37 we flag the lowest times between two consecutive
upsets. The first flag corresponds to a 7 day period, and the two
consecutive upsets both originated in the SAA. But for the two
other flags, respectively 5 and 12 days, the small period of time
1808
Fig. 37. Upset count versus time for the IASI HX6228 memories [4].
Fig. 38. Scatter plot (time between consecutive events versus time) for SPOT-1
OBC SEUs [4].
was due in the first case to a coincidence of a GCR upset fol-
lowed 5 days later by a SAA upset, and in the second case, to a
SAA upset followed by a GCR upset 12 days later.
SPOT: Upsets were recorded on Phillips HEF4736 1 kbit
SRAMs arrays (1440 devices) of SPOT-1 and-2 on board com-
puters [18]. Those upsets were due to galactic cosmic ions.
For SPOT-1, on a series running from 1986 to 2003, time
between two consecutive upsets varied from 0.3 days (i.e., 3
upsets a day) to 432 days (see Fig. 38), where the mean upset
period was 83 days. Sample size was 74 upsets.
For SPOT-2, on a series running from 1990 to 2007, time
between two consecutive upsets varied from 0.5 days (i.e., 2
upsets a day) to 773.5 days (see Fig. 39), where the mean upset
period was 93 days. Sample size was 66 upsets.
If now we compare the two series of upset counts versus time
for the two satellites, we can observe “ramps” and “gaps” in the
two series as shown in Fig. 40.
At the beginning (1986–1996), the upset count variations
seemed to reproduce the modulation of cosmic ray fluxes, which
are higher in solar minimum and lower in solar maximum. But
even in this period, one thing remained unexplained: in 1993,
SPOT-2 ramped up sharply whereas SPOT-1 remained “quiet”.
The two satellites were exposed to the same environment on
the same orbit and same orbital plane. In 1997, SPOT-1 SEUs
ramped up whereas SPOT-2 remained at a moderate rate. By
2001–2002 (solar maximum again), both satellites had lower
upset rates and appeared to be quiet.
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NUCLEAR SCIENCE, VOL. 60, NO. 3, JUNE 2013
Fig. 39. Scatter plot (time between consecutive events versus time) for SPOT-2
OBC SEUs [4].
Fig. 40. SPOT-1 and-2 OBC SEU count versus time [4].
In the case of SPOT OBCs, upsets were recorded either when
raising a flag on the satellite, in which case they are precisely
dated and located, or through memory dumps. In the latter case,
there is some uncertainty on the exact date of the upset, so the
scatter plots may suffer from this filtering. Because of this un-
certainty, it is difficult to try to reproduce the statistics using a
random generator with a small time scale. We can nevertheless
try to simulate the process at a larger time scale, i.e., try to sim-
ulate an upset count per year, for example.
The mean upset period was about 90 days (one every 3
months). This would correspond to a probability of 1/3 of
having an upset each month. Using a random generator, we
simulate, for each month of the series, upset occurrences with
a probability of 1/3. Table IX shows the total upset count per
year for SPOT1 and SPOT2.
We will use the SPOT1 series because it has the larger spread
in upset count (1 to 10 per year). Fig. 41 compares the upset
count versus date for the actual SPOT-1 series (red dots) and 30
random series per graph (total of 120 random series for the 4
graphs).
The SPOT-1 series remains inside the “statistic valley”. Let
us now evaluate the deviation inside the series (SPOT-1:
, ). The random series also can reproduce this devi-
ation, as shown in Fig. 42.
In conclusion: the in-flight SPOT-1 upset series is situated to-
wards the most “stretched” zone in yearly upset count variations
ECOFFET: OVERVIEW OF IN-ORBIT RADIATION INDUCED SPACECRAFT ANOMALIES
TABLE IX
SPOT1 AND SPOT2 SEU YEARLY COUNT.
Fig. 41. SPOT-1 OBC SEU yearly count (thick dotted line) compared with
results obtained with random sorting. X axis is years from 1986 to 2003, Y axis
is event count from 0 to 90 [4].
Fig. 42. SPOT-1 OBC SEU minimum and maximum yearly count (thick dotted
curve) compared with results obtained with random sorting. X axis is minimum
count from 0 to 4, and Y axis maximum count from 4 to 12 [4].
(highest and lowest counts) compared with simulated random
series. Nevertheless a random series can reproduce the observed
values, so, formally, there is no way to distinguish between mere
1809
Fig. 43. Location of CY7C1069 latch-ups recorded by the CARMEN-2 exper-
iment [4].
chance and variations in environmental conditions in the SPOT
series annual count variations.
The SPOT example may be representative, in the long term,
of what could be observed on IASI because the two systems
have about the same upset period. In conclusion, it is impossible
to determine whether solar activity had an effect on SPOT upset
rates; the variations observed could be due to mere chance.
3) Case Study: In order to study the statistical aspects with
better accuracy, we need:
— A large sample size, e.g., either a long term series of
medium sensitivity phenomena such as SPOT or Pioneer,
which are rare, or a shorter term series of a higher sensi-
tivity phenomenon
— A sample size in which all events are dated with reasonable
accuracy (this is the drawback of the SPOT series because
of imprecise upset dating after memory dumps).
We will use the latch-up records on a CYPRESS CY7C1069
SRAM flown as a test sample on the CNES CARMEN-2 space
environment and component test bed passenger on JASON-2
[37] as a case study.
In-Flight Observations: Latch-ups (SELs) were located
mainly on the SAA, very few have occurred in high latitude
zones (see Fig. 42). Events were dated with an accuracy of 64
seconds.
Let us consider the reference period: 23/06/08–31/12/08.
The timeline of events (latch-up count versus time) is shown in
Fig. 43. During this period, we can note a gap of 44 days in the
latch-up records, due to an anomaly in the internal sub-system
communication protocol. This period will be removed from the
latch-up series in the analysis below.
One can note again periods of high and low SEL rate; are they
due to changes in the environment, or mere chance?
Let us zoom for example on the June-August 2008 period as
shown in Fig. 44. Periods of high rates and periods of low rates
can clearly be observed.
The main time constants are indicated on the graph: the mean
time between events , orbital period (100 min), and
maximum SAA crossing time . The minimum ob-
served time between consecutive events is . Dots
in the band correspond to 2 upsets during one SAA
pass.
1810
Fig. 44. Latch-up count versus time for CY7C1069 as recorded by the
CARMEN-2 experiment [4].
Fig. 45. Latch-up count versus time for CY7C1069 as recorded by the
CARMEN-2 experiment emphasizing on June-August 2008 period [4].
There is one dot in the “forbidden band”
. This is because on the Jason orbit, it is possible to
pass two times through the SAA in one orbital path when this
pass is at the edge of the SAA.
The distribution of times between two consecutive events ex-
hibits a mean time between events of 0.947 days, minimum time
between events of 128 seconds and a maximum time between
events of 7.8 days. Fig. 45 draws a scatter plot of time between
events in flight.
Virtual SEE Count—Uniform Probability: Let us assume
a mean period of 1 event/day (in-flight: 0.947). Let us suppose
a constant SEL probability “p” (to be discussed further). Each
hour we assume to have a probability of an SEL of
For each hour of each day for the time period between 23/06
and 31/12, we use a random generator at probability
to simulate event occurrences.
The results show “ramps” (high count rate) and “gaps” (low
count rate) very similar to those of actual flight data. Fig. 46
compares sample runs with flight data. The final count on the
reference period for the sample runs range from about 160 to
200 due to mere random processes.
It is thus not surprising to see ramps and gaps at different
times for different trials, this is very similar to the SPOT1/2
case. In space, we may see one device ramp up, and another
similar one having a gap.
The mean, minimum and maximum time between events for
the sample runs are summarized in Table X. The minimum pe-
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NUCLEAR SCIENCE, VOL. 60, NO. 3, JUNE 2013
Fig. 46. Scatter plot of time between consecutive events versus time for the
CARMEN flight data [4].
TABLE X
MEAN, MINIMUM AND MAXIMUM TIME BETWEEN EVENTS IN UNIFORM
PROBABILITY RANDOM SIMULATIONS AND ACTUAL CARMEN IN-FLIGHT DATA.
,
riod cut-off at 1/24 day is due to the trial hypothesis, and the
maximum period is similar but not quite as long as the in-flight
one.
Virtual SEE Count—Non Uniform Probability: The use of
a uniform probability of per hour introduces a cut-off
at 0.042 days and does not explain the minimum time between
events observed in flight. In space, the SEE probability is not
uniform because of SAA passes. On the JASON orbit, the mean
SAA pass duration is about 20 min, for an orbital period of 100
min (duty cycle of 1/5).
. The mean rate of 1 event/day would correspond, as used
above, to a uniform probability of 1/24 per hour or, in another
unit: per minute. To simulate the
modulation of the SEE probability by SAA passes, we will use
a very simple first order model and suppose, within a 100 min
period, a probability function such as:
— A probability of having an SEE during SAA passes of
— A probability of having an SEE outside SAA passes of zero
(0)
Each minute of each day for a period of 45 days, we sort out
SEE occurrence following the scheme above.
Sample runs are shown in Fig. 47. Again, “ramps” (high count
rate) and “gaps” (low count rate) very similar to those of ac-
tual flight data are reproduced. The maximum time between
ECOFFET: OVERVIEW OF IN-ORBIT RADIATION INDUCED SPACECRAFT ANOMALIES
Fig. 47. Comparison between random simulations and actual in-flight
CARMEN latch-up count. The in-flight series exhibit a 44 day gap [4].
TABLE XI
MEAN, MINIMUM AND MAXIMUM TIME BETWEEN EVENTS IN NON- UNIFORM
PROBABILITY RANDOM SIMULATIONS AND ACTUAL CARMEN IN-FLIGHT DATA.
Fig. 48. Examples of simulations of event count using the non-uniform prob-
ability function used for modeling SAA passes [4].
events is also well reproduced and now, with the model change
to a non-uniform probability distribution, the minimum time be-
tween events is also reproduced.
The mean, minimum and maximum time between events for
the sample runs are summarized in Table XI.
A scatter plot of time between actual events versus time for
the simulated runs is shown in Fig. 48. Fig. 49 shows a side-by-
side comparison of the flight data and the simulated runs scatter
plots.
Summary of the Case Study: Using a coarse random con-
stant probability process, we reproduce ramps (high SEE rate)
1811
Fig. 49. Scatter plots (time between events versus time) for the simulated runs
[4].
TABLE XII
EXTRAPOLATION OF THE STATISTICAL MEAN, MINIMUM AND MAXIMUM TIME
BETWEEN EVENTS FOR THE SPOT AND IASI CASES.
and gaps (low SEE rate periods), and explain larger periods be-
tween events. Using a varying probability function, because the
SEE probability is not the same along the orbit, even with a sim-
plistic model, we reproduce even the smaller periods between
events. To conclude, an observed SEE series exhibiting a mean
period of 1 event/day, with 7 days maximum time between 2
events, and 128 seconds minimum time between 2 events, can
be explained by a pure random process.
Out of 189 events, there were six occasions in which events
were separated by less than 20 min. The average probability of
having 2 SEEs in one orbital pass for a 1 day period phenom-
enon is thus about 3%.
4) Back to SPOT and IASI Cases: If we apply a simple
scaling rule between the CARMEN series and other series using
the ratio of the mean SEE periods, we could predict upset per-
formances for SPOT and IASI. We used the same mean rate for
SPOT and IASI which is conservative for the minimum time
between events for SPOT.
The applicability of this rule has to be assessed, but the
scaling should not be too bad. The SPOT upsets are due to
cosmic rays only (not SAA as for CARMEN) and there are 2
passes over the polar zones per orbit, about 20 min duration
for each pass (assuming the “polar” zone starts at 45 north
or south). In this case, the modulation is in fact twice the
SAA modulation (probability spread over 40 min instead of
20 min), so the “averaged peak” probability would be lower
than for a “one shot zone” as for CARMEN, and thus the
minimum period would be underestimated by the scaling rule.
The IASI upsets are situated half in the SAA and half in the
polar zones. Here again we remain on the conservative side
for the minimum time between events (probability spread over
).
On IASI, 5 days and 400 days between events have already
been observed, but with so few events there is more range in the
mean upset rate. On SPOT-2, 700 days have been observed.
1812
Fig. 50. Comparison between scatter plots (time between events versus time) for the actual flight data (left) and the simulated runs (right) [4].
On the two SPOT satellites, we have a certain number
of events separated by much less than 3.6 days (see scatter
plots in VIII.A.2.b., Figs. 37 and 38 ), which behaved out of
family with a random event. Those points may be related to
some other effect than SEE. Particularly, one double upset was
recorded on SPOT-1. This event took place on December 26,
1993. The first upset corresponded to a 0 to 1 transition of bit
4 at address 023142, dated 15h 11\min 29s. The other corre-
sponded to a 1 to 0 transition of bit 10 at address 132503, dated
. These addresses refer to physically
different packages. The satellite was at a position of
latitude of longitude on both events. These events
may not be SEEs.
5) Considerations on See Test Logs: SEE ground test logs
also exhibit the same ramps and gaps features that in-flight
records do because the same statistical nature of SEE counting
occurs both in space and during ground tests. Fig. 50 depicts
a sample proton latch-up test run for the CYPRESS SRAMs
flown on the CARMEN payload and used in the case study.
The same statistical representation could be used to analyze
the test logs. In the case of cyclotron beams we also face the
issue of a non-uniform rate because cyclotron beams are pulsed
beams.
6) Conclusionsmdash;Methodology for See Analysis: The
statistical behavior described above (ramps and gaps) would be
applicable to flight series of different time scales (mean period
1/month, 1/year, etc.). This is also the behavior of SEE count
logs during ground tests, with the same problem of varying
event probability in case of pulsed beams. For mission opera-
tion, dependability analysis, or for critical SEE effects, the cal-
culation of a mean SEE rate may not be sufficient for system
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NUCLEAR SCIENCE, VOL. 60, NO. 3, JUNE 2013
impact assessment. As a proposed methodology, we may for-
mulate:
— Calculate the mean SEE rate.
— Determine the probability function.
— Determine min and max periods between events (at confi-
dence level to be chosen).
— Or, which is the same: estimate min and max SEE rates
(with confidence levels).
This would help in determining whether rates are “normal” or
not and sort out what could be related to mere chance and what
is abnormal i.e., may be related to environmental variations.
Determining the “normal” domain would help in operations for
evaluating \max/min workload and also for relations with final
customers when “ramps” of anomalies appear: they simply
could be due to “bad luck”. Determining the “normal” domain
would also help in assessing how strongly environmental
variations modify the statistics.
During the project design phase, mean SEE rates may be
accompanied with an evaluation of the statistical max (con-
fidence level) risk, especially in the case of destructive phe-
nomena when a mean predicted rate is compared with lifetime
or FITs.
Other considerations associated with this statistical behavior
may be: SEE counting is sometimes used as a proxy to assess en-
vironment conditions. But doing this measure through the proxy
of discrete, probabilistic phenomena will be subject to the same
large statistical variations, so detection accuracy should be care-
fully studied. Also, SEE prediction models should of course be
as accurate as possible in the determination of the mean in-flight
rate for a given environment, nevertheless the statistic “fog”
may introduce some trade-offs in the efforts to achieve this goal.
ECOFFET: OVERVIEW OF IN-ORBIT RADIATION INDUCED SPACECRAFT ANOMALIES 1813

Fig. 51. Sample ground test log of latch-up count versus time for the
CY7C1069 used in the CARMEN experiment [4].
B. Correlations and Cause To Effects Relationships
Fig. 52. Comparison between POSEIDON/JASON-1 resets (top) and electron
flux measurements (from top to bottom: NPOES-15 5.35 MeV and 3.35 MeV,
SAC-C ICARE1 MeV and 0.5 MeV). Credits NOAA, CNES. IPSAT plot
CNES/ONERA [4].

1) Unexpected Correlation: Resets of Poseidon/Jason-1: It

is sometimes believed that the charging environment is of little
impact on LEO missions and that the great majority of space en-
vironment related LEO anomalies are radiation induced. Some
cases moderate this belief, as the well documented failure of a
solar array on the ADEOS-2 satellite due to a charging issue in
the output power cables.
The Poseidon instrument on JASON-1 began to experience
un-commanded resets some years after being started. The occur-
rence of those resets seemed to increase with time with a climax
around the year 2004. This version of Poseidon was entirely
built using rad-hard components. In spite of that, the favorite
suspect was a radiation effect such as an SET or a SEU. Con-
sidering the acceleration of the occurrence, the project began
thinking that the instrument might be coming to its end. No cor-
relation was made between those resets and solar particle events
Fig. 53. JASON-2 passenger incident (white vertical line) compared with elec-
or other conditions in the proton belt or cosmic rays. However tron flux measurements (from top to bottom: JASON-2 ICARE-NG 3.6 MeV
there appeared to be a loose correlation between the periods MeV and METOP SEM2 3.35 MeV). Credits CNES, NOAA. IPSAT
plot CNES/ONERA [4].
of increased reset occurrence and the periods in which coronal
mass ejections lead to persisting high energy electron clouds in
the outer electron belt (Fig. 51). relationship, or if this is mere chance or if there is yet a third
Based on this observation, but without any element of proof, root cause.
it was believed that the phenomenon would slow down or dis- 3) Revisited Correlations in a Different Environment: TC2
appear when the electron conditions would settle at the end of Recent Studies: Taking advantage of the very calm conditions
the solar cycle. That was what happened. of the latest solar minimum, a cross-analysis of recent TC2C
This, among other observations, tends to show that the and TC2D GEO satellites anomalies by charging and radiation
charging environment is possibly related with some SEE type effects engineers were done. Those anomalies tended to be as-
anomalies in LEO. This could also be the case for the out sociated in the past with ESD effects and the charging environ-
of family events on the SPOT-1 and 2 computers discussed ment. In solar maximum, the number of electron enhancement
previously in Section V-A. events is such that almost any event would correlate. The ad-
2) Un-decidable Correlations: Anomaly on Jason-2 Pas- vantage of analyzing events during the calm period is that the
senger: On 11 April 2010 one passenger payload of Jason-2 environment was not charging as much. What kinds of anoma-
had an anomaly. Looking at flux data only, one may think there lies manifested during that period?
was a correlation with the 5 April magnetic storm, the associ- The result of the analysis showed:
ated electron “cloud” and increase in ESD risk as depicted in Type 1
Fig. 52. But the location of the anomaly was right in the SAA — Event 1: major ESD risk conditions (magnetic storm)
high proton flux zone (see Fig. 53). Again, deeper analysis — Events 2 and 3: low ESD risk conditions
is required to determine whether there is a cause-to-effect — Event 4: no ESD risk
1814
Fig. 54. Location of the JASON-2 passenger incident compared with AP8 20
MeV proton flux map [4].
Type 2: not correlated with a magnetic storm
Type 3: event 1 and 2: not an ESD
Type 4: event 1 and 2: not an ESD
Type 5: low ESD risk conditions
Type 6: medium ESD risk conditions
Only Type 1/case 1, seems to be correlated with an excep-
tional environmental activity. All types could as well be caused
by SETs (single event transients). Nothing either in the avail-
able cosmic ion records (ACE) indicates anomalous cosmic ray
fluxes at the anomalies dates, but SEEs are probabilistic phe-
nomena. Again, an analysis deeper than simple correlation is
needed.
C. Anomaly Prevention: Space Weather and Preventive
Actions
In some cases, anticipative space weather actions have to
be taken to protect sensitive payloads. One example may be
a NASA Lidar on CNES CALIPSO LEO satellite, part of the
A-train. Solar flares can lead to a possible hazard for instru-
ment safety. CNES switches off this payload on NASA Space
Weather solar flare warnings.
D. Unexplained Observations – “X Files”
On 2 and 3 august 2010, simultaneous frequency jumps were
observed on all DORIS altimeters ultra-stable oscillators (USO)
as shown in Fig. 54. The carrier missions are SPOT4, SPOT5,
ENVISAT and CRYOSAT2 in LEO polar orbits, and
JASON-1 and-2 in a LEO 1336 km, 66 orbit.
Those USOs are more or less sensitive to prompt ionizing
dose depending on the flight model (see IV.D. for the JASON-1
case). The phenomenon was only observed on passes over
Kourou, French Guiana, and could be SAA related.
On 1 August 2010, a complex but quite weak event devel-
oped on the Sun. No significant enhancement of the radiation
conditions, as observed from the available environment moni-
toring instruments were detected in this period of time. There is
no explanation to date of these simultaneous frequency jumps!
IX. CONCLUSIONS
Radiation-induced spacecraft anomalies have been observed
since the very beginning of the space era. They now represent
one of the major sources of flight anomalies. In most cases,
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NUCLEAR SCIENCE, VOL. 60, NO. 3, JUNE 2013
Fig. 55. Simultaneous frequency jumps were observed on all DORIS instru-
ments on August 2–3, 2010 [4].
the anomaly investigations have encouraged and continue
to encourage radiation effects research. Radiation effects
knowledge is of tremendous added value for engineering
anomaly workarounds, as JPL brilliantly demonstrated with the
GALILEO probe.
Radiation effects anomalies have their origin at the compo-
nent level but the observed anomaly is a system response, and it
is important to know how the system works that may “filter” the
symptoms for a good analysis. The random nature of the SEE
phenomena can lead to surprising behaviors which should be
known to satellite operators and final customers. Also, correla-
tions can be tricky (e.g., ESD vs. SEE), and multi-field expert
analysis is recommended.
In-situ measurement of environment conditions is of great
help for anomaly analysis and the use of “satellite environment
black boxes” is recommended when possible.
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