Risk assessment for heavy ions of parts tested with protons

An internuclear cascade - evaporation code is used to model energy deposition in thin slabs of silicon. This model shows that protons produce a significant number of events with effective Linear Energy Transfer (LET) greater than 8 MeV cm(2)/mg and demonstrates that proton testing of microelectronic components can be an effective way to screen devices for low earth orbit susceptibility to heavy ions.