Low Power, and Highly reliable Double Node Upset Immune Flipflop for Nanoscale CMOS Technologies

Standard cells are the foundation of any chip design, so their reliability is crucial in critical applications, like in radiation-prone environments. In such environments, conventional flip-flops (FFs) might get affected by Single Node Upsets (SNUs) or Double Node Upsets (DNUs). Therefore, this article proposes two highly reliable radiation-hardened FF designs: Radiation-hardened DNU-tolerant FF (RHDUT-FF) and radiation-hardened DNU-recoverable FF (RHDUR-FF). These designs consist of CEs, CE-based latches,, and tristate inverters. They are completely Radiation hardened against SNUs as well as DNUs. RHDUT-FF is cost-effective, but RHDUR-FF provides complete self-recovery from DNUs. Simulation results show the complete DNU tolerance in RHDUT-FF and complete DNU recovery in RHDUR-FF. Compared to existing designs, RHDUT-FF and RHDUR-FF reduces area by 10% and 15%, timing by 50% and 36%, and power by 62% and 33%, respectively.