Total Ionizing Dose Test Report VPT Components JANS2N5154U3 NPN Power Si Transistor
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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.
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In order to harden power converters for the rigors of space, NASA awarded multiple SBIR contracts to Blacksburg, Virginia-based VPT Inc. The resulting hybrid DC-DC converters have proven valuable in aerospace applications, and as a result the company has generated millions in revenue from the product line and created four high-tech jobs to handle production.
This paper will outline the design and test results for the Europa Lander motor controller’s Power Conversion Slice. Europa Lander is a proposed NASA mission concept to send a stationary spacecraft to Jupiter’s Icy Moon, Europa, to search for subsurface biosignatures. The Power Conversion Card is one of the many technologies designed for this mission. The Power Conversion Card’s primary function is to convert the power supplied by the spacecraft battery to usable power for use within the motor controller. In addition, this card provides power system telemetry to the spacecraft computer. This card tolerates Europa’s harsh radiation environment within a protected vault to enable it to survive the external temperatures which can be as low as -184°C during the three-week mission. This design makes use of multiple commercially available radiation hardened electronics, including Cobham’s UT32M0R500 Arm Microcontroller along with VPT’s DC-DC Converters for power conversion. The microcontroller is used to collect local power system telemetry and assess card health autonomously without intervention from the spacecraft’s main computer. This paper will showcase the design behind the prototype and electrical testing results.