Bridging the space systems performance-reliability gap for future deep space resources exploration and exploitation.

In building equipment for space exploitation, one has to trade system robustness for the high processing capabilities and low energy consumption. The high performance, low robustness approach, is acceptable, especially in Earths’ vicinity. However, in more demanding (especially high-radiation) environments, attempts had disappointing outcomes. The processing-reliability gap, between highly reliable and highly performant systems, spans 2-3 orders of magnitude. This gap brings hope, that some of this excess processing power can be utilized, in building a combination of hardware and software mechanisms that is capable of increasing robustness and resilience of otherwise susceptible semiconductor devices, while allowing to harness the remaining processing power to build affordable space systems with large degrees of autonomy, rich functionality and high bandwidth. At the CritiX research group, we aim to bridge this performance-reliability gap, by researching the enabling building blocks for constructing more reliable and more secure System-on-Chips.