The developments in space technology depend on and benefits from the developments in terrestrial technologies.An example is the introduction of transistors and integrated circuits (IC) which changed the design of electronicssystems of space vehicles from vacuum tube based to transistor based design. Introduction of microcontrollers andmicroprocessors opened new horizons in the design of control systems and algorithms.In addition the current trend of commercialization of space missions calls for multi-purpose, flexible, powerfuland low cost solutions. Subsystems and sensors of these spacecraft should meet more stringent criteria such as lowerpower, smaller size and mass in addition to the environmental criteria for space applications. This paper discusses thepotential of new consumer / automotive IC technologies in new generation space missions. Also we will introducespecific ICs which we have designed and successfully simulated to be used in low-cost spacecraft.Communication and navigation are two main functions existing in almost all spacecraft. Designing eachsubsystem separately and using separate printed circuit boards (PCB) for each of them increases the size of thespacecraft. New IC technologies however provide the opportunity to integrate all subsystems in a single package andreduce the size and mass while the saved volume can be used to increase the functionality of the spacecraft. A studyshows that using the complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) IC technologies with transistor feature size(gate length) of less than 0.18 μm are practically radiation tolerant.In order to be able to combine different functions, each subsystem is designed as an IC design library. An ICdesign library is a miniaturized design of a fully functional subsystem which is ready to be used in a chip. Thecomponents of the library are the functions required for each subsystem. The complete system will be the result ofintegration of these miniaturized subsystems.As a proof of concept, we have designed three library components. A Class E amplifier with high efficientamplitude modulator, a very low frequency active antenna receiver for radio astronomy and, finally, the GPS/Galileoreceiver front-end is designed to use both GPS and Galileo Navigation systems for spacecraft navigation.This combination of Communication, Navigation and Sensor libraries gives us a highly miniaturized, highlyintegrated and flexible chip which has a total area of less than 1 cm2 and a mass of few grams which providesopportunities to define new novel applications in space.
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