Intersil's Rad-Hard ICs Blast off on Orion's Flight Test
Intersil Corporation, a provider of innovative power management and precision analog solutions, has announced that 16 of its radiation-hardened ICs were onboard the Dec. 5, 2014 maiden voyage of NASA's Orion spacecraft, also known as the uncrewed Exploration Flight Test 1. The Orion spacecraft is designed to go where no man has gone before, including astronauts exploring and collecting asteroid samples from a future planned robotic mission to redirect an asteroid to orbit the moon, and the long sought after manned mission to Mars.
Intersil's rad-hard ICs are deployed in Orion's crew module, where they are used to support subsystems for mission critical applications in power distribution, navigation and flight control, and in the inertial measurement unit. A wide range of Intersil rad-hard solutions are used including voltage regulators, comparators, multiplexers, PWM controllers, MOSFET drivers, dual analog switches, quad differential receivers and microprocessor supervisory circuits.
"Intersil's innovative rad-hard ICs are playing a key role in NASA's next big step into deep space exploration, which is energizing a new generation of engineers, scientists and astronauts," said Philip Chesley, senior vice president of Precision Products at Intersil. "The successful Orion test flight is a major achievement, and we're proud to be a part of it."
Intersil's history and experience in the space and defense industries spans almost six decades, beginning with the founding of Radiation Inc. in 1950. Since then, virtually every satellite, shuttle launch and deep-space mission has included Intersil products.
All Intersil SMD products are MIL-PRF-38535/QML compliant and are 100% burned in.
Intersil's space flight IC capabilities include:
"¢ ~300 space-qualified radiation-hardened products available
"¢ Consistent design and manufacturing in Intersil's MIL-PRF-38535-qualified facility located in Palm Bay, Florida
"¢ Intersil is one of only 15 RHA Defense Logistics Agency (Land and Maritime) QML suppliers
"¢ All products are fully Class V (space level) compliant
"¢ All products are on individual DLA SMD drawings
