CRITICAL-EVALUATION OF THE PULSED-LASER METHOD FOR SINGLE EVENT EFFECTS TESTING AND FUNDAMENTAL-STUDIES

In this paper we present an evaluation of the pulsed laser as a techni que for single events effects (SEE) testing. We explore in detail the important optical effects, such as laser beam propagation, surface ref lection, and linear and nonlinear absorption, which determine the natu re of laser-generated charge tracks in semiconductor materials. While there are differences in the structure of laser- and ion-generated cha rge tracks, we show that in many cases the pulsed laser remains an inv aluable tool for SEE testing. Indeed, for several SEE applications, we show that the pulsed laser method represents a more practical approac h than conventional accelerator-based methods.