Defense Applications of GaAs Digital Integrated Circuits

Accomplishments in the development of GaAs digital integrated circuits places the technology ready for insertion into advanced, high performance systems. One micron, depletion MESFET, medium scale ICs are in pilot production at Rockwell International with construction in progress on a LSI/VLSI manufacturing facility. The latest results concerning GaAs digital technology system readiness, including device performance, fabrication yield, reliability, survivability, temperature sensitivity, high speed packaging constraints, and interfacing to other logic families will be given. Comparison to silicon devices technologies being developed within the VESIC program will be given for both present performance levels and projected through 1990. The role of GaAs digital ICs in wideband digital systems will be discussed, and the impact of GaAs ICs on system performance in applications, including electronic warfare, communications, space surveillance and image processing will be shown.