IMPACT OF VLSI/VHSIC ON SATELLITE ON-BOARD SIGNAL PROCESSING.

Current integrated circuit technology has produced LSI chips with a minimum feature size of 6 mu m, gate delays of 10 ns, and a packing density of approximately 150 gates/mm**2. These figures vary for different fabrication techniques and logic families. This paper quotes data for N-channel MOS, the technology which shows the most promise for scaling down to VLSI dimensions in the near future. Improvements in fabrication, such as the use of X-ray lithography, will allow manufacture of IC's with submicron feature sizes within the decade, approaching a theoretical minimum feature size of . 3 mu m. These developments will have a significant impact on the capabilities of on-board spacecraft signal processing functions, allowing more intelligence to be placed on remote-sensing platforms in space. The NEEDS (NASA End-to-End Data System) program will make good use of these capabilities. Specific goals of the NEEDS program present a requirement for on-board signal processing to achieve user-compatible, information adaptive data acquisition.