New efforts!

[JoshexProxy]

Going to need to be more specific.  The presentation covers a number of different effects given different radiation sources and energy levels and the kinds of semiconductor structures that are vulnerable.  In some cases the effect is due to the energy delivered by the radiation particles creating charge effects in the semiconductors.  Charge effects can affect capacitance-based memories (basically, by adding free charge to them).  The presentation also describes cosmic ray induced latch up - that's where a radiation particle shoots through the circuit and as it passes through it creates a spike of voltage in just the right place to take a part of a circuit that normally doesn't conduct current and start a feedback loop where the spike starts current flowing and that current alters the circuit in a way that causes more current to flow, and the circuit basically locks up and cannot be reset (short of removing all the power from the circuit by turning it completely off).  Software people sometimes call these "stuck-at faults" because what happens is a memory cell gets "stuck at" one or zero, and no amount of trying to overwrite that cell causes it to change state.  It is "stuck-at" its value, and basically you have to reboot to fix it.

I meant the root of it all, what is it about a Neutron that can cause this disruption in an electronic storage system. Simple science question.

[Angel Phoenix77]

[Quietly peeks into forum, looks around then quietly turns around and closes the door.

[Arcana]

I meant the root of it all, what is it about a Neutron that can cause this disruption in an electronic storage system. Simple science question.

Nothing special per se.  In fact some of the high energy particles are neutrons, some are protons, some are mesons, some are alpha particles (bare helium nuclei).  Ultimately, all of them can strike the nuclei of atoms in the silicon semiconductors.  The presentation mentions silicon itself and boron, a common semiconductor dopant. 

There are different processes that can occur depending on the energy of the particles: high speed ones can just smash nuclei, shattering the nucleus into a lot of smaller bits.  Low speed neutrons can participate in neutron capture, causing atoms to undergo spontaneous fission.  Either way, an atom in the semiconductor that used to be this is now a pile of that, and those things are usually no longer fixed to the solid crystal.  As they move away from the impact site, the electrons that were bound to them also get free.  You then end up with free conduction electrons and/or valence hole moving around creating currents in the material. 

Because semiconductors are engineered to have certain voltages here and there, these currents can be redirected, amplified, or cause spontaneous changes in the circuitry state. Move enough electrons into the right place in certain memory cells and that cell can energize: it can flip from a zero to a one (or vice versa).  Push them through the right place and they can trigger a cascade of other electrons and a transistor can turn on and get stuck on.

Short version: baryonic radiation (protons, neutrons, etc) can smash atomic nuclei.  Smashing atoms in a semiconductor tends to free electrons that were bound to that atom.  Those electrons can then move in the semiconductor.  Moving electrons is current, controlling current is what semiconductors do, messing that up can change what the circuits should be doing.

[Victoria Victrix]

Please enjoy this fine cockatoo video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJOZp2ZftCw

[Arcana]

I see your dancing cockatoo and raise you a parrot giving a TED talk:

https://www.ted.com/talks/einstein_the_parrot_talks_and_squawks

[Baaleos]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DImp4PG2Ozs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cyrcNVNpihI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=whWfJ5GSQCE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AkpDlqEwBoo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_XcEVx5WJVg


Caterpie Fainted!!
Caterpie Fainted!!

[rkcdan]

Sewer team forming please send tell

[Solitaire]

Sewer team forming please send tell

Tell  ;)

[duane]

Sewer team forming please send tell

Tell

Do you want a healer, tanker or controller?  I am happy to grab whatever the team needs.

[Tubbius]

It seems the bird videos have really reversed the polarity of the neutron flow of this conversation.  :)

[TimtheEnchanter]

We're confusing the polarity!

[Shibboleth]

It is perfectly fine to fictionalize: all science fiction does to some extent.  But there are limits.  If you decide to put California on the east coast instead of the west coast just because it is convenient, or you think it would be more interesting if jet engines were edible or the sky was yellow that's fine, but there should be some explanation for why those things are true in whatever wacky world you're writing about.  You cannot excuse blatant mistakes for narrative necessity.

No disagreement here.

As goes Dan Brown, not having read him I was not trying to defend him but rather laying out why and where technical accuracy or the lack of it reasonably should be held against a work. I've never felt drawn to any of his works and it would probably take positive reviews from trustworthy sources to inspire me to try him due to the wealth of criticism over The Da Vinci Code (but then, I don't generally favor alternate history anyway).

[Felderburg]

Sewer team forming please send tell

Hate to break it to you, but... he's been dead for a few hundred years: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Tell

...if wikipedia is to be believed.

[Brigadine]

We're confusing the polarity!

NEVER CROSS THE STREAMS

[Arcana]

Hate to break it to you, but... he's been dead for a few hundred years

https://images.rapgenius.com/660c654cac605799937d9cb034a42b81.460x270x1.jpg

[Arcana]

NEVER CROSS THE STREAMS

Eh, what could go wrong.

https://images.weserv.nl/?url=media6.tiin.vn%2Fmedia01%2F50fd0e563d0b9%2F2014%2F03%2F17%2Fed53585b-8311-4279-9b30-f7e704d2c018.jpg
https://images.weserv.nl/?url=k14.vcmedia.vn%2Fthumb_w%2F600%2FTUcCKsDLlXNsjUG7RZV5C4G4GPDR4i%2FImage%2F2014%2F03%2Farticle-2585090-1C70199800000578-335_634x489-1ac7d.jpg
https://images.weserv.nl/?url=nld.vcmedia.vn%2F2014%2F1-imageview-1395024973306.jpg

[LaughingAlex]

That is insanity Arcana......

[Felderburg]

That is insanity Arcana......

It's an insanely straight edged hole.

[Taceus Jiwede]

That is insanity Arcana......

Insane yes.  But if you were a good swimmer that actually would work out.  Like a really good swimmer......the kid was probably okay.  Probably.

[LadyVamp]

Semiconductor failures induced by radiation sources, both terrestrial and cosmic, are fairly well known.  Here's a power-pointy looking presentation on the subject:

http://www.ewh.ieee.org/r6/scv/rl/articles/ser-050323-talk-ref.pdf

It talks about the various historical sources of radiation that could damage or malfunction semiconductor circuits.  In summary, the smaller and denser semiconductors get the more sensitive they become to radiation induced malfunctions.  In the 70s the biggest source of radiation was trace radioactive elements within the semiconductors themselves, so manufacturing processes were adjusted to protect against them by eliminating them, shielding from them, or in altering the circuit design so they were less sensitive to them.  As ICs got smaller and more sensitive, the trace radioactive atoms in the ceramic packaging, aluminum traces, and lead solder became a problem and those had to be dealt with.  Finally, semiconductors are now small enough and sensitive enough, but manufacturing good enough to eliminate most terrestrial sources of radiation that cosmic rays are now the dominant source of random radiation induced errors.  ECC (error correcting code) memory is designed in part to correct these random bit flipping errors in computer RAM.

Thank You, Arcana.  I already suspected that it was true since I used to work in the power industry and knew that the more radioactivity the plant deals with, the more they seem to have computer and network related problems.