In Phase I, the research team formed by APEI, Inc. and University of
Arkansas proved the feasibility of developing ultra-wide temperature
(-230 &lt;!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN"
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&lt;sup&gt;o&lt;/sup&gt;
C to +130 &lt;sup&gt;o&lt;/sup&gt;
C) motor drives utilizing silicon-germanium (SiGe) asynchronous logic
digital control electronics by the successful design, simulation and
layout of an insensitive-delay asynchronous microcontroller. The
microcontroller incorporates asynchronous-to-synchronous and
synchronous-to-asynchronous interfaces (wrappers) using an IBM SiGe 5AM
process.  The complete asynchronous microcontroller was successfully
simulated using temperature calibrated models to -230 C. Electronic
components needed in the development of the DC-motor power stage were
first characterized down to -184 C and then a complete 20W DC-motor
drive power stage was successfully demonstrated while operating at
cryogenic temperatures and driving a Maxon RE 25 permanent magnet
DC-motor at full power (This motor is currently used on the Mars Spirit
and Opportunity rovers). Ultra-wide temperature power electronics system
will have a profound impact on deep space exploration craft enabling
greater mobility and mission lifetime. The use of ultra-wide temperature
power electronics will allow increased payload capacity of Lunar and
Mars exploratory craft, while improving reliability through reduced
system level complexity.  The goal of this Small Business Innovation
Research Phase II project is to deliver, to NASA JPL, a complete
DC-motor drive that is fully functional over the entire temperature
range required for lunar and Martian extreme environment exploratory
robotic missions (-230 C to +130 C).  This cryogenic DC-motor drive will
encompass a SiGe-based 8051-compatible delay-insensitive asynchronous
microcontroller with significantly enhanced capabilities for the
advanced control of the DC-motor drive.