Design of an Internal Antenna with Near‐Omnidirectional H‐Plane Radiation Pattern over Ultra‐wide Bandwidth

In this paper, an ultra‐wideband internal antenna for use in mobile applications is proposed. The proposed antenna has symmetrical bi‐arm structures printed on the top and bottom of the substrate, and it occupies a compact area of 10 mm × 10 mm × 1 mm. The designed antenna has an impedance bandwidth from 3 GHz to 12 GHz and near omnidirectional radiation patterns over the frequency band of interest. The group delay between two antennas fabricated using the proposed design is less than 0.8 ns, and the maximum gain variation is about 3.16 dB.     

Technologies and the development of the Automated Metadata Indexing and Analysis (AMIA) system

The Automated Metadata Indexing and Analysis (AMIA) project aims to provide an effective digital asset management (DAM) tool for large digital asset databases. We began with text-based indexing since it is still the most reliable approach as compared with other content-based media features. AMIA not only searches for the text of the file name, but also utilizes embedded information such as the metadata in Maya files. The AMIA system builds a linked map between all dependency files. We present an approach of preserving previously established metadata created by the old DAM tools, such as AlienBrain, and integrating them into the new system. Findings indicate that AMIA has significantly improved search performance comparing to previous DAM tools. Finally, the ongoing and future work in the AMIA project is described.     

The Role of Elastic and Plastic Anisotropy of Snin Recrystallization and Damage Evolution DuringThermal Cycling in SAC305 Solder Joints

Because failures in lead-free solder joints occur at locations other than the most highly shear-strained regions, reliability prediction is challenging. To gain physical understanding of this phenomenon, physically based understanding of how elastic and plastic deformation anisotropy affect microstructural evolution during thermomechanical cycling is necessary. Upon solidification, SAC305 (Sn-3.0Ag-0.5Cu) solder joints are usually single or tricrystals. The evolution of microstructures and properties is characterized statistically using optical and orientation imaging microscopy. In situ synchrotron x-ray measurements during thermal cycling are used to examine how crystal orientation and thermal cycling history change strain history. Extensive characterization of a low-stress plastic ball grid array (PBGA) package design at different stages of cycling history is compared with preliminary experiments using higher-stress package designs. With time and thermal history, microstructural evolution occurs mostly from continuous recrystallization and particle coarsening that is unique to each joint, because of the specific interaction between local thermal and displacement boundary conditions and the strong anisotropic elastic, plastic, expansion, and diffusional properties of Sn crystals. The rate of development of recrystallized microstructures is a strong function of strain and aging. Cracks form at recrystallized (random) boundaries, and then percolate through recrystallized regions. Complications arising from electromigration and corrosion are also considered.     

Fabrication of ZnO nanorod-based hydrogen gas nanosensor

We report a first work on nanofabrication of hydrogen nanosensor from single ZnO branched nanorods (tripod) using in-situ lift-out technique and performed in the chamber of focused ion beam (FIB) system. Self-assembled ZnO branched nanorod has been grown by a cost-effective and fast synthesis route using an aqueous solution method and rapid thermal processing. Their properties were analyzed by X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy, energy dispersion X-ray spectroscopy, transmission electron microscopy, and micro-Raman spectroscopy. These analyses indicate high quality ZnO nanorods. Furthermore, our synthesis technique permits branched nanorods to be easily transferred to other substrates. This flexibility of substrate choice opens the possibility of using FIB system for handling.

The main advantage of the proposed in-situ approach is a controllable lift-out procedure which permitted us to obtain a 90% success rate for building nanodevices. The fabricated nanosensor uses only single self-assembled ZnO branched nanorod (tripod) to gauge the 150 ppm H₂ in the air at room temperature. The hydrogen sensitivity is in the range of 0.6–2% depending on which two branches to use. The nanosensor has selectivity against other gases such as O₂, CH₄, CO and LPG, which shows sensitivity of <0.02%. The single ZnO branched nanorod sensor can operate at low power of <5 μW.     

Novel Color-Sequential Transflective Liquid Crystal Displays

A novel transflective liquid crystal display architecture and its system driving schemes are proposed. In the reflective mode, the ambient light is used to readout the displayed images. While in the transmissive mode, a color-sequential light emitting diode backlight is used to eliminate the color filters. Under such device configuration, several advantages such as increased brightness and maximized color saturation for both transmissive and reflective modes can be achieved     

Photonic-crystal surface-emitting laser near 1.55 /spl mu/m on gold-coated silicon wafer

An InP/InGaAs-based photonic band-edge laser bonded on silicon operating near 1.55 mum is presented. A gold reflector positioned below the slab containing the active layer reduces the optical losses of the Bloch-mode resonator. As a result, a quality factor exceeding 8000 is obtained at transparency leading to a laser threshold as low as 3.4 muJ/cm²     

An Efficient Evolution Method From TDM-PON to Next-Generation PON

An efficient evolution method from a time-division-multiplexing passive optical network (TDM-PON) is proposed and demonstrated for a next-generation PON. A single-type three-port wavelength band combiner/splitter enables a simple and efficient evolution of TDM-PON maintaining the current PON infrastructure and wavelength plan. The crosstalk between the TDM-PON and next-generation PON is negligibly small     

Acoustooptic Coherent Mode Coupling in Polarization-Maintaining Fiber and Its Application as a Variable-Polarization-Dependent Loss Element

In this letter, we investigate coherent acoustooptic coherent mode coupling from the LP₀₁ core mode to LP_1m cladding mode of a polarization-maintaining fiber (PMF) induced by two acoustic gratings. We show narrowband variable attenuation along either birefringent axis of the PMF by varying the relative phase between the two acoustic gratings. By launching two acoustic gratings at different frequencies, variable attenuation and low crosstalk along either birefringent axis within the acoustooptic coupling bandwidth are demonstrated     

Low‐Power 512‐Bit EEPROM Designed for UHF RFID Tag Chip

In this paper, the design of a low‐power 512‐bit synchronous EEPROM for a passive UHF RFID tag chip is presented. We apply low‐power schemes, such as dual power supply voltage (VDD=1.5 V and VDDP=2.5 V), clocked inverter sensing, voltage‐up converter, I/O interface, and Dickson charge pump using Schottky diode. An EEPROM is fabricated with the 0.25 μm EEPROM process. Power dissipation is 32.78 μW in the read cycle and 78.05 μW in the write cycle. The layout size is 449.3 μm × 480.67 μm.     

Simulation Models for Investigation of Multiuser Scheduling in MIMO Broadcast Channels

Spatial correlation is a result of insufficient antenna spacing among multiple antenna elements, while temporal correlation is caused by Doppler spread. This paper compares the effect of spatial and temporal correlation in order to investigate the performance of multiuser scheduling algorithms in multiple‐input multiple‐output (MIMO) broadcast channels. This comparison includes the effect on the ergodic capacity, on fairness among users, and on the sum‐rate capacity of a multiuser scheduling algorithm utilizing statistical channel state information in spatio‐temporally correlated MIMO broadcast channels. Numerical results demonstrate that temporal correlation is more meaningful than spatial correlation in view of the multiuser scheduling algorithm in MIMO broadcast channels. Indeed, the multiuser scheduling algorithm can reduce the effect of the Doppler spread if it exploits the information of temporal correlation appropriately. However, the effect of spatial correlation can be minimized if the antenna spacing is sufficient in rich scattering MIMO channels regardless of the multiuser scheduling algorithm used.