Three takes on telecom's troubles

Spectrum asked three IEEE members from the telecommunications sector to comment on the industry's current woes and prospects. Roch Guerin discusses bandwidth as a commodity and how to deal with it. The impact of technological change on telecommunications is enormous and calls for a shift in business models. Technology is making bandwidth a commodity and it should not matter who supplies it. Competition is vital and commodity providers must be decoupled from value providers. Frank Ferrante points out that the Year 2000 crisis resulted in manufacturers being deluged with orders for new upgraded systems. Vast sums were spent to meet the demand in time. However, when Y2K was over, production stayed high and inventories continued to build, while demand effectively stopped overnight. Dazzling new innovations are needed to compel the masses to spend and manufacturers must apply their resources to deliver quickly and efficiently. Jules A. Bellisio discusses the role of engineers in bringing new ideas to the market place. Many engineers have put together ventures for the sole purpose of attracting capital. The underlying technology and business propositions were there solely to lure the unsuspecting. By allowing engineers to use technology simply to cover for a scam, then the profession is also to blame for the current problems.     

Sociotechnical systems, risk management, and public health: comparing the North Battleford and Walkerton outbreaks

Accidents in different complex sociotechnical systems are rarely compared using the same theoretical framework for risk management. We conducted a comparative analysis of two Canadian public health disasters involving drinking water distribution systems, the North Battleford Cryptosporidium parvum outbreak in April 2001 and the Walkerton E. coli outbreak in May 2000. Both accidents resulted from a complex interaction between all levels of a complex sociotechnical system. However, the low-level physical and individual factors differed in the two cases, whereas, the high-level governmental and regulatory factors tended to be the same. These findings may have implications for the design of public policies to minimize risk in complex sociotechnical systems.     

Gap modulation in MCu[Q1−xQ′x]F (M=Ba, Sr; Q, Q′=S, Se, Te) and related materials

BaCuQF (Q=S, Se, Te) materials exhibit band gaps that allow transmission of much of the visible spectrum. BaCuSF is transparent in thin-film form with a band gap of 3.1 eV. Band gap estimates for powders of the solid solution series BaCuS_1−xSe_xF were obtained from wavelength-dependent diffuse-reflectance measurements using an integrating sphere. The band gap can be tuned by the substitution of Se for S to 2.9 eV for BaCuSeF. The decrease scales almost linearly with the increase in the volume of the tetragonal unit cell, which is determined primarily by the expansion of the a lattice parameter; the overall volume increase is 7.0% from x=0 to 1. Further reduction of the band gap is observed in BaCuSe_1−xTe_xF solid solutions, where a unit cell volume increase of 5.5% produces a band gap of 2.7 eV in BaCuSe_0.5Te_0.5F. Powders and films of BaCuSF exhibit strong red luminescence under ultraviolet excitation, which is suppressed by K doping. Additional tuning of band gap and electrical properties (the materials are p-type conductors) can be achieved by replacing Ba with Sr.     

可替代石磨水洗的经纱染色和匹染

1　引言石磨水洗牛仔布的成本是非常高的 ,但由于客户喜欢陈旧、磨损的外观 ,所以这种高成本又是十分必要的。那么 ,如何将这么高的成本降下来呢 ?通常的做法是把工厂转移到劳动力低廉的发展中国家。如果有着悠久历史的纺织品公司因为劳动力成本较高而不再具有竞争力 ,他们将不得不寻找另外一种可替代石磨水洗而同样能获得满意外观的方法。这是一种似乎对于我们具有实际意义的想法 ,它似乎具有逻辑性又很合理 ,但是这可能吗 ?当然 ,这种方法必须工艺简单 ,保证附加成本较低 ;必须可连续生产 ,以保证产量较高 ;必须可在常规设备上采用现有工…     

Heavy Metals Bioremediation from Polluted Water by Glass-Ceramic Materials

The objective of this research was to study the removal of cadmium and lead from an aqueous solution through a biological treatment. For this purpose a glass-ceramic material was manufactured from industrial and urban wastes. Biofilms of microorganisms found in wastewater were developed on its surface, and continuous tests were conducted in the presence and absence of the biofilm to analyze the glass-ceramic's ability to remove the heavy metals from an aqueous environment. The results suggest that this bioremediation process, developed on an industrial scale, could represent an alternative to the chemical processes currently used.     

Range of the Applicability of the Wilkins Method to the Investigation of the Dynamic Stress-Strain State of Anisotropic Elastic Axisymmetric Shells

The exactness and stability of the Wilkins method in the investigation of the stress-strain state of axisymmetric anisotropic elastic shells, including thick-walled ones, have been studied for different values of artificial viscosity, pulse load rise and fall time, and different deformation process durations. A comparison of numerical calculations, performed by means of an application software package developed by V. A. Romashchenko on the basis of the Wilkins method, with experimental results, known numerical data, and with calculations using the computation kernel LS-DYNA 3D has been carried out.     

Atomic layer chemical vapour deposition of copper

Copper films with (1 1 1) texture are of crucial importance in integrated circuit interconnects. We have deposited strongly (1 1 1)-textured thin films of copper by atomic layer deposition (ALD) using [2,2,6,6-tetramethyl-3,5-heptadionato] Cu(II), Cu(thd)₂, as the precursor. The dependence of the microstructure of the films on ALD conditions, such as the number of ALD cycles and the deposition temperature was studied by X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and transmission electron microscopy. Analysis of (1 1 1)-textured films shows the presence of twin planes in the copper grains throughout the films. SEM shows a labyrinthine structure of highly connected, large grains developing as film thickness increases. This leads to low resistivity and suggests high resistance to electromigration.     

Analysis and simulations of vibrations of a beam with a slider

A model for vibrations of a beam with a slider is derived, analysed and numerically simulated. It describes a viscoelastic beam that is clamped at one end to a vibrating device, while the other end moves between two stops attached to a slider. The contact is described by the normal compliance or by the Signorini conditions. The existence of weak solutions is established using the theory of set-valued pseudomonotone operators. The model is discretized using fourth-order spatial discretization, the solutions are numerically simulated and their results presented. The dynamics of the vibrations are depicted and so are the noise characteristics of the system.     

A 0.18-/spl mu/m SiGe BiCMOS receiver and transmitter chipset for SONET OC-768 transmission systems

A 43-Gb/s receiver (Rx) and transmitter (Tx) chip set for SONET OC-768 transmission systems is reported. Both ICs are implemented in a 0.18-/spl mu/m SiGe BiCMOS technology featuring 120-GHz f/sub T/ and 100 GHz f/sub max/. The Rx includes a limiting amplifier, a half-rate clock and data recovery unit, a 1:4 demultiplexer, a frequency acquisition aid, and a frequency lock detector. Input sensitivity for a bit-error rate less than 10/sup -9/ is 40 mV and jitter generation better than 230 fs rms. The IC dissipates 2.4 W from a -3.6-V supply voltage. The Tx integrates a half-rate clock multiplier unit with a 4:1 multiplexer. Measured clock jitter generation is better than 170 fs rms. The IC consumes 2.3 W from a -3.6-V supply voltage.