An Innovative Understanding of Metal–Insulator–Metal (MIM)-Capacitor Degradation Under Constant-Current Stress

This paper provides a new understanding of metal-insulator-metal-capacitor-degradation behavior under a wide range of constant-current-stress conditions. It was found that capacitance degrades with stress, but the behavior of the degradation strongly depends on the stress-current density. At high stress levels, the capacitance increases logarithmically as the injection charge increases until dielectric breakdown occurs. At lower stress conditions, the degradation rate is proportional to the stress current and reverses after a certain period of time. A metal-insulator interlayer is observed using cross-sectional transmission-electron-microscopy micrographs, which possibly explains this reversal phenomenon.     

QRS feature extraction using linear prediction

This communication proposes a method called linear prediction (a high performant technique in digital speech processing) for analyzing digital ECG signals. There are several significant properties indicating that ECG signals have an important feature in the residual error signal obtained after processing by Durbin's linear prediction algorithm. This communication also indicates that the prediction order need not be more than two for fast arrhythmia detection. The ECG signal classification puts an emphasis on the residual error signal. For each ECG's QRS complex, the feature for recognition is obtained from a nonlinear transformation which transforms every residual error signal to a set of three states pulse-code train relative to the original ECG signal. The pulse-code train has the advantage of easy implementation in digital hardware circuits to achieve automated ECG diagnosis. The algorithm performs very well in feature extraction in arrhythmia detection. Using this method, our studies indicate that the PVC (premature ventricular contraction) detection has at least a 92 percent sensitivity for MIT/BIH arrhythmia database.     

Damaged layer characteristics in micro-endmilling of copper using an ultrahigh-speed air spindle

This paper presents an investigation on the characteristics of damaged layer in micro-machining by using the ultrahigh-speed air spindle. The damaged layer in metal cutting is derived from plastic deformation and transformation of metal structure. In this study, micro-cutting force, surface roughness, and plastic deformation layer according to the variation of machining conditions were investigated by experiments. The damaged layer was measured using optical microscope for the samples prepared by metallographic techniques. Its scale was dependent on cutting process parameters, especially feed per tooth. According to experimental results, it was verified that the thickness of damaged layer was increased with increasing of feed per tooth and cutting depth, also thickness of damaged layer was reduced in down-milling compared to upmilling during micro-endmilling operation.     

Scalable and systolic Montgomery multiplier over GF(2m) generated by trinomials

A Montgomery's algorithm in GF(2^m) based on the Hankel matrix-vector representation is proposed. The hardware architecture obtained from this algorithm indicates low-complexity bit-parallel systolic multipliers with irreducible trinomials. The results reveal that the proposed multiplier saves approximately 36% of space complexity as compared to an existing systolic Montgomery multiplier for trinomials. A scalable and systolic Montgomery multiplier is also developed by applying the block-Hankel matrix-vector representation. The proposed scalable systolic architecture is demonstrated to have significantly less time-area product complexity than existing digit-serial systolic architectures. Furthermore, the proposed architectures have regularity, modularity and local interconnectability, making the.m highly appropriate for VLSI implementation.     

Novel one-step route for synthesizing sub-micrometer PSt hollow spheres via redox interfacial-initiated method in inversed emulsion

Interfacial-initiated polymerization of styrene (St) was carried out in inversed emulsion with cumene hydroperoxide (CHPO) and ferrous sulfate (FeSO₄)/disodium ethylenediaminetetraacetate (NaEDTA)/sodium formaldehyde sulfoxylate (SFS) as the redox initiation system. The water-soluble Fe²⁺-NaEDTA-SFS acted as the reducing component and the oil-soluble CHPO as the oxidant component of the redox initiation system. Therefore, the primary radicals were produced mainly at the oil/water interface to initiate the polymerization of St. Thus, sub-micrometer hollow polystyrene (PSt) spheres were obtained by one-stage polymerization, which was supported by the techniques of transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM).     

N-Type Field-Effect Transistors Using Multiple Mg-Doped ZnO Nanorods

Nanorod field-effect transistors (FETs) that use multiple Mg-doped ZnO nanorods and a SiO₂ gate insulator were fabricated and characterized. The use of multiple nanorods provides higher on-currents without significant degradation in threshold voltage shift and subthreshold slopes. It has been observed that the on-currents of the multiple ZnO nanorod FETs increase approximately linearly with the number of nanorods, with on-currents of ~1 muA per nanorod and little change in off-current (~4times10^-12). The subthreshold slopes and on-off ratios typically improve as the number of nanorods within the device channel is increased, reflecting good uniformity of properties from nanorod to nanorod. It is expected that Mg dopants contribute to high n-type semiconductor characteristics during ZnO nanorod growth. For comparison, nonintentionally doped ZnO nanorod FETs are fabricated, and show low conductivity to compare with Mg-doped ZnO nanorods. In addition, temperature-dependent current-voltage characteristics of single ZnO nanorod FETs indicate that the activation energy of the drain current is very low (0.05-0.16 eV) at gate voltages both above and below threshold     

2D Image Construction from Low Resolution Response of a New Non‐invasive Measurement for Medical Application

This paper presents an application of digital signal processing to data acquired by the radio imaging method (RIM) that was adopted to measure moisture distribution inside the human body. RIM was originally developed for the mining industry; we are applying the method to a biomedical measurement because of its simplicity, economy, and safety. When a two‐dimensional image was constructed from the measured data, the method provided insufficient resolution because the wavelength of the measurement medium, a weak electromagnetic wave in a VHF band, was longer than human tissues. We built and measured a phantom, a model simulating the human body, consisting of two water tanks representing large internal organs. A digital equalizer was applied to the measured values as a weight function, and images were reconstructed that corresponded to the original shape of the two water tanks. As a result, a two‐dimensional image containing two individual peaks corresponding to the original two small water tanks was constructed. The result suggests the method was applicable to biomedical measurement by the assistance of digital signal processing. This technique may be applicable to home‐based medical care and other situations in which safety, simplicity, and economy are important.     

浅谈江西电网稳定装置的配置

对江西电网稳定控制系统的发展历程、现状作了简要的回顾，并提出了部分建议。