AlAs/GaAs Schottky-collector resonant-tunnel-diodes

The Schottky-collector resonant-tunnel-diode (SRTD) is an resonant-tunnel-diode with the normal N⁺ collector layer and ohmic contact replaced by direct Schottky contact to the space-charge layer, thereby eliminating the associated parasitic series resistance Rins. By scaling the Schottky collector contact to submicron dimensions, the device periphery-to-area ratio is increased, decreasing the periphery-dependent components of the parasitic resistance, and substantially increasing the device's maximum frequency of oscillation. We report measured d.c. and microwave parameters of planar SRTDs fabricated with 1 μm-geometries in AlAs/GaAs.     

A W-band source module using MMIC's

A W-band source module providing 4-GHz tuning bandwidth (92.5-96.5 GHz) has been developed. This module consists of three MMIC chips: a 23.5 GHz HBT VCO, a 23.5-94 GHz HEMT frequency quadrupler and a W-band three-stage HEMT output amplifier, all fabricated in TRW production lines. It exhibits a measured output power of 3 dBm at 94-95 GHz and a 3-dB tuning bandwidth greater than 3 GHz, with a phase noise of -92 dBc/Hz at 1 MHz offset. This work demonstrates a new and efficient way to implement high performance W-band source. Its wide tuning bandwidth with good phase noise performance, as well as design simplicity, makes this approach attractive for many W-band system applications     

Thin film Y-Ba-Cu-O/Ag composites for fluxonic devices

We have investigated thin film composites of YBa₂Cu₃O₇ (YBCO) with Ag for fluxonic device applications. YBCO/Ag composite films are produced by first depositing a layer of Ag onto a substrate and then heating the film to the YBCO deposition temperature of 680°C or higher. YBCO is deposited by off-axis sputtering onto the Ag-coated substrate. The resulting YBCO/Ag film is a composite of YBCO with well-defined Ag regions several microns in size. Scanning electron micrograph images of the films' surfaces show a background of smooth YBCO grains dotted with Ag clusters. For a wide range of increasing Ag composition, the transition temperatures of the composite films on SrTiO₃ remain high, while the critical current densities have been reduced as much as 65 times. On MgO substrates, critical current density has been reduced by more than four orders of magnitude. Also on MgO, significant voltage response is seen in external magnetic fields of less than 1 mT. These measurements suggest that the films may be arrays of superconductor-normal-superconductor (SNS) junctions formed by weakly coupled YBCO grains with Ag in the grain boundaries. The field responsivity and low critical current densities of these composites make them potentially useful for fabrication of fluxonic devices     

A comparison of two micromachined inductors (bar- and meander-type)for fully integrated boost DC/DC power converters

Two micromachined integrated inductors (bar- and meander-type) are realized on a silicon wafer by using modified, IC-compatible, multilevel metallization techniques. Efforts are made to minimize both the coil resistance and the magnetic reluctance by using thick electroplated conductors, cores, and vias. In the bar-type inductor, a 25-μm thick nickel-iron permalloy magnetic core bar is wrapped with 30-μm thick multilevel copper conductor lines. For an inductor size of 4 mm×1.0 mm×110 μm thickness having 33 turns of multilevel coils, the achieved specific inductance is approximately 30 nH/mm² at 1 MHz. In the meander-type inductor, the roles of conductor wire and magnetic core are switched, i.e., a magnetic core is wrapped around a conductor wire. This inductor size is 4 mm×1.0 mm×130 μm and consists of 30 turns of a 35-μm thick nickel-iron permalloy magnetic core around a 10-μm thick sputtered aluminum conductor lines. A specific inductance of 35 nH/mm² is achieved at a frequency of 1 MHz. Using these two inductors, switched DC/DC boost converters are demonstrated in a hybrid fashion. The obtained maximum output voltage is approximately double an input voltage of 3 V at switching frequencies of 300 kHz and a duty cycle of 50% for both inductors, demonstrating the usefulness of these integrated planar inductors     

Simulations of electric field domain suppression in a superlattice oscillator device using a distributed circuit model

We present a method for simulating static domain formation in distributed negative differential resistance devices using a distributed circuit array model coupled with quantum transport simulations. This simulation method is applied to the case of a superlattice Bloch oscillator to ascertain the efficacy of electric field domain wall suppression by micro shunt side walls. Two independent simulation mechanisms using the same basic distributed circuit model are employed to separate simulation artifacts from true physical trends. Simulations are presented, suggesting that the presence of the micro shunt can suppress domain formation above a critical device bias voltage. The simulated dependence of this critical voltage on macroscopic device parameters is presented.     

Multi-radio diversity in wireless networks

This paper describes the Multi-Radio Diversity (MRD) wireless system, which uses path diversity to improve loss resilience in wireless local area networks (WLANs). MRD coordinates wireless receptions among multiple radios to improve loss resilience in the face of path-dependent frame corruption over the radio. MRD incorporates two techniques to recover from bit errors and lower the loss rates observed by higher layers, without consuming much extra bandwidth. The first technique is frame combining, in which multiple, possibly erroneous, copies of a given frame are combined together in an attempt to recover the frame without retransmission. The second technique is a low-overhead retransmission scheme called request-for-acknowledgment (RFA), which operates above the link layer and below the network layer to attempt to recover from frame combining failures. We present an analysis that determines how the parameters for these algorithms should be chosen. We have designed and implemented MRD as a fully functional WLAN infrastructure based on 802.11a. We evaluate the MRD system under several different physical configurations, using both UDP and TCP, and measured throughput gains up to 3× over single radio communication schemes employing 802.11’s autorate adaptation scheme. Computer and Communication Sciences, EPFL, Switzerland. Allen Miu received his Ph.D. degree at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2006 and is currently a wireless systems architect at Ruckus Wireless, Inc. He received his S.M. in Computer Science from MIT and a B.Sc. with highest honors in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from the University of California at Berkeley. He previously worked on the Cricket Indoor Location System and was a research intern at Microsoft Research, Redmond in 2000 and Hewlett-Packard Laboratories, Palo Alto in 2002. His research interests include wireless networks, location systems, mobile computing, and embedded systems. Hari Balakrishnan is an Associate Professor in the EECS Department and a member of the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) at MIT. His research interests is in the area of networked computer systems. In addition to many widely cited papers, several systems developed as part of his research are available in the public domain. He received a Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of California at Berkeley in 1998 and a B.Tech. from the Indian Institute of Technology (Madras) in 1993. His honors include an Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship (2002), an NSF CAREER Award (2000), the ACM doctoral dissertation award for his work on reliable data transport over wireless networks (1998), and seven award-winning papers at various top conferences and journals, including the IEEE Communication Society’s William R. Bennett Prize (2004). He has also received awards for excellence in teaching and research at MIT (Spira, Junior Bose, and Harold Edgerton faculty achievement awards). C. Emre Koksal received his B.S. degree in Electrical Engineering from the Middle East Technical University, Ankara in 1996. He received his S.M. and Ph.D. degrees from MIT in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science in 1998 and 2002 respectively. He was a postdoctoral fellow in the Networks and Mobile Systems Group in the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory at MIT until 2003. Since then he has been a senior researcher jointly in the Laboratory for Computer Communications and the Laboratory for Information Theory at EPFL, Switzerland. His general areas of interest are wireless communications, computer networks, information theory, stochastic processes and financial economics. He also has a certificate on Financial Technology from the Sloan School of Management at MIT.     

Low phase noise millimeter-wave frequency sources using InP-basedHBT MMIC technology

A family of millimeter-wave sources based on InP heterojunction bipolar transistor (HBT) monolithic microwave/millimeter-wave integrated circuit (MMIC) technology has been developed. These sources include 40-GHz, 46-GHz, 62-GHz MMIC fundamental mode oscillators, and a 95-GHz frequency source module using a 23.8-GHz InP HBT MMIC dielectric resonator oscillator (DRO) in conjunction with a GaAs-based high electron mobility transistor (HEMT) MMIC frequency quadrupler and W-band output amplifiers. Good phase noise performance was achieved due to the low 1/f noise of the InP-based HBT devices. To our knowledge, this is the first demonstration of millimeter-wave sources using InP-based HBT MMIC's     

Preparation and Characterization of 17O-Enriched Alumina for Nuclear Fusion Damage Experiments

Alumina enriched in ¹⁷O was successfully fabricated from aluminum isopropoxide and water containing the ¹⁷O isotope. This material was necessary for an experiment to study the radiation damage expected in alumina exposed to a nuclear fusion reactor environment. The enrichment levels of specimens subjected to different preparation schedules were measured using a nuclear reaction analysis technique. Replacement of the ¹⁷O isotope in the ceramic by atmospheric oxygen occurred readily. Therefore, successful fabrication of suitably enriched alumina specimens required that all processing steps be performed under vacuum or inertgas environments. The optimum fabrication procedure produced enriched alumina specimens of >99.5% of theoretical density, ∽10-μm grain size, and a flexural strength of 280 MPa.     

Policy Analysis, Peer Reviewed: Evaluation of Bioaccumulation Factors in Regulating Metals

Regulations.