UNICORE 6 — Recent and Future Advancements

UNICORE is a European Grid Technology with more than 10 years of history. Originating from the Supercomputing domain, the latest version UNICORE 6 has turned into a general-purpose Grid technology that follows established standards and offers a rich set of features to its users. The paper starts with an architectural insight into UNICORE 6, highlighting the workflow features, standards and the different clients. Next, the current state of advancement is presented by describing recent developments. The paper closes with an outlook on future planned developments.     

Compact Modules for Wireless Communication Systems in the E-Band (71–76 GHz)

The millimeter-wave spectrum above 70 GHz provides a cost-effective solution to increase the wireless communications data rates by increasing the carrier wave frequencies. We report on the development of two key components of a wireless transmission system, a high-speed photodiode (HS-PD) and a Schottky Barrier Diode (SBD). Both components operate uncooled, a key issue in the development of compact modules. On the transmitter side, an improved design of the HS-PD allows it to deliver an output RF power exceeding 0 dBm (1 mW). On the receiver side, we present the design process and achieved results on the development of a compact direct envelope detection receiver based on a quasi-optical SDB module. Different resonant (meander dipole) and broadband (Log-Spiral and Log-Periodic) planar antenna solutions are designed, matching the antenna and Schottky diode impedances at high frequency. Impedance matching at baseband is also provided by means of an impedance transition to a 50 Ohm output. From this comparison, we demonstrate the excellent performance of the broadband antennas over the entire E-band by setting up a short-range wireless link transmitting a 1 Gbps data signal.     

Design of 5.9 ghz dsrc-based vehicular safety communication

The automotive industry is moving aggressively in the direction of advanced active safety. Dedicated short-range communication (DSRC) is a key enabling technology for the next generation of communication-based safety applications. One aspect of vehicular safety communication is the routine broadcast of messages among all equipped vehicles. Therefore, channel congestion control and broadcast performance improvement are of particular concern and need to be addressed in the overall protocol design. Furthermore, the explicit multichannel nature of DSRC necessitates a concurrent multichannel operational scheme for safety and non-safety applications. This article provides an overview of DSRC based vehicular safety communications and proposes a coherent set of protocols to address these requirements     

Rapid Combinatorial Synthesis and Chromatography Based Screening of Phosphorescent Iridium Complexes for Solution Processing

This work reports the combinatorial synthesis and screening of phosphorescent iridium complexes as solution processable emitters for OLEDs. The approach taken here allows for the rapid synthesis, isolation, spectroscopic characterization and identification of the libraries based on chromatographic methods. Subsequent analysis of the irradiation induced degradation provides insight on the stability of the complexes under continuous excitation. The method is versatile and can easily be applied to other metal complexes or organic dyes for various applications, e.g., in electroluminescence, photovoltaics and sensing.     

Visualizing the performance loss of solar cells by IR thermography — an evaluation study on CIGS with artificially induced defects

Local electric defects may result in considerable performance losses in solar cells. Infrared (IR) thermography is one important tool to detect these defects on photovoltaic modules. Qualitative interpretation of IR images has been carried out successfully, but quantitative interpretation has been hampered by the lack of “calibration” defects. The aims of this study are to (i) establish methods to induce well‐defined electric defects in thin‐film solar cells serving as “calibration” defects and to (ii) assess the accuracy of IR imaging methods by using these artificially induced defects. This approach paves the way for improving quality control methods based on imaging in photovoltaic. We created ohmic defects (“shunts”) by using a focused ion beam and weak diodes (“interface shunts”) by applying a femto‐second laser at rather low power on copper indium gallium selenide cells. The defects can be induced precisely and reproducibly, and the severity of the defects on the electrical performance can be well adjusted by focused ion beam/laser parameters. The successive assessment of the IR measurement (ILIT‐Voc) revealed that this method can predict the losses in P_mpp (maximal power extractable) with a mean error of below 10%. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Analysis of temperature coefficients for III–V multi‐junction concentrator cells

The temperature dependence of the I–V parameters of different III–V multi‐junction concentrator cells at several concentration levels was investigated. Moreover, the influence of spectral changes on the temperature coefficients of multi‐junction solar cells was examined. Complete sets of temperature coefficients of a metamorphic Ga_0.35In_0.65P/Ga_0.83In_0.17As dual‐junction cell, a metamorphic Ga_0.35In_0.65P/Ga_0.83In_0.17As/Ge triple‐junction cell and a lattice‐matched Ga_0.50In_0.50P/Ga_0.99In_0.01As/Ge triple‐junction cell determined under well‐controlled laboratory conditions are reported. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Nanopositioning using the spiral of Archimedes: The probe-based storage case

Micro-Electro-Mechanical-Systems (MEMS)-based scanning probes appear as potential candidates for a wide variety of emerging nanoscale applications, including ultra-high-density data-storage and surface imaging. In this work, a spiral trajectory nanopositioning scheme is proposed as an alternative to the conventional raster positioning pattern. The resulting positioning signal has an extremely narrowband frequency content, which shifts very slowly over time. These properties enable enhanced tracking performance and offer potentially uninterrupted high-speed operation. The mathematical analysis of the spiral positioning signal as well as its properties are presented. Experimental results obtained from applying the new nanopositioning scheme on a MEMS-based scanning-probe data-storage setup for thermomechanical storage on polymer medium are illustrated.     

Reconstruction quality and spectral content of an electromagnetic time-domain inversion algorithm

A tomographic time-domain reconstruction algorithm for solving the inverse electromagnetic problem is described. The application we have in mind is dielectric breast cancer detection but the results are of general interest to the field of microwave tomography. Reconstructions have been made from experimental and numerically simulated data for objects of different sizes in order to investigate the relation between the spectral content of the illuminating pulse and the quality of the reconstructed image. We have found that the spectral content is crucial for a successful reconstruction. The work has further shown that when imaging objects with different scale lengths it is an advantage to use a multiple step procedure. Low frequency content in the pulse is used to image the large structures and the reconstruction process then proceed by using higher frequency data to resolve small scale lengths. Good agreement between the results obtained from experimental data and simulated data has been achieved.     

Forward and Reverse Converters and Moduli Set Selection in Signed-Digit?Residue?Number?Systems

This paper presents an investigation into using a combination of two alternative digital number representations; the residue number system (RNS) and the signed-digit (SD) number representation in digital arithmetic circuits. The combined number system is called RNS/SD for short. Since the performance of RNS/SD arithmetic circuits depends on the choice of the moduli set (a set of pairwise prime numbers), the purpose of this work is to compare RNS/SD number systems based on different sets. Five specific moduli sets of different lengths are selected. Moduli-set-specific forward and reverse RNS/SD converters are introduced for each of these sets. A generic conversion technique for moduli sets consisting of any number of elements is also presented. Finite impulse response (FIR) filters are used as reference designs in order to evaluate the performance of RNS/SD processing. The designs are evaluated with respect to delay and circuit area in a commercial 0.13 μm CMOS process. For the case of FIR filters it is shown that generic moduli sets with five or six moduli results in designs with the best area × delay products.

Adhesion and Mechanical Properties of PNIPAM Microgel Films and Their Potential Use as Switchable Cell Culture Substrates

Thermoresponsive poly(N‐isopropylacrylamide) (PNIPAM) microgel films are shown to allow controlled detachment of adsorbed cells via temperature stimuli. Cell response occurs on the timescale of several minutes, is reversible, and allows for harvesting of cells in a mild fashion. The fact that microgels are attached non‐covalently allows using them on a broad variety of (charged) surfaces and is a major advantage as compared to approaches relying on covalent attachment of active films. In the following, the microgels’ physico‐chemical parameters in the adsorbed state and their changes upon temperature variation are studied in order to gain a deeper understanding of the involved phenomena. By means of atomic force microscopy (AFM), the water content, mechanical properties, and adhesion forces of the microgel films are studied as a function of temperature. The analysis shows that these properties change drastically when crossing the critical temperature of the polymer film, which is the basis of the fast cell response upon temperature changes. Furthermore, nanoscale mechanical analysis shows that the films posses a nanoscopic gradient in mechanical properties.