The effect of pulsed reverse current on the polarization behaviour of acid copper plating solutions containing organic additives

The polarization behaviour of acid copper solutions containing polyethers, sulphopropyl sulphides and chloride ions was studied using both direct and pulsed reverse current. The effect of these additives on the rest potentials of copper foils immersed in the electrolyte was also studied. Polyethers were found to have an inhibiting effect on the deposition of copper whereas the sulphopropyl sulphides produced a stimulating (i.e. depolarizing) effect. Chloride ion concentration was found to have an influence on the adsorption characteristics of the polyether. The use of pulsed reverse current in solutions containing both polyether and sulphopropyl sulphide was found to inhibit the adsorption/diffusion of the sulphopropyl sulphide at the cathode surface. Thus at higher current densities, above 2 A dm^–2, the inihibiting effect of the polyether produced a shift in the cathodic polarization potential to more negative values as compared with an equivalent current density using direct current. At lower current densities, below 2 A dm^–2, the depolarization effect of the sulphopropyl sulphide was still effective. This effect of pulsed current on additive containing solutions can improve dramatically the metal distribution in low current density areas on plated items. This was illustrated by plating Hull cell panels using both pulsed and direct current.     

Gas chromatographic analysis of reactive carbonyl compounds formed from lipids upon UV-irradiation

Peroxidation of lipids produces carbonyl compounds; some of these, e.g., malonaldehyde and 4-hydroxynonenal, are genotoxic because of their reactivity with biological nucleophiles. Analysis of the reactive carbonyl compounds is often difficult. The methylhydrazine method developed for malonaldehyde analysis was applied to simultaneously measure the products formed from linoleic acid, linolenic acid, arachidonic acid, and squalene upon ultraviolet-irradiation (UV-irradiation). The photoreaction products, saturated monocarbonyl, α,β-unsaturated carbonyls, and β-dicarbonyls, were derivatized with methylhydrazine to give hydrazones, pyrazolines, and pyrazoles, respectively. The derivatives were analyzed by gas chromatography and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry. Lipid peroxidation products identified included formaldehyde, acetaldehyde, acrolein, malonaldehyde, n-hexanal, and 4-hydroxy-2-nonenal. Malonaldehyde levels formed upon 4 hr of irradiation were 0.06 μg/mg from squalene, 2.4 μg/mg from linolenic acid, and 5.7 μg/mg from arachidonic acid. Significant levels of acrolein (2.5 μg/mg) and 4-hydroxy-2-nonenal (0.17 μg/mg) were also produced from arachidonic acid upon 4 hr irradiation.     

Testing for spatial heterogeneity in functional MRI using the multivariate general linear model

Much current research in functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) employs multivariate machine learning approaches (e.g., support vector machines) to detect distributed spatial patterns from the temporal fluctuations of the neural signal. The aim of many studies is not classification, however, but investigation of multivariate spatial patterns, which pattern classifiers detect only indirectly. Here we propose a direct statistical measure for the existence of distributed spatial patterns (or spatial heterogeneity) applicable to fMRI datasets. We extend the univariate general linear model (GLM), typically used in fMRI analysis, to a multivariate case. We demonstrate that contrasting maximum likelihood estimations of different restrictions on this multivariate model can be used to estimate the extent of spatial heterogeneity in fMRI data. Under asymptotic assumptions inference can be made with reference to the χ(2) distribution. The test statistic is then assessed using simulated timecourses derived from real fMRI data followed by analyzing data from a real fMRI experiment. These analyses demonstrate the utility of the proposed measure of heterogeneity as well as considerations in its application. Measuring spatial heterogeneity in fMRI has important theoretical implications in its own right and may have potential uses for better characterising neurological conditions such as stroke and Alzheimer's disease.     

Adhesion studies of CVD copper metallization

The adhesion of chemical vapor deposition (CVD) Cu thin films to various barriers was observed to improve with a post-deposition anneal or a physical vapor deposition (PVD) Cu flash layer on the barrier before depositing CVD Cu. The ambient exposure of the barrier before the deposition of CVD Cu has been observed to lead to degradation of adhesion in both CVD Cu seed and CVD/PVD Cu high vacuum integrated metallization schemes. The integrated CVD and PVD Cu deposition scheme exhibits better adhesion due to the inherent annealing provided during the PVD deposition which is carried out at temperatures between 300 and 400°C. We have evaluated both qualitative and quantitative tests — tape test, Stud pull test and 4-point bend test — in understanding adhesion and observed that each of these tests give different details of interface breakdown.     

Magnification of label maps with a topology-preserving level-set method

Image segmentation aims at partitioning an image into multiple segments. The application of this procedure produces a label map (also referred to as segmentation map) that classifies the pixels of the original image. In contrast to "natural" images, label maps are nominal-scale images, typically represented as integer-valued images. Nominal-scaled label maps can also appear as a representation of the raw data in areas, such as in geostatistics. In some applications, the original resolution of a label map does not suffice and a larger size map has to be generated. In this paper, we present a magnification algorithm for label maps and nominal images. The main property of our method is that it preserves the topology during the magnification process, which means that no isolated pixel vanishes. To the best of our knowledge, apart from nearest-neighbor interpolation, the problem of label map magnification has not previously been addressed in the literature. The main idea of the proposed method is to accomplish a boundary refinement by smoothing the regions' boundaries on a finer grid. The method relies on well known methods, namely, the fundamental operations of morphological image processing-erosion and dilation-and the level-set method. The level-set method is well suited for our purposes since it does not depend on a parametrization and it is numerically stable. The topological flexibility of the level-set method-often found to be an advantage in applications-is a drawback here, since the topology of the original label map should be preserved. However, using the so-called simple point criterion from digital topology, one can adapt the conventional level-set method so that the topology will not be modified throughout the magnification procedure.     

Paradox of richness: a cognitive model of media choice

Researchers have long studied the effects of social presence and media richness on media choice and the effects of media use. This focus on social presence and social psychological theories has led to valuable research on communication. However, little research (either empirical or theoretical) has been done to understand the ways in which media choices influence the cognitive processes that underlie communication. In this paper, we present a cognitive-based view of media choice and media use, based on dual process theories of cognition, which argue that in order for individuals to systematically process messages, they must be motivated to process the message and have the ability to process it. We argue that the use of rich media high in social presence induces increased motivation but decreases the ability to process information, while the use of lean media low in social presence induces decreased motivation but increases the ability to process information. The paradox of richness lies in its duality of impact: from a cognitive perspective, rich media high in social presence simultaneously acts to both improve and impair performance.     

3G移动电话的系统级LSI

引言 无线移动电话仅具备语音功能的时代已经离我们远去了.目前的3G手机更多的是作为多媒体系统,提供彩显、游戏、音频、视频、相机、蓝牙、GPS、WLAN、高速广域数据服务以及其他高级特性.由于功能非常之多,因此处理新型3G电话比处理仅有语音功能的2G电话要复杂5倍至10倍,在应用处理方面则要求更高.     

Analysis of Current–Voltage Measurements on Long-Wavelength HgCdTe Photodiodes Fabricated on Si Composite Substrates

We have performed a detailed study of dark current versus voltage to understand existing limitations in dark current and address the nonuniformity of dark current in devices fabricated on HgCdTe grown on silicon substrates. One interesting observation is that trap-assisted tunneling, g-r currents, are not found close to zero bias in certain devices. Devices from the low end of the R ₀ A distribution show heavy shunting paths close to zero bias. We believe that these shunting paths may be the limiting cause of tail distributions in fabricated focal plane array tail distributions. Possible causes for these shunting paths are surface charges associated with dislocation cores and impurity gettering at dislocation cores. The measured non-anti-reflection (AR)-coated quantum efficiency (QE) was 0.576 at 78 K and displays the classical response versus wavelength. The measured QE on isolated single devices is consistent with the 256 × 256 focal-plane array mean QE. Obtained average dark currents are on the order of mid 10⁻⁵ A cm^–2, which is one order of magnitude higher than dark currents obtained from arrays on lattice-matched substrates. On average, arrays on lattice-mismatched substrates show performance characteristics inferior to those of arrays fabricated on lattice-matched substrates. This inferior performance is due to array pixel operability, as can be seen from the tail of the distribution and the average dark currents, which are one order of magnitude higher than those obtained on lattice-matched substrates.