A 1.25-inch 60-frames/s 8.3-M-pixel digital-output CMOS image sensor

The ultrahigh-definition television (UDTV) camera system requires an image sensor having four times higher resolution and two times higher frame rate than the conventional HDTV systems. Also, an image sensor with a small optical format and low power consumption is required for practical UDTV camera systems. To respond to these requirements, we have developed an 8.3-M-pixel digital-output CMOS active pixel sensor (APS) for the UDTV application. It features an optical format of 1.25inch, low power consumption of less than 600 mW at dark, while reproducing a low-noise, 60-frames/s progressive scan image. The image sensor is equipped with 1920 on-chip 10-bit analog-to-digital converters and outputs digital data stream through 16 parallel output ports. Design considerations to reproduce a low-noise, high-resolution image at high frame rate of 60 fps are described. Implementation and experimental results of the 8.3-M-pixel CMOS APS are presented.     

BAAQ: an infrastructure for application integration and knowledge discovery in bioinformatics.

The emerging grid computing technologies enable bioinformatics scientists to conduct their researches in a virtual laboratory, in which they share public databases, computational tools as well as their analysis workflows. However, the development of grid applications is still a nightmare for general bioinformatics scientists, due to the lack of grid programming environments, standards and high-level services. Here, we present a system, which we named Bioinformatics: Ask Any Questions (BAAQ), to automate this development procedure as much as possible. BAAQ allows scientists to store and manage remote biological data and programs, to build analysis workflows that integrate these resources seamlessly, and to discover knowledge from available resources. This paper addresses two issues in building grid applications in bioinformatics: how to smoothly compose an analysis workflow using heterogeneous resources and how to efficiently discover and re-use available resources in the grid community. Correspondingly an intelligent grid programming environment and an active solution recommendation service are proposed. Finally, we present a case study applying BAAQ to a bioinformatics problem.     

Diagnosing At-Speed Scan BIST Circuits Using a Low Speed and Low Memory Tester

Numerous solutions have been proposed to reduce test data volume and test application time during manufacturing testing of digital devices. However, time to market challenge also requires a very efficient debug phase. Error identification in the test responses can become impractically slow in the debug phase due to large debug data, slow tester speed, and limited memory of the tester. In this paper, we investigate the problems and solutions related to using a relatively slow and limited memory tester to observe the at-speed behavior of fast circuits. Our method can identify all errors in at-speed scan BIST environment without any aliasing and using only little extra overhead by way of a multiplexer and masking circuit for diagnosis. Our solution takes into account the relatively slower speed of the tester and the reload time of the expected data to the tester memory due to limited tester memory while reducing the test/debug cost. Experimental results show that the test application time by our method can be reduced by a factor of 10 with very little hardware overhead to achieve such advantage.     

Colored Fluorescent Silk Made by Transgenic Silkworms

Silk is a protein fiber used to weave fabrics and as a biomaterial in medical applications. Recently, genetically modified silks have been produced from transgenic silkworms. In the present study, transgenic silkworms for the mass production of three colors of fluorescent silks, (green, red, and orange) are generated using a vector originating from the fibroin H chain gene and a classical breeding method. The suitability of the recombinant silks for making fabrics is investigated by harvesting large amounts of the cocoons, obtained from rearing over 20 thousand silkworms. The application of low temperature and a weakly alkaline solution for cooking and reeling enables the production of silk fiber without loss of color. The maximum strain tolerated and Young's modulus of the fluorescent silks are similar to those of ordinary silk, although the maximum stress value of the recombinant silk is slightly lower than that of the control. Fabrics with fluorescent color are demonstrated using the recombinant silk, with the color persisting for over two years. The results indicate that large amounts of genetically modified silk can be made by transgenic silkworms, and the silk is applicable as functional silk fiber for making fabrics and for use in medical applications.     

Compact solid-State switched pulsed power and its applications

Power semiconductor devices, such as insulated-gate bipolar transistors, metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistors, and static-induction thyristors, are used in different kinds of pulsed power generators developed for different applications. In addition, the semiconductor opening switch is found to have very effective applications in pulsed power generation by inductive energy storage. Semiconductor switches have greatly extended the scales of pulsed power parameters, especially in repetition rate and lifetime. They have also enabled new areas of pulsed power applications, such as accelerators, flue-gas treatment, and gas lasers.     

1.8-V 800-Mb/s/pin DDR2 and 2.5-V 400-Mb/s/pin DDR1 compatibly designed 1Gb SDRAM with dual-clock input-latch scheme and hybrid multi-oxide output buffer

This paper describes three circuit techniques for a DDR1/DDR2-compatible chip architecture designed for both high-speed and high-density DRAMs: 1) a dual-clock input-latch scheme, which reduces the excessive timing margin for random input commands by using a pair of latch circuits controlled by dual-phase one-shot clock signals, achieves a 0.9-ns reduction in cycle time from 3.05 to 2.15 ns; 2) a hybrid multi-oxide output buffer reduces the area penalty of the output buffer caused by compatible chip design from 1.35% to 0.3%; and 3) a quasi-shielded distributed data transfer scheme enables a 2.6-ns reduction in access time to 10.25 ns in both 2-b and 4-b prefetch operations. By using these techniques, we developed a 175.3-mm/sup 2/ 1-Gb SDRAM that operates as an 800-Mb/s/pin DDR2 or 400-Mb/s/pin DDR1.     

Low-jitter design method based on Wn-domain jitter analysis for 10 Gbit/s clock and data recovery ICs

A low-jitter design method based on vn-domain jitter analysis for the clock and data recovery (CDR) ICs using the linear phase-locked loop (PLL) is proposed. Using this method, the loop parameters of the PLL can be optimised, which makes it possible to design the CDR IC for various targets.