A unified proposal for characteristic testing methods and figure of merit of 8‐kV/3.5‐kVA class light‐triggered thyristors

Power devices with high capability have been developed. 8‐kV/3.5‐kA‐class light‐triggered thyristors have the highest capability among power devices. These devices are used in the Kii Channel HVDC transmission system in Japan. In this paper, we report the extracted problems of conventional testing methods of 8‐kV/3.5‐kA‐class light‐triggered thyristors among manufacturers, and the proposed unified testing methods on the basis of element characteristics and operating conditions in the Kii Channel HVDC system. Furthermore, we propose a figure of merit for power devices for the practical use, and try to extract elements used at the Kii Channel HVDC system with small margins and low withstand capabilities. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Electr Eng Jpn, 140(3): 61–70, 2002; Published online in Wiley InterScience ( www.interscience.wiley.com ). DOI 10.1002/eej.10024     

A new method for estimating initial rotor phase of self‐excited hybrid‐field synchronous motors

This paper proposes a new method for properly estimating the rotor initial phase (i.e., the position) of the newly emerging self‐excited hybrid‐field synchronous motors (SelE‐HFSMs), which have the rotor held by both a permanent magnet and a diode‐shorted held winding. The proposed method injects a spatially rotating high‐frequency voltage and detects the rotor phase directly by evaluating the norm of the associated current. The method is very simple, but has a high degree of usability. 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Electr Eng Jpn, 173(3): 49–58, 2010; Published online in Wiley InterScience ( www.interscience. wiley.com ). DOI 10.1002/eej.21027     

Sub-50 nm P-channel FinFET

High-performance PMOSFETs with sub-50-nm gate-length are reported. A self-aligned double-gate MOSFET structure (FinFET) is used to suppress the short-channel effects. This vertical double-gate SOI MOSFET features: 1) a transistor channel which is formed on the vertical surfaces of an ultrathin Si fin and controlled by gate electrodes formed on both sides of the fin; 2) two gates which are self-aligned to each other and to the source/drain (S/D) regions; 3) raised S/D regions; and 4) a short (50 nm) Si fin to maintain quasi-planar topology for ease of fabrication. The 45-nm gate-length p-channel FinFET showed an I_dsat of 820 μA/μm at V_ds=V_gs=1.2 V and T _ox=2.5 mm. Devices showed good performance down to a gate-length of 18 nm. Excellent short-channel behavior was observed. The fin thickness (corresponding to twice the body thickness) is found to be critical for suppressing the short-channel effects. Simulations indicate that the FinFET structure can work down to 10 nm gate length. Thus, the FinFET is a very promising structure for scaling CMOS beyond 50 nm     

Fundamental investigation of plug conveying of cohesionless particles in a vertical pipe (pressure drop and friction of a stationary plug)

A stationary packed bed of cohesionless particles is set up in a vertical pipe for the fundamental study of plug conveying. The effect of flow acceleration or deceleration on the pressure drop of the plug is investigated first. It is found that the pressure drop increases due to the flow acceleration and vice versa. Next, the following three kinds of experiments were made for the study of friction characteristics: 1. Friction between the plug and moving wall without air flow, 2. Friction between the plug and wall with downward air flow, 3. Friction between the plug and wall with upward air flow. The results are compared with the theory established in powder mechanics. The state of stress being of the active or passive case is discussed. Finally the problem of particles raining down from the back of the plug is studied. It is shown that the air velocity necessary to support the particles can be calculated based on a simple analysis of pressure distribution around the particles.     

Development of a Millimeter-Wave Electron-Spin-Resonance Measurement System for Ultralow Temperatures and Its Application to Measurements of Copper Pyrazine Dinitrate

We have developed a millimeter-wave electron-spin-resonance (ESR) measurement system using a ³He-⁴He dilution refrigerator for the ultralow-temperature range below 1 K. The currently available frequency range is 125–130 GHz. This system is based on a Fabry-Pérot-type resonator (FPR) that is composed of two mirrors. The frequency can be changed by adjusting the distance between the mirrors using a piezoelectric actuator installed at the bottom of the resonator. A homodyne detection system with an InSb detector is built into the low-temperature section of the ³He-⁴He dilution refrigerator; this system provides high sensitivity. Using this system, we performed ESR measurements on a Heisenberg quantum-spin chain—copper pyrazine dinitrate, Cu(C₄H₄N₂)(NO₃)₂—over the temperature range from 6.6 down to 0.25 K. The ESR lines change continuously with decreasing temperature. Our results suggest that the ESR spectrum of copper pyrazine dinitrate may be useful as a temperature sensor for the very low-temperature range.     

Efficient electron transport in 4,4′-bis[N-(1-napthyl)-N-phenyl-amino] biphenyl and the applications in white organic light emitting devices

The electron transport capability of 4,4′-bis[N-(1-napthyl)-N-phenyl-amino] biphenyl (α-NPD) was investigated by fundamental physical measurements named as current–voltage (I–V) electrical property evaluation and displacement current measurement (DCM). In electron-dominated devices, the I–V characteristics of α-NPD were similar as that of (8-hydroxyquinolino) aluminum (Alq₃) owing to their same order of electron mobilities. The interface of Al/LiF and α-NPD was proven to be an Ohmic contact through the evaluation of I–V characteristics at low bias regime (<3 V). And an electron injection barrier, 0.21 eV, at Al/LiF/α-NPD was obtained by extrapolating the temperature dependent I–V curves. The electron transport behavior in α-NPD film was further confirmed by DCM evaluations. Furthermore, an efficient white organic light emission device was successfully fabricated by using α-NPD as hole transport layer and electron transport layer, respectively.     

Optimization of coded GMSK systems

In this article, block and convolutional coding for Gaussian minimum shift keying (GMSK) in additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) channels is investigated. The performance improvement that can be obtained without an increase in bandwidth is found for block and convolutional codes with various block lengths and constraint lengths, respectively, when a simple suboptimal demodulation scheme is used. For a fixed system transmission bandwidth, the tradeoff between the percentage of bandwidth to use for coding and the percentage to use for modulation is examined and optimized for various values of bandwidth.     

SiGe-collector trench gate insulated gate bipolar transistor fabricated using multiple target sputtering

A new type of trench gate IGBT (insulated gate bipolar transistor) which uses a SiGe layer for the collector is experimentally investigated. SiGe collectors with different Ge content are deposited by multiple cathode sputtering making low temperature processing possible. The change in turn-off characteristics with Ge content is also investigated. Results indicate that the use of a SiGe collector reduces the tail current at turn-off due to the reduced injection of holes to the n⁻ drift region.     

A reconstruction algorithm from truncated projections

A new tomographic reconstruction method is proposed which permits the reconstruction of a region of interest within a slice from partially truncated scanning data. This method utilizes two types of source data, namely a series of truncated projections and the outline of the object's cross section. The principle of this algorithm is to estimate the outside area of truncation in one projection from the projection data of the other viewing angles and the outline data of the object. The above estimation is accomplished by following two repeated procedures: 1) the modification of the calculated projection data compared each time with the already measured projection data of the truncated area, and 2) the modification of the reconstructed image compared also each time with the shape of the object. Computer simulation shows the convergence of the results obtained by this algorithm thus verifying its validity, and a reconstructed image after iterative processes exhibits good quality.