A Microbial Sensor Based on Direct Electron Transfer at Shewanella Sp. Drop‐Coated Screen‐Printed Carbon Electrodes

Aerobically grown Shewanella sp. bacterial suspension drop‐coated on a disposable screen‐printed carbon electrode was found to possess electroactivity without the aid of redox mediator. Cyclic voltammetric studies revealed the characteristics of a mixed diffusion adsorption‐controlled electrochemical process for direct electron transfer at the bacteria‐modified electrode. Both FE‐SEM and ATR FT‐IR experiments were carried out to investigate the surface characteristics. The electroanalytical applicability was further demonstrated for electrocatalytic reduction of arsenite, hydrogen peroxide and nitrite. Low cost and very simple manufacturing procedure allow for the proposed bacterial sensor to be applied as disposable devices.     

A Low-Power Fullband 802.11a/b/g WLAN Transceiver With On-Chip PA

A low-power fullband 802.11a/b/g WLAN transceiver in 0.15-mum CMOS technology is described. The zero-IF transceiver achieves a receiver noise figure of 4.4/4 dB for the 2.4-GHz/5-GHz bands, respectively. The corresponding sensitivity at 54-Mb/s operation is -72 dBm for 802.11g and -74 dBm for 802.11a using actual PER measurement. An on-chip PA delivers 20 dBm output P1-dB. A new I/Q compensation scheme is implemented in local oscillator (LO) and an image rejection of better than 52 dB is observed. The transmitter delivers 10/1.5 dBm (2.4-/5-GHz) EVM-compliant output power for a 64-QAM OFDM signal at 54-Mb/s. The power consumption is 117/135 mW (1.8-V) in the receive mode and 570/233.1 mW in the transmit mode for 2.4/5 GHz, respectively. The low power consumption, high integration and robustness (-40 to 140degC) make this transceiver suitable for portable applications     

InGaP/InGaAs Pseudomorphic Heterodoped-Channel FETs With a Field Plate and a Reduced Gate Length by Splitting Gate Metal

Depositing gate metal across a step undercut between the Schottky barrier layer and the insulator-like layer is employed to obtain a reduced gate length of 0.4 mum with an additional 0.6-mum field plate from a 1-mum gate window. Most dc and ac characteristics including current density (I_DSS=451mA/mm), transconductance (g_m,max=225mS/mm), breakdown voltages (V_BD(DS)/V _BD(GD)=22/-25.5V), gate-voltage swing (GVS=2.24V), cutoff, and maximum oscillation frequencies (f_t/f_max=17.2/32GHz) are improved as compared to those of a 1-mum gate device without field plate. At a V_DS of 4.0 V, a maximum power added efficiency of 36% with an output power of 13.9 dBm and a power gain of 8.7 dB are obtained at a frequency of 1.8 GHz. The saturated output power and the linear power gain are 316 mW/mm and 13 dB, respectively     

Using 1 MHz pulse-echo ultrasound externally applied to detect mastoid effusion: cadaver experiments

The objective of this study is to explore the feasibility of using ultrasound to detect mastoid effusion (ME). In the past, ultrasound has been used to measure middle ear effusion (MEE) by injecting water into the external ear canal to measure echoes from the tympanic membrane, which is uncomfortable for the patient. It has been shown that air cells in the mastoid of patients with MEE are filled with fluid, which implies that ME could be a useful indicator of MEE. This study suggests using ultrasound to detect ME as a potentially noninvasive approach for MEE detection. In vitro experiments were performed on ten cadaver samples of the human ear. A single-element 1 MHz transducer was used to measure the mastoid of each cadaver before and after injecting water into the mastoid. The experimental results showed that the relative amplitudes of ultrasonic signals differed significantly between before (0.24 ± 0.09, mean ± standard deviation) and after (0.15 ± 0.03) the water injection (p < 0.05, t-test), demonstrating that the ultrasonic reflection can be used to detect ME. The location of the human mastoid under the skin behind the ear allows external measurements, and hence ultrasound-based ME detection may be an alternative, noninvasive diagnostic approach to detecting MEE in the future, providing an examination that avoids discomfort.     

Red polymer light-emitting devices based on dye-dispersed poly (9,9-dioctylfluorene-alt-benzothiadiazole)

A polymer-organic host-guest emitter (POHGE) system for obtaining polymer light-emitting diodes (PLEDs) with pure red emission and high luminance is proposed. The POHGE system was prepared by the fluorescent dye 4-(dicyanomethylene)-2-t-butyl-6-(1,1,7,7-tetra-methyljulolidy-9-enyl)-4H-pyran (DCJTB) doped in green-emitting polymer poly (9,9-dioctylfluorene-alt-benzothiadiazole) (BTF8). A photoluminescence (PL) quenching phenomenon was observed owing to the higher doping amount of DCJTB dopant. In this study, the red DCJTB dopant emits with high luminance and without concentration quenching when the host BTF8 emitting layer is doped with a small amount of the red guest DCJTB dopant. An optimal amount of DCCJTB dopant was obtained at 2 mg. Devices with a configuration of indium tin oxide (ITO)/poly (ethylenedioxythiophene) doped with poly (styrenesulfonate) (PEDOT:PSS)/BTF8:DCJTB/Ca/Al were fabricated. This device achieved an electroluminescence (EL) efficiency of 1.33 cd/A at 6 V. The emission area is 1.5 × 0.5 cm². The devices show the red light emission with a peak at about 630 nm. The color coordinate in Commission Internationale d’Eclairage (CIE) chromaticity is at x = 0.64 and y = 0.36.     

Effects of Al concentration and resulting long-period superstructures on the plastic properties at room temperature of Al-rich TiAl single crystals

The role of Al₅Ti₃ and h-Al₂Ti long-period superstructures on the plastic properties of TiAl at room temperature is investigated on five single crystals with aluminium content comprised between 54.7 at.%, and 62.5 at.%. After annealing at 1200°C for 1?h, the Al₅Ti₃ superstructure develops in the L1₀ (γ) matrix upon increasing Al concentration except for Ti–62.5 at.%Al where h-Al₂Ti substitutes for Al₅Ti₃. The CRSS for <110]{111} first increases abruptly with the development of the Al₅Ti₃-type ordering. Then, the CRSS reaches a plateau at which dislocations assemble in groups of four to prevent extra anti-phase boundary (APB) from being engendered during glide throughout the Al₅Ti₃ phase. In Ti–62.5 at.%Al, the CRSS for ordinary slip further increases upon the precipitation of h-Al₂Ti in the L1₀ phase, whereas it decreases when the crystal is fully transformed into single-phased Al₅Ti₃. <101] superlattice dislocations are primarily activated under both the [210] and [1?1?8.6] load orientations irrespective of the Al concentration, but the dislocation microstructure strongly depends on orientation as well as on the degree of Al₅Ti₃ ordering. In the [210] orientation, the frequency of the decomposition of <101] dislocations into 1/2<110] and 1/2<112] dislocations decreases abruptly with the development of Al₅Ti₃. This is interpreted in terms of the increased difficulty to move ordinary dislocations. Under the [1?1?8.6] orientation, the density of faulted dipoles diminishes remarkably with the development of Al₅Ti₃. This is consistent with the transformation of the low energy extrinsic stacking fault of the L1₀ phase into a higher energy complex extrinsic stacking fault.     

White light electroluminescence from graphene‐enhanced single polymer comprising two color emitters of equal molar ratios

White polymeric light‐emitting diode (WPLED) based on a single polymer, poly(3‐hexylthiophene‐alt‐9,9‐dioctylfluorene) (PTAF), has been successfully demonstrated. This conjugated alternating copolymer, PTAF, comprises 50 mol % of 3‐hexylthiophene which is an orange‐red color chromophore and 50 mol % 9,9‐dioctylfluorene which is a bluish‐green color chromophore. It was synthesized by Suzuki cross‐coupling reaction and has a molecular weight of 15,021 and polydispersity of 1.36. Nanocomposite consisting PTAF and graphene nanosheets enhances the optoelectronic properties and the device fabricated with a configuration of ITO/PEDOT:PSS/(PTAF + 1% graphene)/Ca/Al shows two‐color white electroluminescence with CIE 1931 coordinates of (0.28, 0.34). The white luminescence from a single polymer affords the WPLED device a simple structure and low fabrication cost. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part B: Polym Phys, 2011     

On the development of a triple‐preserving Maxwell's equations solver in non‐staggered grids

We present in this paper a finite difference solver for Maxwell's equations in non‐staggered grids. The scheme formulated in time domain theoretically preserves the properties of zero‐divergence, symplecticity, and dispersion relation. The mathematically inherent Hamiltonian can be also retained all the time. Moreover, both spatial and temporal terms are approximated to yield the equal fourth‐order spatial and temporal accuracies. Through the computational exercises, modified equation analysis and Fourier analysis, it can be clearly demonstrated that the proposed triple‐preserving solver is computationally accurate and efficient for use to predict the Maxwell's solutions. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Exploiting In-Zone Broadcasts for Cache Sharing in Mobile Ad Hoc Networks

The problem of cache sharing for supporting data access in mobile ad hoc networks is studied in this paper. The key to this problem is to discover a requested data item in an efficient manner. In the paper, we propose two caching protocols, IXP and DPIP, which distinguish themselves from the existing ones in that they fully exploit in-zone broadcasts to facilitate cache sharing operation. In particular, the DPIP protocol offers an implicit index push property, which is highly useful for enhancing cache hit ratio in the neighborhood of a data requester node. Moreover, our protocols also exploit the broadcasts to facilitate the design of a simple but efficient count-based cache replacement scheme. Performance study shows that the proposed protocols can significantly improve the performance of data access in a mobile ad hoc network.     

Dual-Current Pump Module for Transient Improvement of Step-Down DC–DC Converters

This paper presents a novel dual-current pump module (DCPM) to improve the transient response of dc-dc converters. The DCPM operates only during transient to provide two additional current injections for step-up load and current drains for step-down load. Due to the two current pump paths, the current stress on the switches of the DCPM is also reduced. The measurement results show that the DCPM can enhance the dynamic recovery time of the buck dc-dc converter by more than an order.