Chip DBM

Radio frequency energy harvesting (RFEH) is one form of renewable energy harvesting currently seeing widespread popularity because many wireless electronic devices can coordinate their communications via RFEH, especially in CMOS technology. For RFEH, the sensitivity of detecting low-power ambient RF signals is the utmost priority. The voltage boosting mechanisms at the input of the RFEH are typically applied to enhance its sensitivity. However, the bandwidth in which its sensitivity is maintained is very poor...

By using the flip-chip bonding technology, a high performances 3D-integrated silicon photonics receiver is demonstrated. The receiver consists of a high-speed germanium-silicon (Ge-Si) photodetector (PD) and a commercial linear transimpedance amplifiers (TIA). The overall 3 dB bandwidth of the receiver is around 38 GHz with appropriate gain. Based on this 3D-integrated receiver, the 56, 64, 90, 100 Gbit/s non-return-to-zero (NRZ) and 112, 128 Gbit/s four-level pulse amplitude (PAM-4) modulation clear openings of eye diagrams are experimentally obtained...

A 1.4-dB Noise Figure (NF) four-stage K-band Monolithic Microwave Integrated Circuit (MMIC) Low-Noise Amplifier (LNA) in UMS 100 nm GaAs pHEMT technology is presented. The proposed circuit is designed to cover the 5G New Release n258 frequency band (24.25-27.58 GHz). Momentum EM post-layout simulations reveal the circuit achieves a minimum NF of 1.3 dB, a maximum gain of 34 dB, | S 11 | better than -10 dB from 23 GHz to 29 GHz, a P 1dB of -18 dBm and an OIP3 of 24.5 dBm. The LNA draws a total current of 59...

A circulator, which is a non-reciprocal device, is widely used in full-duplex systems, future communication and sensing networks, and quantum computing, and it is difficult to implement a passive topology on a chip. Based on switch-based spatio-temporal conductivity modulation, in this study, we design and implement a non-magnetic on-chip passive circulator operating at the Ku band in a 90-nm bulk CMOS technology using a 25% duty-cycle I/Q clock signal. With the virtue of the four-phase non-overlapping clock signal, the proposed circulator achieves a 3...

BACKGROUND: Minimally invasive scoliosis surgery (MISS) is currently introduced on novel technique for surgical treatment of adolescent idiopathic scoliosis (AIS). This study is aimed to evaluate the efficacy of facet fusion in MISS compared to posterior fusion in conventional open scoliosis surgery (COSS) and compare facet fusion rates based on three bone graft substitutes in MISS for adolescent idiopathic scoliosis (AIS). METHODS: Eighty six AIS patients who underwent scoliosis surgery were divided into two groups: the COSS group and the MISS group...

We demonstrate Ge/Si high-power and high-speed distributed traveling wave photodetectors (TWPD) by using the inductive gain peaking technique. Input terminals of TW electrodes are open to enhance RF output efficiencies to output loads. Furthermore, optimized on-chip spiral inductors are incorporated at output terminals of TW electrodes to alleviate bandwidth degradations caused by the absences of matching impedances. A comprehensive equivalent circuit model is developed to calculate the frequency response of this scheme...

Soliton microcombs, offering large mode spacing and broad bandwidth, have enabled a variety of advanced applications, particularly for telecommunications, photonic data center, and optical computation. Yet, the absolute power of microcombs remains insufficient, such that optical power amplification is always required. Here, we demonstrate a combined technique to access power-sufficient optical microcombs, with a photonic-integrated soliton microcomb and home-developed erbium-doped gain fiber. The soliton microcomb is generated in an integrated Si3N4 microresonator chip, which serves as a full-wave probing signal for power amplification...

In this work, we present an optically subharmonic pumped WR3-mixer for enabling photonic coherent frequency-domain terahertz (THz) imaging and spectroscopy systems in the future. The studied mixer operates within the upper range of the WR3-band from 270 GHz to 320 GHz. High-power uni-travelling carrier photodiodes (UTC-PDs) are developed for providing the subharmonic local oscillator (LO) signal within the corresponding WR6-band in the range between 135 GHz and 160 GHz. The proposed THz mixer module consists of a gallium arsenide (GaAs)-based low barrier Schottky diodes (LBSDs) chip and an indium phosphide (InP)-based UTC-PD chip...

Demineralized bone matrix (DBM) is considered one of the most reliable bone tissue grafts for regular surgical use, as it provides a scaffold that is structurally like native bone, and that enhances bone regeneration. However, commercially available DBM products are not suited for surgical restitutions of large bones. Therefore, each Tissue Bank is urged to implement their own demineralization protocol, which usually does not meet the high demand for bone grafting. In this project, we developed an open source system for medium-scale manufacturing of DBM grafts from human cadaveric donors to automate the demineralization protocol and improve its reproducibility...

System-on-chip millimeter wave integrated circuit technology is used on the two-dimensional millimeter-wave imaging reflectometer (MIR) upgrade for density fluctuation imaging on the DIII-D tokamak fusion plasma. Customized CMOS chips have been successfully developed for the transmitter module and receiver module array, covering the 55-75 GHz working band. The transmitter module has the capability of simultaneously launching eight tunable probe frequencies (>0 dBm output power each). The receiver enclosure contains 12 receiver modules in two vertical lines...

A wideband and low-power distributed cascode mixer is implemented for future mobile communications. The distributed design inspired by the distributed amplifier (DA) enables a mixer to operate in a wide band. In addition, the cascode structure and inductive positive feedback design allow high conversion gain with low-power consumption. The proposed mixer is fabricated using a 130 nm commercial complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) process. It consists of three cascode gain cells and operates with a drain voltage of 1...

A highly integrated multi-mode multi-band (MMMB) power amplifier module (PAM) using hybrid bulk complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS), gallium arsenide (GaAs) heterojunction bipolar transistor (HBT), and silicon-on-insulator (SOI) technologies for low band (LB, 824-915 MHz) and high band (HB, 1710-1980 MHz) is proposed. The hybrid MMMB PAM integrates a bulk CMOS controller die, a GaAs HBT power amplifier (PA) die and a SOI switch die on a six-layer laminate. To simultaneously obtain both highly efficient and highly linear characteristics over a wide range of input power levels, a parallel dual-chain PA strategy has been adopted to provide vary bias current and gain for low-power mode (LPM) and high-power mode (HPM) operation...

This paper presents an energy-autonomous wireless soil pH and electrical conductance measurement IC powered by soil microbial and photovoltaic energy. The chip integrates highly efficient dual-input, dual-output power management units, sensor readout circuits, a wireless receiver, and a transmitter. The design scavenges ambient energy with a maximal power point tracking mechanism while achieving a peak efficiency of 81.3% and the efficiency is more than 50% over the 0.05-14 mW load range. The sensor readout IC achieves a sensitivity of -8...

We present a fully-integrated single-lane 53 GBd PAM-4 silicon photonics (SiPh) transmitter (Tx) with a flip-chip bonded laser diode (LD). The LD is butt-coupled to a Si edge coupler including a SiO2 suspended spot-size converter. The coupled power exceeds 10 dBm with a 1 dB allowable misalignment of 2.3 µm. The RF and eye performances of the Tx are evaluated. Extinction ratio >5 dB is obtained at 3.5 Vppd voltage swing. Aided by silicon capacitors, the Tx decouples parasitic inductances leading to remarkable improvements in the eye openings and transmitter dispersion eye closure quaternary by 1...

In this paper, an inductorless and gain-controllable 0.5~2.5 GHz wideband low noise amplifier (LNA) based on second generation current controlled current conveyors (CCCIIs) is presented. The proposed wideband LNA utilizes CCCIIs as building blocks to implement the amplifier stage and impedance matching stage. By varying the DC biasing current of the CCCII, the voltage gain of the proposed LNA is controllable in the range of 1~18 dB. In the frequency range of 0.5~2.5 GHz, the post-layout simulation results show that the proposed LNA has a typical voltage gain S21 of 12...

Nucleic acid aptamer-based research has focused on achieving the highest performance for bioassays. However, there are limitations in evaluating the affinity for the target analytes in these nucleic acid aptamer-based bioassays. In this study, we mainly propose graphene oxide (GO)-based electrical and optical analyses to efficiently evaluate the affinity between an aptamer and its target. We found that an aptamer-coupled GO-based chip with an electrical resistance induced by a field-effect transistor, with aptamers as low as 100 pM, can detect the target, thrombin, at yields as low as 250 pM within five minutes...

A high data rate RF-DAC and a power detector (PD) are designed and fabricated in a 250 nm indium phosphide (InP) double heterojunction bipolar transistor (DHBT) technology. A communication link using the Tx-Rx over polymer microwave fiber (PMF) is measured. The link consists of a pulse amplitude modulation (PAM) modulator and a PD as a demodulator, as well as a one-meter-long dielectric waveguide. The working frequency range of the complete link is verified to be 110-150 GHz. The peak output power of the PAM modulator is 5 dBm, and it has a -3 dB bandwidth of 43 GHz...

This paper presents a radio frequency (RF) triple pole triple throw 3P3T cross antenna switch for cellular mobile devices. The negative biasing scheme was applied to improve the power-handling capability and linearity of the switch by increasing the maximum tolerable voltage drop across the drain and source and reverse biasing the parasitic junction diodes. To avoid signal reflection through the antenna in off-state, all the antenna ports were equipped with 50-ohm termination to provide the pull-down path. Considering the simultaneous operation of antenna ports in different switch cases, the presented T-type pull-down path demonstrated improvement of isolation by over 15 dB...

This paper proposes a 2.4-GHz fully-integrated single-frequency multi-channel RF energy harvesting (RFEH) system with increased harvested power density. The RFEH can produce an output power of ~423-μW in harvesting ambient RF energy. The front-end consists of an on-chip impedance matching network with a stacked rectifier concurrently matched to a 50 Ω input source. The circuit mitigates the "dead-zone" by enhancing the pumping efficiency, achieved through the increase of Vgs drivability of the proposed internal gate boosting 6-stage low-input voltage charge pump and the 5-stage shared-auxiliary-biasing ring-voltage-controlled-oscillator (VCO) integrated to improve the start-up...

We fabricated an optical transmitter with high frequency and integrated design based on the flip-chip interconnection technique (Hi-FIT) and assisted extended reach electroadsorption modulator integrated distributed feedback (EADFB) laser (AXEL) for 200-Gbit/s/λ application. The Hi-FIT makes it possible to increase modulation bandwidth thanks to wire-free interconnection and peaking control techniques while the AXEL can increase the optical modulation output power thanks to an integrated semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA)...