Current Issue : October - December Volume : 2016 Issue Number : 4 Articles : 5 Articles
An inductive linear displacement measurement microsystem realized as a monolithic\nApplication-Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC) is presented. The system comprises integrated\nmicrotransformers as sensing elements, and analog front-end electronics for signal processing and\ndemodulation, both jointly fabricated in a conventional commercially available four-metal 350-nm\nCMOS process. The key novelty of the presented system is its full integration, straightforward\nfabrication, and ease of application, requiring no external light or magnetic field source. Such\nsystems therefore have the possibility of substituting certain conventional position encoder types.\nThe microtransformers are excited by an AC signal in MHz range. The displacement information\nis modulated into the AC signal by a metal grating scale placed over the microsystem, employing\na differential measurement principle. Homodyne mixing is used for the demodulation of the scale\ndisplacement information, returned by the ASIC as a DC signal in two quadrature channels allowing\nthe determination of linear position of the target scale. The microsystem design, simulations, and\ncharacterization are presented. Various system operating conditions such as frequency, phase, target\nscale material and distance have been experimentally evaluated. The best results have been achieved\nat 4 MHz, demonstrating a linear resolution of 20 �¼m with steel and copper scale, having respective\nsensitivities of 0.71 V/mm and 0.99 V/mm....
A true random number generator (TRNG) is proposed and evaluated by field-programmable gate arrays (FPGA)\nimplementation that generates random numbers by exclusive-ORing (XORing) the outputs of many SR latches (Hata\nand Ichikawa, IEICE Trans. Inf. Syst. E95-D(2):426ââ?¬â??436, 2012). This enables compact implementation and generates\nhigh-entropy random numbers.\nIn this paper, we fabricate and evaluate 39 TRNGs using SR latches on 0.18 Ã?¼m ASICs. Random numbers are generated\nby XORing the outputs of 256 SR latches. Our TRNGs pass the SP800-90B health tests and the AIS20/31 statistical tests\nin changing temperatures (from âË?â??20 to 60 Ã?°C) and voltages (1.80 Ã?± 0.15 V). We also perform an independent and\nidentically distributed (IID) test and calculate min-entropy according to the SP800-90B. With these tests, we are able to\nconfirm that our TRNGs are highly robust against environmental stress. The power consumption and circuit scale of\nour TRNGs are 0.27 mW and 1240.5 gates, respectively. Our TRNGs that use SR latches are small enough to be\nimplemented in embedded devices....
Background: Multipoint observations of plasma waves are essential for separating spatial and temporal variations of\na plasma turbulence. Miniaturization and high environmental (temperature and radiation) robustness are key requirements\nfor scientific instrument design toward a sensor network consisting of palm-sized probes. With increasing these\ndemands, a preamplifier for the 3-axis loop antenna of an electromagnetic sensor probe has been developed by\nusing application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) technology with a 0.25-Ã?¼m complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor\nprocess.\nFindings: In the present study, a new temperature compensation method is proposed by using the open-loop gain\nof the ASIC preamplifier with a bandgap reference (BGR) circuit. Usually, the gain is characterized by the closed-loop\ngain, which is governed by the accuracy of the polysilicon resistances in a chip. The open-loop gain is characterized\nby the effective transconductance of the ASIC preamplifier, which often has a negative temperature dependence.\nThe temperature dependence of the gain can be dramatically improved by using the temperature-compensated\nBGR circuit to cancel out the negative dependence of the transconductance. The temperature dependence of\nthe gain was about âË?â??0.01 dB/ââ??¦C in the frequency range within the closed-loop bandwidth. On the other hand, the\ntemperature dependence of the gain at 60 kHz operating with the open-loop gain was improved from âË?â??39 Ã?â?? 10âË?â??3\nto âË?â??2.6 Ã?â?? 10âË?â??3 dB/ââ??¦C by using the temperature-compensated BGR circuit. Moreover, the radiation robustness for the\ntotal ionizing dose (TID) level is evaluated by irradiation with gamma rays from cobalt-60. The ASIC preamplifier is not\nsensitive to TID effects when a thin gate oxide is used. The ASIC preamplifier showed a high radiation tolerance to at\nleast a total ionizing dose level of 400 krad(Si). Finally, the effectiveness of the ASIC preamplifier is evaluated on the\nbasis of a virtual sounding rocket experiment using theoretical calculations of LF standard electromagnetic waves.\nConclusions: Fundamental issues (miniaturization, low-noise performance, and high environmental robustness) are\nsolved by the presented ASIC preamplifier. The success in developing the high robustness ASIC preamplifier leads to a\nfuture mission using a lot of palm-sized probes in space....
More pronounced aging effects, more frequent early-life failures, and incomplete testing and verification processes due to timeto-\nmarket pressure in new fabrication technologies impose reliability challenges on forthcoming systems. A promising solution to\nthese reliability challenges is self-test and self-reconfiguration with no or limited external control. In this work a scalable self-test\nmechanism for periodic online testing of many-core processor has been proposed. This test mechanism facilitates autonomous\ndetection and omission of faulty cores and makes graceful degradation of the many-core architecture possible. Several test\ncomponents are incorporated in the many-core architecture that distribute test stimuli, suspend normal operation of individual\nprocessing cores, apply test, and detect faulty cores. Test is performed concurrently with the system normal operation without any\nnoticeable downtime at the application level. Experimental results show that the proposed test architecture is extensively scalable\nin terms of hardware overhead and performance overhead that makes it applicable to many-cores with more than a thousand\nprocessing cores....
Abstract. Problems of scientific devices control (for example, fine control of measuring\npaths), collecting auxiliary (service information about working capacity, conditions of\nexperiment carrying out, etc.) and preliminary data processing are actual for any space device.\nModern devices for space research it is impossible to imagine without devices that didn't use\ndigital data processing methods and specialized or standard interfaces and computing facilities.\nFor realization of these functions in ââ?¬Å?GRISââ?¬Â experiment onboard ISS for purposes\nminimization of dimensions, power consumption, the concept ââ?¬Å?system-on-chipââ?¬Â was chosen\nand realized. In the programmable logical integrated scheme by Microsemi from ProASIC3\nfamily with maximum capacity up to 3M system gates, the computing kernel and all necessary\nperipherals are created. In this paper we discuss structure, possibilities and resources the\nservice telemetry and control device for ââ?¬Å?GRISââ?¬Â space experiment....
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