Portable Electronic Systems Research Articles

Electronic Data Collection and Management System for Global Adult Tobacco Survey

Introduction:Portable handheld computers and electronic data management systems have been used for national surveys in many high-income countries, however their use in developing countries has been challenging due to varying geographical, economic, climatic, political and cultural environments. In order to monitor and measure global adult tobacco use, the World Health Organization and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention initiated the Global Adult Tobacco Survey, a nationally representative household survey of adults, 15 years of age or older, using a standard core questionnaire, sample design, and data collection and management procedures. The Survey has been conducted in 14 low- and middle-income countries, using an electronic data collection and management system. This paper describes implementation of the electronic data collection system and associated findings.Methods:The Survey was based on a comprehensive data management protocol, to enable standardized, globally comparable high quality data collection and management. It included adaptation to specific country needs, selection of appropriate handheld hardware devices, use of open source software, and building country capacity and provide technical support.Results:In its first phase, the Global Adult Tobacco Survey was successfully conducted between 2008 and 2010, using an electronic data collection and management system for interviews in 302,800 households in 14 countries. More than 2,644 handheld computers were fielded and over 2,634 fieldworkers, supervisors and monitors were trained to use them. Questionnaires were developed and programmed in 38 languages and scripts. The global hardware failure rate was < 1% and data loss was almost 0%.Conclusion:Electronic data collection and management systems can be used effectively for conducting nationally representative surveys, particularly in low- and middle-income countries, irrespective of geographical, climatic, political and cultural environments, and capacity-building at the country level is an important vehicle for Health System Strengthening.

Leveraging Technological Capabilities for Competitive Advantages: Giving Samsung Way a Glance

One of the serious problems confronting developing and developed economies is the management and preservation of energy sources. While modern technologies (systems, tools, and machines) are being developed, demands for computing and telecommunication systems grow to adapt people with new business environment. Current electricity users comprise new generation of heavy electricity users such as portable electronic systems which have been boosted rapidly over span of happening years, whereas their main energy sources such as batteries have been improved in energy density and capacity at a much slower pace.

Design and performance evaluation of portable electronic nose systems for freshness evaluation of meats II - Performance analysis of electronic nose systems by prediction of total bacteria count of pork meats

The objective of this study was to predict total bacteria count of pork meats by using the portable electronic nose systems developed throughout two stages of the prototypes. Total bacteria counts were measured for pork meats stored at 4℃ for 21days and compared with the signals of the electronic nose systems. PLS(Partial least square), PCR (Principal component regression), MLR (Multiple linear regression) models were developed for the prediction of total bacteria count of pork meats. The coefficient of determination (R p 2 ) and root mean square error of prediction (RMSEP) for the models were 0.789 and 0.784 log CFU/g with the 1st system for the pork loin, 0.796 and 0.597 log CFU/g with the 2nd system for the pork belly, and 0.661 and 0.576 log CFU/g with the 2nd system for the pork loin respectively. The results show that the developed electronic system has potential to predict total bacteria count of pork meats.

Robust feedforward compensation scheme with AC booster for high frequency low voltage buck DC–DC converters

Today and in the future, high frequency low voltage DC---DC converters are an effective power-management solution for fast transient response and small profile in portable electronic systems. This paper presents a robust feedforward compensation scheme with AC booster. An ac amplifier is added in parallel with the main path to compensate the high-frequency gain reduction, which improves gain-bandwidth (GBW) product and slew rate significantly. This approach takes the multistage error amplifier (EA) as an element in the compensation circuit instead of using passive elements used in traditional proportional-plus-integral-and-derivative (PID) compensation circuits. The positive phase shift of left-half-phase (LHP) zeros caused by the feedforward path and ac boosting path in the multistage EA is used to cancel the negative phase shift by the resonant poles of the power stage of buck DC---DC converter in order to compensate the DC---DC converters. A graphical loop-gain method is used to design the feedback compensation and analyze the closed-loop performances of the converter for the complexion arising from the presence of multiple poles of EA before crossover frequency in high frequency converters. The high gain, wide bandwidth, and high slew rate are achieved by the absence of traditional pole-splitting effect and the added ac booster. In addition, the design guidelines for this feedback compensation network realized by robust feedforward with AC booster compensation (RFACBC) scheme and multistage EA are established. When the proposed compensation networks were employed in 100 MHz buck DC---DC converter implemented in SMIC 0.18 μm CMOS process, the simulation results validate the feasibility and functionality of the RFACBC scheme and design guidelines. The closed-loop dc gain achieves over 60 dB with over 20 MHz GBW and 61° phase margin under wide range loads. Furthermore, the settling time is improved due to the advanced frequency compensation.

Design and performance evaluation of portable electronic nose systems for freshness evaluation of meats.

The aim of this study was to develop a portable electronic nose system for freshness measurement of meats, which could be an alterative of subjective measurements of human nose and time-consuming measurements of conventional gas chromatograph methods. The portable electronic system was o optimized by comparing the measurement sensitivity and hardware efficiency, such as power consumption and dimension reduction throughout two stages of the prototypes. The electronic nose systems were constructed using an array of four different metal oxide semiconductor sensors. Two different configurations of sensor array with dimension were designed and compared the performance respectively. The final prototype of the system showed much improved performance on saving power consumption and dimension reduction without decrease of measurement sensitivity of pork freshness. The results show the potential of constructing a portable electronic system for the measurement of meat quality with high sensitivity and energy efficiency.

Synthesis and Electrochemical Characterization of Polypyrrole/Multi-walled Carbon Nanotube Composite Electrodes for Supercapacitor Applications

Summary of reactant composition for synthesizing PPy/ MWCNT composites.PCNT-10 PCNT-20 PCNT-30MWCNT (g) 0.100 0.210 0.325FeCl 3 (g) 3.880 3.880 3.880Pyrrole (g) 0.967 0.967 0.967Water (mL) 100 100 100 Introduction The growing demand for portable electronic systems, digital communication devices and electric vehicles has prompted con-siderable interest in supercapacitors with high power density and long cycle life. 1-3 The major types of materials used in super-capacitors are: (i) high surface area activated carbons, (ii) re-dox metal oxides and (iii) conducti ng polymers. 4-6 Among them, conducting polymers attracted great deal of interest due to their high specific capacitance, low material cost, easy synthesis and many other inherent properties. 7-14 However, the main drawback of conducting polymer-based supercapacitors is poor cycle life due to the volume change during doping and dedoping process. Hence it is necessary to strengthen adequately the electroche-mically active sites of conducting polymers by the addition of large surface area carbon materials or carbon nanotubes (CNTs). CNTs have been attractive materials for electrodes of super-capacitors due to their high accessible surface area, high elec-tronic conductivity, chemical and mechanical stability. In order to improve the mechanical and electrochemical properties of electrodes based on conducting polymers, the composites of conducting polymers and CNTs have been synthesized for supercapacitor applications.

A growth model for marketing evolution of multi-generation NAND flash memory

Marketing growth of information-technology products is continuously sustained by semiconductor non-volatile memories. Flash memory plays a crucial role for mass storage of portable electronic systems. In this work, we study the marketing dynamics of flash memory using a growth model. The model considering non-uniform influence, asymmetric diffusion, and heterogeneity of the population of potential adaptors is solved and optimised numerically. Comparison between simulated and realistic data for NAND flash memory from 128 Mb to 1 Gbit verifies the theoretical findings. The results of this study could be advanced for forecasting new technologies of flash memory.

Design of Shock Table Tests to Mimic Real-Life Drop Conditions

A systematic study, both experimentally and analytically, is conducted to evaluate the feasibility of using appropriate shock table tests to mimic the drop impact environment for components and systems adopted in portable electronics. Firstly, experiments are carried out to observe the dynamic characteristics of typical portable electronic systems and components under drop impact. Then a series of shock table tests with different constraint conditions are designed to mimic the real-life impact state. By comparing the typical results from shock table tests and those from drop tests, the correlation of shock table test parameters and drop tests conditions is investigated. The results reveal that the conventional fully constrained shock table test cannot mimic the real-life drop impact conditions, while an appropriate shock table test method should allow the sample to rotate freely. Theoretical analysis is developed to explain the mechanics of the impact scenarios. It is found that due to Hertz contact spring effect and the rotational acceleration during the impact, the acceleration of the centroid sample is significantly different to that of the table. In addition, acceleration estimated by traditional force-divided-by-mass method may underestimate the real acceleration of components inside the products.

Analysis of a Multi-Oscillated Current Resonant Type DC-DC Converter

This paper presents the analysis of a new multi-oscillated current resonant type DC-DC converter. Current resonant converters have several remarkable features such as high efficiency, small size, low cost and low noise, and are frequently employed in many portable electronic systems such as personal computers, cellular phones and flat panel displays. The current resonant type converter generally employs pulse frequency modulation for constant voltage control in the output. For this reason, the magnetizing current through the converter not only causes a power loss under a light load, but also a loss during stand-by. Therefore, this type of converter has a problem in that the required smaller size cannot be achieved, because an auxiliary source is necessary for stand-by. In order to solve these problems, a new current resonant type power supply is proposed in which two driving methods are employed. In these driving methods, one MOSFET as a main switch is driven by an auxiliary winding of the transformer and another MOSFET as a main switch is driven by the driving IC with a low withstand voltage. Good agreement of the observed and simulated waveforms was confirmed. In addition, eight distinct states and four distinct operating modes, which compose of the sequence of states, were clarified by experimental and simulated analysis.

An Effective Power Consumption Measurement Procedure for Bluetooth Wireless Modules

Measuring quickly and with adequate accuracy, the average power that is dissipated by wireless modules is essential to estimate the real energy consumption and the battery lifetime of portable electronic systems that are provided with wireless connectivity. In this paper, an innovative and effective procedure to measure the average power that is dissipated by Bluetooth modules in different operating conditions is proposed. Such a procedure relies on a high-level parametric finite-state machine describing the behavior of a generic Bluetooth device according to standard specifications. In order to keep the overall measurement uncertainty below a given target value, the sources of uncertainty affecting the procedure are analyzed thoroughly. In addition, some guidelines to reduce the influence of random contributions are described. Finally, a virtual instrument implementing the whole measurement procedure is shown, and some significant experimental results are reported.

Two Statistical Methods for Resolving Healthy Individuals and Those with Congestive Heart Failure Based on Extended Self-similarity and a Recursive Method

In this paper we introduce two methods for measuring irregularities in human heartbeat time series (HHTS). First we consider the multi-fractal structure of HHTS to distinguish healthy individuals and from those with congestive heart failure. In this way we modify the Extended Self-Similarity (ESS) method and apply it to HHTS. Our second approach is based on the recursive method, which we use to predict the duration of the next heartbeat by considering a few previous ones. We use standard physiological data and show that these approaches lead to very satisfactory methods to resolve the healthy and CHF individuals. These methods can be used potentially in portable electronic heart alarm systems.

Innovative technologies for high density non-volatile semiconductor memories

In the last decade, the impressive growth of the portable systems market has been also sustained by the availability of successful semiconductor Non-Volatile Memory (NVM) technologies. The key driver has been the Flash memory, in particular the NAND Flash, the preeminent NVM technology for the mass storage application in portable electronic systems. The needs for higher and higher density memory will continuously grow, driven, for example, by the needs of huge amount of memory for the long video recording. In this contest is growing the industrial interest to explore new technologies able to guarantee a density increase beyond, and cost competitive with, existing NAND Flash. The paper presents innovative NVM technologies, that exploit new materials, different physical storage concepts and also alternative memory array architectures with respect to the Flash memories of today, with particular attention to the minimum cell size passive arrays (cross-point memory), based on ferroeletric or conductive polymers, on magnetic tunnel junction and on chalcogenide alloy. A final section is dedicated to the mechanical decoded probe storage technology, the so-called “seek and scan” approach, like the one used in Hard-Disk or Compact-Disk, that could have interesting applications in several fields, ranging from the mass storage application to molecular manipulation, thus tracing the route for the post-Moore’s law NVM development.

Performance of the Spreeta 2000 integrated surface plasmon resonance affinity sensor

Surface plasmon resonance (SPR) has become well established as a laboratory tool for the study of biological binding reactions, but has had limited application outside of this context. With the goal of moving SPR applications from high-cost systems designed for central laboratories to low-cost, portable electronic systems designed for the field, Texas Instruments Inc. (TI), has developed Spreeta, a line of compact, integrated SPR sensor components. This paper reports on the performance of TI’s newest SPR device, the Spreeta 2000, measured using instruments developed by TI and by Prolinx Inc., who are developing advanced molecular interaction analysis technology utilizing a proprietary version of Spreeta 2000. Noise optimization techniques including averaging and sum normalization are discussed, and the dependence of refractive index (RI) noise on these techniques is measured. For a measurement time of 0.8 s, a noise level of 1.8×10 −7 RI is observed. To estimate the accuracy potentially obtainable using the sensor, the smoothness of the sensor response is measured using RI gradients, and is found to be 0.2% over a change in RI of 0.04. As a demonstration of the capabilities of the Spreeta 2000 when incorporated into an appropriate instrumentation system, an automated assay for mouse IgG is presented.

Fabrication of miniaturized Si-based electrocatalytic membranes

The increasing interest for lightweight and portable electronic systems, cellphones and small digital devices is driving technological research towards integrated regenerating power sources with small dimensions and great autonomy. Conventional batteries are already unable to deliver power in ever smaller volumes while maintaining the requirements of long duration and light weight. A possible solution to overcome these limits is the use of miniaturized fuel cells. The fuel cell offers a greater gravimetric energy density compared to conventional batteries. The micromachining technology of silicon is an important tool to reduce the fuel cell structure to micron sizes. The use of silicon also gives the opportunity to integrate the power source and the electronic circuits controlling the fuel cell on the same structure. This article reports preliminary results concerning the micromachining process for fabricating a silicon-based electrocatalytic membrane for miniaturized Si-based proton-exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cells.

A 1.8 V 15-bit 1 mW 2nd-order sigma-delta modulator

Low-voltage low-power sigma-delta modulators provide a critical interface in portable mixed-signal electronic systems. This paper deals with the design and implementation of a low-voltage, low-power 2nd-order sigma-delta modulator operating from a single 1.8 V power supply using a conventional 3.3 V, double-poly, 0.35 μm CMOS process, based on fully-differential switched-capacitor techniques. All the circuit blocks are integrated on one chip, and the input common-mode voltage is set at mid-rail, resulting in low power dissipation, minimum off-chip components, and high efficiency, flexibility and compatibility. The design is useful for voice applications in personal communications systems supplied by two nickel-cadmium or alkaline batteries. The modulator exhibits a 15-bit dynamic range for a 7 kHz bandwidth, and a 14-bit dynamic range for a 20 kHz bandwidth at an oversampling frequency of 2.56 MHz. The peak SNDR reaches 62 dB. The complete 2nd-order modulator has a power dissipation of 0.99 mW, and occupies 0.31 mm2 die area excluding bonding pads.

Known good die meets chip size package

The increasing density, functionality, and high speed performance of integrated circuit components are fueling demands for smaller and faster portable electronic systems. Designers are becoming more experienced at cutting size, delays, and costs wherever possible. One area that offers attractive benefits for reducing size and improving performance is in the IC package itself, either eliminating it altogether, or reducing the size to the point where it takes up very little more space than the IC. In that context, chip size packages (CSPs) offer a viable solution to the problem. The electrical performance of a circuit is degraded by any capacitance, inductance, and lead length added to the IC bond pads. In addition to the performance limitations of the IC package itself, the larger footprint of the package implies that the next level of interconnect will also be sub optimal due to size and fanout of the IC interconnections. CSPs address these problems, too.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">&gt;</ETX>

Portable electronic storage systems

Notebook, palmtop, and pen-based computers have unique storage requirements. In addition to a rapid growth in capacity to support emerging multimedia applications, portable systems require small, removable media; high shock resistance; thermal resilience; and light-weight, unique form factors dictated by ergonomic constraints and choices. It is argued that storage is the critical enabling technology for many new multimedia applications and addressing its rapidly increasing requirements is key to bringing forward this new technology. >

Power Generation and Distribution Design Criteria Evaluations for a Mobile Air Traffic Control Complex

This paper outlines the procedures, criteria and evaluations that were considered in the development of a power generation and distribution system for a mobile air traffic control system. By conducting the study in conjunction with other study groups charged with the responsibility of designing and selecting the electronic equipment necessary for this system, a completely compatible generation and distribution system was developed. Even though developed for this particular application, the power system is sufficiently flexible to be adaptable to other portable electronic systems. The research reported in this paper was sponsored by the Air Force Cambridge Research Laboratories, Office of Aerospace Research, under contract AF 19(604)8015.