Low-voltage, low-area, nW-power CMOS digital-based biosignal amplifier

This paper presents the operation principle and the silicon characterization of a power efficient ultra-low voltage and ultra-low area fully-differential, digital-based Operational Transconductance Amplifier (OTA), suitable for microscale biosensing applications (BioDIGOTA). Measured results in 180nm CMOS prototypes show that the proposed BioDIGOTA is able to work with a supply voltage down to 400 mV, consuming only 95 nW. Owing to its intrinsically highly-digital feature, the BioDIGOTA layout occupies only 0.022 mm2 of total silicon area, lowering the area by 3.22× times compared to the current state of the art, while keeping reasonable system performance, such as 7.6 NEF with 1.25 μVRMS input referred noise over a 10 Hz bandwidth, 1.8% of THD, 62 dB of CMRR and 55 dB of PSRR

Testing variability-intensive systems using automated analysis: an application to Android

Software product lines are used to develop a set of software products that, while being different, share a common set of features. Feature models are used as a compact representation of all the products (e.g., possible configurations) of the product line. The number of products that a feature model encodes may grow exponentially with the number of features. This increases the cost of testing the products within a product line. Some proposals deal with this problem by reducing the testing space using different techniques. However, a daunting challenge is to explore how the cost and value of test cases can be modeled and optimized in order to have lower-cost testing processes. In this paper, we present TESting vAriAbiLity Intensive Systems (TESALIA), an approach that uses automated analysis of feature models to optimize the testing of variability-intensive systems. We model test value and cost as feature attributes, and then we use a constraint satisfaction solver to prune, prioritize and package product line tests complementing prior work in the software product line testing literature. A prototype implementation of TESALIA is used for validation in an Android example showing the benefits of maximizing the mobile market share (the value function) while meeting a budgetary constraint.Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad TIN2012-32273Junta de Andalucía TIC-5906Junta de Andalucía TIC-186

Low temperature sensitivity CMOS transconductor based on GZTC MOSFET condition

Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor (CMOS) Transconductors, or Gm cells, are key building blocks to implement a large variety of analog circuits such as adjustable filters, multipliers, controlled oscillators and amplifiers. Usually temperature stability is a must in such applications, and herein we define all required conditions to design low thermal sensitivity Gm cells by biasing MOSFETs at Transconductance Zero Temperature Condition (GZTC). This special bias condition is analyzed using a MOSFET model which is continuous from weak to strong inversion, and it is proved that this condition always occurs from moderate to strong inversion operation in any CMOS fabrication process. Additionally, a few example circuits are designed using this technique: a single-ended resistor emulator, an impedance inverter, a first order and a second order filter. These circuits have been simulated in a 130 nm CMOS commercial process, resulting in improved thermal stability in the main performance parameters, in the range from 27 to 53 ppm/ºC

IBM-1 description of the fission products 108,110,112^{108,110,112}Ru

IBM-1} calculations for the fission products $^{108,110,112}$Ru have been carried out. The even-even isotopes of Ru can be described as transitional nuclei situated between the U(5) (spherical vibrator) and SO(6) ($\gamma$-unstable rotor) symmetries of the Interacting Boson Model. At first, a Hamiltonian with only one- and two-body terms has been used. Excitation energies and $B$(E2) ratios of gamma transitions have been calculated. A satisfactory agreement has been obtained, with the exception of the odd-even staggering in the quasi-$\gamma$ bands of $^{110,112}$Ru. The observed pattern is rather similar to the one for a rigid triaxial rotor. A calculation based on a Hamiltonian with three-body terms was able to remove this discrepancy. The relation between the IBM and the triaxial rotor model was also examined.Comment: 22 pages, 8 figure

MOSFET ZTC condition analysis for a self-biased current reference design

In this paper a self-biased current reference based on Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor Field Effect Transistor (MOSFET) Zero Temperature Coefficient (ZTC) condition is proposed. It can be imple mented in any Complementary Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor (CMOS) fabrication process and pro vides another alternative to design current references. In order to support the circuit design, ZTC condition is analyzed using a MOSFET model that is continuous from weak to strong inversion, show ing that this condition always occurs from moderate to strong inversion in any CMOS process. The proposed topology was designed in a 180 nm process, operates with a supply voltage from 1.4V to 1.8 V and occupies around 0.010mm2 of silicon area. From circuit simulations our reference showed a temperature coefficient (TC) of 15 ppm/o C from -40 to +85o C, and a fabrication process sensitivity of σ/μ = 4.5% for the current reference, including average process and local mismatch variability analysis. The simulated power supply sensitivity is estimated around 1%/V

Potassium leaching from thermopotash

Potassium losses by percolation or leaching can be reduced by using less soluble sources. This study aimed at evaluating leaching losses of potassium from granulated potassium chloride (KCl), granulated thermopotash and powdered thermopotash. The experimental design was completely randomized, with three replications, in a factorial scheme with four sources (control, granulated KCl, granulated thermopotash and powdered thermopotash) and two soil types (Ustoxic Quartzipsamment and Oxysol Red). The soil samples were added to lysimeters and moistened up to their field capacity. The potassium fertilizers were applied at 3,000 kg ha-1 of K2O, in the upper layer of the lysimeter, and incorporated to the first column ring (0,05 m), in all treatments. These columns were irrigated for 18 days, with water equivalent to a 344 mm rainfall. The soil solution was collected every two days and stored in 50 L containers. Potassium contents were determined in the leachate and in the soil, up to the depth of 0.8 m, at the end of the experiment. The potassium leaching was higher when KCl was the source used. The powdered termopotash supplied more potassium to the top soil layer (0-20 cm), while the KCl supplied more potassium to the subsurface layers, presenting a higher mobility in the soil profile, regardless of soil type. The granulated thermopotash released less potash to the top soil layer than the powdered thermopotash, while no significant differences were observed for the other layers

Systematic decay studies of even-even 132−138132-138^Nd, 144−158144-158^Gd, 176−196176-196^Hg and 192−198192-198^Pb isotopes

The alpha and cluster decay properties of the $132-138$^Nd, $144-158$^Gd, $176-196$^Hg and $192-198$^Pb even-even isotopes in the two mass regions A = 130-158 and A = 180-198 are analysed using the Coulomb and Proximity Potential Model. On examining the clusters at corresponding points in the cold valleys (points with same A_2) of the various isotopes of a particular nucleus we find that at certain mass numbers of the parent nuclei, the clusters emitted are getting shifted to the next lower atomic number. It is interesting to see that the change in clusters appears at those isotopes where a change in shape is occurring correspondingly. Such a change of clusters with shape change is studied for the first time in cluster decay. The alpha decay half lives of these nuclei are computed and these are compared with the available experimental alpha decay data. It is seen that the two are in good agreement. On making a comparison of the alpha half lives of the normal deformed and super deformed nuclei, it can be seen that the normal deformed $132$^Nd, $176-188$^Hg and $192$^Pb nuclei are found to be better alpha emitters than the super deformed (in excited state) $134,136$^Nd, $190-196$^Hg and $194$^Pb nuclei. The cluster decay studies reveal that as the atomic number of the parent nuclei increases the N \neq Z cluster emissions become equally or more probable than the N=Z emissions. On the whole the alpha and cluster emissions are more probable from the parents in the heavier mass region (A=180-198) than from the parents in the lighter mass region (A= 130-158). The effect of quadrupole ({\beta}_2) and hexadecapole ({\beta}_4) deformations of parent and fragments on half life times are also studied.Comment: 42 pages,19 figure

Estructura financiera en la expansión comercial de la compañía CERESCOS S.A.S. en Europa

Trabajo de Síntesis AplicadaEl presente trabajo muestra la evaluación financiera de una alternativa de expansión internacional para la empresa colombiana del sector cuidado y belleza de manos y pies CERESCOS S.A.S. Se proporciona la evaluación financiera para una expansión comercial en el modelo de distribución directa en los países de Alemania, Francia, Gran Bretaña, España, Suiza y Australia; partiendo de la situación actual de la empresa, que ha penetrado el mercado de España con el modelo B2B.Introducción. 1. Objetivo General 2. Objetivos específicos 3. Estado del arte 4. Caso de estudio 5. Conclusiones y recomendaciones BibliografíaEspecializaciónEspecialista en Análisis y Administración Financier

Periods of prey absence and stability of the spider mite biological control

O objetivo deste trabalho foi avaliar os parâmetros biológicos do ácaro predador Phytoseiulus macropilis na ausência de alimento por períodos de um a seis dias. Foram avaliados: o número de ovos por fêmea ao dia; o número total de ovos; a longevidade de fêmeas; e a razão sexual dos descendentes. Fêmeas que ficaram por mais de três dias sem alimento apresentaram queda em todas variáveis biológicas avaliadas. O predador P. macropilis somente se estabelecerá em campo se as manchas ocupadas pelo ácaro-rajado não estiverem muito distantes umas das outras.The objective of this work was to access the biological parameters of the predator mite Phytoseiulus macropilis in the food absence for periods of one or more days. Data evaluated were: egg number per female per day; total number of eggs; longevity of females; and the offspring sex rate. Female in starvation for three or more days showed decrease in all biological variables. P. macropilis only will settle in the field if patch populations occupied by spider mite are not very distant from each other

Genomic and proteomic biases inform metabolic engineering strategies for anaerobic fungi.

Anaerobic fungi (Neocallimastigomycota) are emerging non-model hosts for biotechnology due to their wealth of biomass-degrading enzymes, yet tools to engineer these fungi have not yet been established. Here, we show that the anaerobic gut fungi have the most GC depleted genomes among 443 sequenced organisms in the fungal kingdom, which has ramifications for heterologous expression of genes as well as for emerging CRISPR-based genome engineering approaches. Comparative genomic analyses suggest that anaerobic fungi may contain cellular machinery to aid in sexual reproduction, yet a complete mating pathway was not identified. Predicted proteomes of the anaerobic fungi also contain an unusually large fraction of proteins with homopolymeric amino acid runs consisting of five or more identical consecutive amino acids. In particular, threonine runs are especially enriched in anaerobic fungal carbohydrate active enzymes (CAZymes) and this, together with a high abundance of predicted N-glycosylation motifs, suggests that gut fungal CAZymes are heavily glycosylated, which may impact heterologous production of these biotechnologically useful enzymes. Finally, we present a codon optimization strategy to aid in the development of genetic engineering tools tailored to these early-branching anaerobic fungi