As the world economy grows and industrialization of the developing countries increases, the demand for energy continues to rise. Triboelectric nanogenerators (TENGs) have been touted as having great potential for low-carbon, non-fossil fuel energy generation. Mechanical energies from, amongst others, body motion, vibration, wind and waves are captured and converted by TENGs to harvest electricity, thereby minimizing global fossil fuel consumption. However, only by ascertaining performance efficiency along with low material and manufacturing costs as well as a favorable environmental profile in comparison with other energy harvesting technologies, can the true potential of TENGs be established. This paper presents a detailed techno-economic lifecycle assessment of two representative examples of TENG modules, one with a high performance efficiency (Module A) and the other with a lower efficiency (Module B) both fabricated using low-cost materials. The results are discussed across a number of sustainability metrics in the context of other energy harvesting technologies, notably photovoltaics. Module A possesses a better environmental profile, lower cost of production, lower CO₂ emissions and shorter energy payback period (EPBP) compared to Module B. However, the environmental profile of Module B is slightly degraded due to the higher content of acrylic in its architecture and higher electrical energy consumption during fabrication. The end of life scenario of acrylic is environmentally viable given its recyclability and reuse potential and it does not generate toxic gases that are harmful to humans and the environment during combustion processes due to its stability during exposure to ultraviolet radiation. Despite the adoption of a less optimum laboratory manufacturing route, TENG modules generally have a better environmental profile than commercialized Si based and organic solar cells, but Module B has a slightly higher energy payback period than PV technology based on perovskite-structured methyl ammonium lead iodide. Overall, we recommend that future research into TENGs should focus on improving system performance, material optimization and more importantly improving their lifespan to realize their full potential.

The Internet of Things (IoT) technology has the means to shape the future of many industries. Data is the language of the communication between different nodes through the network; the networks are the communication channel. The cloud is the home and destination of the data which adds intelligence through data analytics software, Precision agriculture uses the IoT features to help in managing crops production, by optimizing the quality of the crops through applying required nutrients and reduce the harmful impacts on the environment due to the application of excess pesticides. In this paper, we deployed a sensing network to gather the field data of some crops (Potatoes, Tomatoes, etc.), then fed these data to a machine learning algorithm to get a warning message finally displaying both the data and the warning message through a Graphical User Interface (GUI).

Reliability and variability have become big design challenges facing submicrometer SRAM designers. A low area overhead adaptive body bias (ABB) circuit is proposed in this paper to compensate for NBTI aging and process variations to improve the SRAM reliability and yield. The proposed ABB circuit consists of a threshold voltage sensing circuit and an on-chip analog controller. Postlayout simulation results, referring to an industrial hardware-calibrated STMicroelectronics 65 nm CMOS technology transistor model, are presented. The transistor model contains process variations and NBTI aging model cards, which are declared by STMicroelectronics to be silicon verified. Cadence RelXpert, Virtuoso Spectre, and Virtuoso UltraSim tools are used to estimate the NBTI aging and process variations impacts on the SRAM array. These results show that the proposed ABB compensates effectively for NBTI aging and process variations. For example, the proposed ABB reduces the read failure probability from 0.32% to 0.05% and the SNM degradation from 10.9% to 2.6% at 10 years aging time. In addition, the proposed ABB enhances the soft errors immunity of the SRAM cell by reducing the critical charge degradation from 12.7% to 3.4% at 10 years aging time.

Ultrawideband (UWB) signals are extremely power limited due to the severe power spectral density constraints obligated by the Federal Communications Committee. Therefore, the design of radiation efficient antennas for UWB signaling is a challenging step in the design and development of impulse radio UWB (IR-UWB) communication systems, especially when these signals coexist with previously standardized narrowband (NB) wireless services. In this paper, a dual-band-notched quad-element UWB multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) antenna design is presented. The proposed design is capable of suppressing NB interference (NBI). The NBI suppression capability of the proposed design is tested both experimentally and through simulations. Moreover, the experimentally measured spectral characteristics of the proposed design are employed in simulating the bit error rate (BER) performance of IR-UWB systems, considering the biphase modulation (BPM) scheme. Both experimental and simulation results show that the proposed design is capable of improving the BER performance of BPM-modulated IR-UWB systems in an NBI environment by suppressing the NBI signals located at six different frequencies within the bandwidth of the two band notches of the proposed design, while introducing a negligible distortion to the IR-UWB signaling waveforms.

Article A Modified CMOS Realization of the Operational Transresistance Amplifier (OTRA) was published on April 1, 2006 in the journal Frequenz (volume 60, issue 3-4).

Emerging nonvolatile universal memory technology is vital for providing the huge storage capabilities, which is needed for nanocomputing facilities. Memristor, which is recently discovered and known as the missing fourth circuit element, is a potential candidate for the next-generation memory. Memristor has received extra attention in the last few years. To support this effort, this paper presents a novel read/write circuit that facilitates the reading and writing operation of the Memristor device as a memory element. The advantages of the proposed read/write circuit are threefold. First, the proposed circuit has a nondestructive successive reading cycle capability. Second, it occupies less die area. Finally, the proposed read/write circuit offers a significant improvement in power consumption and delay time compared with other read/write circuits.