We developed an electrically driven near-infrared broadband light source based on self-assembled InAs quantum dots (QDs). By combining emissions from four InAs QD ensembles with controlled emission center wavelengths, electro-luminescence (EL) with a Gaussian-like spectral shape and approximately 85-nm bandwidth was obtained. The peak wavelength of the EL was blue-shifted from approximately 1230 to 1200 nm with increased injection current density (J). This was due to the state-filling effect: sequential filling of the discrete QD electron/hole states by supplied carriers from lower (ground state; GS) to higher (excited state; ES) energy states. The EL intensities of the ES and GS emissions exhibited different J dependence, also because of the state-filling effect. The point-spread function (PSF) deduced from the Fourier-transformed EL spectrum exhibited a peak without apparent side lobes. The half width at half maximum of the PSF was 6.5 µm, which corresponds to the estimated axial resolution of the optical coherence tomography (OCT) image obtained with this light source. These results demonstrate the effectiveness of the QD-based device for realizing noise-reduced high-resolution OCT.

In our previous paper, we presented a concept of “Baseband Radio” as an ideal of future wireless communication scheme. Furthermore, for enhancing the adaptability of baseband radio, the adaptive baseband radio was discussed as the ultimate communication system; it integrates the functions of cognitive radio and software-defined radio. In this paper, two transmission schemes that take advantage of adaptive baseband radio are introduced and the results of a performance evaluation are presented. The first one is a scheme based on DSFBC for realizing higher reliability; it allows the flexible use of frequency bands over a wide range of white space. The second one is a low-power-density communication scheme with spectrum-spreading by means of frequency-domain differential coding so that the secondary system does not seriously interfere with primary-user systems that have been assigned the same frequency band.

Cognitive radio (CR) is an important technology to provide high-efficiency data communication for the IoT (Internet of Things) era. Signal detection is a key technology of CR to detect communication opportunities. Energy detection (ED) is a signal detection method that does not have high computational complexity. It, however, can only estimate the presence or absence of signal(s) in the observed band. Cyclostationarity detection (CS) is an alternative signal detection method. This method detects some signal features like periodicity. It can estimate the symbol rate of a signal if present. It, however, incurs high computational complexity. In addition, it cannot estimate the symbol rate precisely in the case of single carrier signal with a low Roll-Off factor (ROF). This paper proposes a method to estimate coarsely a signal's bandwidth and carrier frequency from its power spectrum with lower computational complexity than the CS. The proposed method can estimate the bandwidth and carrier frequency of even a low ROF signal. This paper evaluates the proposed method's performance by numerical simulations. The numerical results show that in all cases the proposed coarse bandwidth and carrier frequency estimation is almost comparable to the performance of CS with lower computational complexity and even outperforms in the case of single carrier signal with a low ROF. The proposed method is generally effective for unidentified classification of the signal i.e. single carrier, OFDM etc.

Flexible resource utilization in terms of adaptive use of optical bandwidth with agile reconfigurability is key for future metro networks. To address this issue, we focus on optical subwavelength switched network architectures that leverage high-speed optical switching technologies and can accommodate dynamic traffic cost-effectively. Although optical subwavelength switched networks have been attracting attention, most conventional studies apply static (pre-planned) protection scenarios in the networks of limited sizes. In this paper, we discuss optical switch requirements, the use of transceivers, and protection schemes to cost-effectively create large-scale reliable metro networks. We also propose a cost-effective adaptive protection scheme appropriate for optical subwavelength switched networks using our fast time-slot allocation algorithm. The proposed scheme periodically re-optimizes the bandwidth of both working and protection paths to prevent bandwidth resources from being wasted. The numerical examples verify the feasibility of our proposed scheme and the impact on network resources.

The traffic of the future aggregation network will dynamically change not only in volume but also destination to support the application of virtualization technology to network edge equipment to achieve cost-effectiveness. Therefore, future aggregation network will have to accommodate this traffic cost-effectively, despite dynamic changes in both volume and destination. To correspond to this trend, in this paper, we propose an optical layer 2 switch network based on bufferless optical time division multiplexing (TDM) and dynamic bandwidth allocation to achieve a future aggregation network cost-effectively. We show here that our proposed network architecture effectively reduced the number of wavelengths and optical interfaces by application of bufferless optical TDM technology and dynamic bandwidth allocation to the aggregation network.

This paper proposes the use of two transmit and two receive antennas spaced at roughly the width of a human body to improve communication quality in the presence of shadowing by a human body in the 60GHz band. In the proposed method, the transmit power is divided between the two transmit antennas, and the receive antenna that provides the maximum receive level is then chosen. Although the receive level is reduced by 3dB, the maximum attenuation caused by human body shadowing is totally suppressed. The relationship between the antenna element spacing and the theoretical spacing based on the 1st. Fresnel zone theory is clarified. Experiments confirm that antenna spacing several centimeters wider than that given by the 1st. Fresnel zone theory is enough to attain a significant performance improvement.

In this paper, an iterative optimal method is proposed to design the prototype filters for a fast filter bank (FFB) with low complexity, aiming to control the optimum ripple magnitude tolerance of each filter according to the overall specifications. This problem is formulated as an optimization problem for which the total number of multiplications is to be minimized subject to the constrained ripple in the passband and stopband. In the following, an iterative solution is proposed to solve this optimization problem for the purpose of obtaining the impulse response coefficients with low complexity at each stage. Simulations are conducted to verify the performance of the proposed scheme and show that compared with the original method, the proposed scheme can reduce about 24.24% of multiplications. In addition, the proposed scheme and the original method provide similar mean square error (MSE) and the mean absolute error (MAE) of the frequency response.

A simplified circuit has been utilized for fast computation of the current flowing in the cross-point memory array. However, the circuit has a constraint in that the selected cell is located farthest from current drivers so as to estimate the current degraded by metal wire resistance. This is because the length of the current path along the metal wire varies with the selected address in the cross-point memory array. In this paper, a new simplified circuit is proposed for calculating the current at every address in order to take account of the metal wire resistance. By employing the Monte Carlo simulation to solve the proposed simplified circuit, the current distribution across the array is obtained, so that failure rates of read disturbance and write error are estimated precisely. By comparing the conventional and the proposed simplified circuits, it was found that the conventional simplified circuit estimated optimistic failure rates for read disturbance and for write error when the wire resistance was prominent enough as a parasitic resistance.

A major challenge in wideband spectrum sensing, in cognitive radio system for example, is the requirement of a high sampling rate which may exceed today's best analog-to-digital converters (ADCs) front-end bandwidths. Compressive sampling is an attractive way to reduce the sampling rate. The modulated wideband converter (MWC) proposed recently is one of the most successful compressive sampling hardware architectures, but it has high hardware complexity owing to its parallel channels structure. In this paper, we design a single channel sub-Nyquist sampling scheme to bring substantial savings in terms of not only sampling rate but also hardware complexity, and we also present a wideband power spectrum sensing and reconstruction method for bandlimited wide-sense stationary (WSS) signals. The total sampling rate is only one channel rate of the MWC's. We evaluate the performance of the sensing model by computing the probability of detecting signal occupancy in terms of the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and other practical parameters. Simulation results underline the promising performance of proposed approach.

Since digital hearing aids are sensitive to time delay and power consumption, the computational complexity of noise reduction must be reduced as much as possible. Therefore, some complicated algorithms based on the analysis of the time-frequency domain are very difficult to implement in digital hearing aids. This paper presents a new approach that yields an improved noise reduction algorithm with greatly reduce computational complexity for multi-channel digital hearing aids. First, the sub-band sound pressure level (SPL) is calculated in real time. Then, based on the calculated sub-band SPL, the noise in the sub-band is estimated and the possibility of speech is computed. Finally, a posteriori and a priori signal-to-noise ratios are estimated and the gain function is acquired to reduce the noise adaptively. By replacing the FFT and IFFT transforms by the known SPL, the proposed algorithm greatly reduces the computation loads. Experiments on a prototype digital hearing aid show that the time delay is decreased to nearly half that of the traditional adaptive Wiener filtering and spectral subtraction algorithms, but the SNR improvement and PESQ score are rather satisfied. Compared with modulation frequency-based noise reduction algorithm, which is used in many commercial digital hearing aids, the proposed algorithm achieves not only more than 5dB SNR improvement but also less time delay and power consumption.

Microwave systems have a number of promising applications in surveillance and monitoring systems. The main advantage of microwave systems is their ability to detect targets at distance under adverse conditions such as dim, smoky, and humid environments. Specifically, the wide bandwidth of ultra-wideband radar enables high range resolution. In a previous study, we proposed an accurate shape estimation algorithm for multiple targets using multiple ultra-wideband Doppler interferometers. However, this algorithm produces false image artifacts under conditions with severe interference. The present paper proposes a technique to suppress such false images by detecting inconsistent combinations of the radial velocity and time derivative of image positions. We study the performance of the proposed method through numerical simulations of a two-dimensional section of a moving human body, and demonstrate the remarkable performance of the proposed method in suppressing false image artifacts in many scenarios.

In this letter, an effective acoustic feedback cancellation algorithm is proposed based on the normalized sub-band adaptive filter (NSAF). To improve the confliction between fast convergence rate and low misalignment in the NSAF algorithm, a variable step size is designed to automatically vary according to the update state of the filter. The update state of the filter is adaptively detected via the normalized distance between the long term average and the short term average of the tap-weight vector. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed algorithm has superior performance in terms of convergence rate and misalignment.

A broadband mode transition between grounded coplanar waveguide (GCPW) and post-wall waveguide (PWW) is proposed. The transition is composed of GCPW, microstrip line (MSL) and PWW, where the GCPW and PWW are connected via the MSL. The transition is fabricated on liquid crystal polymer (LCP) substrate because of its low dielectric loss and cost effectiveness based on a roll-to-roll fabrication process. Center strip of the GCPW is sandwiched by two ground pads in each of which two through-holes and a rectangular slit are structured. Broadband impedance matching is achieved by this structure thanks to an addition of lumped inductance and capacitance to the transition. A part of the MSL is tapered for the broadband operation. A 25% impedance bandwidth for |S11| less than -15dB is achieved in measurement of a fabricated transition. Loss of the GCPW ground-signal-ground (GSG) pad of 0.12dB and that of the MSL-PWW transition of 0.29dB at 60GHz are evaluated from the measurement. Fabrication error and the caused tolerance on performance are also evaluated and small variation in production is confirmed. The mode transition can be used for low loss antenna-in-package in millimeter-wave applications.

Up to now, broadband THz time-domain system has been developed and widely used for THz inspection system; however for many THz devices for THz band wireless communication, narrow-band system would be preferred rather than typical broadband system. In this work we established a narrowband and time-domain THz radiation and detection system and characterized uncooled microbolometer-based THz imagers using that system. The central frequency of generated narrowband THz wave was 850 GHz. This system enables simultaneous measurement of pulse energy and waveform of THz pulse using a superconducting transition edge sensor for measuring energy and electro-optic sampling for measuring THz waveform. We used this system to evaluate the performance of uncooled THz imagers; IRV-T0831 and T0832 from NEC. Noise equivalent power (NEP) of approximately 0.22 pW/Hz1/2 was achieved in case of T0832 at less than 1 THz which is lower than NEP value of previous reports.

Conventional localization techniques such as triangulation and multilateration are not reliable in non-line-of-sight (NLOS) environments such as dense urban areas. Although fingerprint-based localization techniques have been proposed to solve this problem, we may face difficulties because we do not know the parameters of the illegal radio when creating the fingerprint database. This paper proposes a novel technique to localize illegal radios in an urban environment by interpolating the channel impulse responses stored as fingerprints in a database. The proposed interpolation technique consists of interpolation in the bandwidth (delay), frequency and spatial domains. A localization algorithm that minimizes the squared error criterion is employed in this paper, and the proposed technique is evaluated through Monte Carlo simulations using location fingerprints obtained from ray-tracing simulations. Results show that utilizing an interpolated fingerprint database is advantageous in such scenarios.

In OpenFlow, data and control plane are decoupled from switches or routers. While the data plane resides in the switches or routers, the control plane might be moved into one or more external servers (controllers). In this article, we propose verification mechanisms for the data plane functionality of switches. The latter consists of two parts: (1) Flow-Match Header part (to match a flow of incoming packets) and (2) action part (e.g., to forward incoming packets to an outgoing port). We propose a mechanism to verify the Flow-Match Header part of the data plane. The mechanism can be executed at the controller, or on an additional device or server (or virtual machines) attached to the network. Deploying a virtual machine (VM) or server for verification may decrease the load of the controller and/or consumed bandwidth between the controller and a switch. We propose a heuristic to place external verification devices or VMs in a network such that the verification time can be minimized. Verification time with respect to consumed resources are evaluated through emulation experiments. Results confirm that the verification time using the proposed heuristic is indeed shortened significantly, while requiring low bandwidth resources.

The pilot symbols in the broadband Air-to-Ground (A/G) communications system, e.g., L-band Digital Aeronautical Communications System (L-DACS1), are expected to be also utilized for navigation. In order to identify the co-channel signals from different Ground Stations (GSs), the N-Shift Zero Correlation Zone (NS-ZCZ) sequences are employed for pilot sequences. The ideal correlation property of the proposed pilot sequence in ZCZ can maintain the signal with less co-channel interference. The simulation confirms that the more co-channel GSs are employed, the higher navigation accuracy can be achieved.

For realizing wideband class-F power amplifiers (PA), geo-electrical analysis methods are introduced to determine the best design parameters in a simpler way than relying on computer-guided optimization. The fabricated class-F PA at 1.9 GHz demonstrated a peak efficiency of 80.5% and a bandwidth of 750 MHz for an efficiency of more than 63%. It is presumed that the optimization increased the bandwidth by 10%.

In this letter, a new subband adaptive filter (SAF) which is robust against impulsive noise in system identification is presented. To address the vulnerability of adaptive filters based on the L2-norm optimization criterion to impulsive noise, the robust SAF (R-SAF) comes from the L1-norm optimization criterion with a constraint on the energy of the weight update. Minimizing L1-norm of the a posteriori error in each subband with a constraint on minimum disturbance gives rise to robustness against impulsive noise and the capable convergence performance. Simulation results clearly demonstrate that the proposal, R-SAF, outperforms the classical adaptive filtering algorithms when impulsive noise as well as background noise exist.

A novel high common-mode (CM) suppression wideband balanced passband filter (BPF) is proposed using the stub centrally loaded slotline resonators (SCLSR) which have two resonant frequencies (odd- and even-modes) in the desired passband. The odd-mode resonant frequency of the slotline SCLSR can be flexibly controlled by the stub, whereas the even-mode one is fixed. Meanwhile, a transmission zero near the odd-mode resonant frequency can be generated due to the main path signal counteraction. First, the wideband single-ended BPF and corresponding balanced BPF are designed based on the slotline SCLSR with the parallel coupled microstrip line input/output (I/O). Ultra wideband high CM suppression that can be achieved for the slotline resonator structure has no resonant mode under CM excitation. Furthermore, by folding the parallel coupled microstrip line I/O, the source-load coupling is effectively decoupled to improve the CM suppression within the passband. The high suppression wideband balanced BPF is fabricated and measured, respectively. Good agreement between simulation and measurement results is obtained.