An improved method and apparatus for thermal-to-electric conversion involving relatively hot and cold juxtaposed surfaces separated by a small vacuum gap wherein the cold surface provides an array of single charge carrier converter elements along the surface and the hot surface transfers excitation energy to the opposing cold surface across the gap through Coulomb electrostatic coupling interaction.

In one embodiment, harmful solar cell polarization is prevented or minimized by providing a conductive path that bleeds charge from a front side of a solar cell to the bulk of a wafer. The conductive path may include patterned holes in a dielectric passivation layer, a conductive anti-reflective coating, or layers of conductive material formed on the top or bottom surface of an anti-reflective coating, for example. Harmful solar cell polarization may also be prevented by biasing a region of a solar cell module on the front side of the solar cell.

[Problem] To provide a photovoltaic device capable of generating power whether day or night, without affecting the appearance of a structure or reducing lighting or other functions, and able to inhibit rises in room temperature by converting thermal radiation into electrical energy. [Means to Solve Problems] Provide a photoelectric conversion element 3 with a photovoltaic device 1 on structural members 2a-2d facing the outside of a house or other structure. Power generated by the photoelectric conversion element 3 is extracted via a power extraction unit 4. The power conversion element 3 includes a semiconductor layer 11, conductive layer 20, a metal nanostructure 30 having multiple periodic structures 33, a first electrode 41 and a second electrode 42. The first and second electrodes 41, 42 are separated in the direction of the surface of the photoelectric conversion element 1 with the terminals 71, 81 of the power extraction unit 4 respectively connected.

A PV panel uses an array of small silicon sphere diodes (10-300 microns in diameter) connected in parallel. The spheres are embedded in an uncured aluminum-containing layer, and the aluminum-containing layer is heated to anneal the aluminum-containing layer as well as p-dope the bottom surface of the spheres. A phosphorus-containing layer is deposited over the spheres to dope the top surface n-type, forming a pn junction. The phosphorus layer is then removed. A conductor is deposited to contact the top surface. Alternatively, the spheres are deposited with a p-type core and an n-type outer shell. After deposition, the top surface is etched to expose the core. A first conductor layer contacts the bottom surface, and a second conductor layer contacts the exposed core. A liquid lens material is deposited over the rounded top surface of the spheres and cured to provide conformal lenses designed to increase the PV panel efficiency.

A separate connection device (40) intended to be inserted between a metal frame (3), of an electrical component (1), and a metal supporting structure (20) in order to connect, electrically and separately, the frame to the supporting structure. The connection device (40) comprises a metal blade manufactured from spring steel which comprises two self-connecting end areas (45, 46) arranged in separate planes and comprising a set of sharp teeth (47) arranged in order to be embedded within the metal material and formed on a folded section of the metal blade so that the sets of teeth (37, 47) extend in opposite directions and in planes intended to intersect the planes of the frame (3) and of the supporting structure (20) when the connection device is mounted.

The present invention provides a photoelectric conversion material comprising a fullerene derivative represented by the formula C60(R1)5(R2), wherein each R1 independently represents an organic group having a substituent; and R2 represents a hydrogen atom or a substituted or unsubstituted C1-C30 hydrocarbon group. Further, the present invention also provides a photoelectric conversion device having a self-assembled monomolecular film of the photoelectric conversion material, and a solar cell having the photoelectric conversion device.

A conductive paste may include a conductive component and an organic vehicle. The conductive component may include an amorphous metal. The amorphous metal may have a lower resistivity after a crystallization process than before the crystallization process, and at least one of a weight gain of about 4 mg/cm2 or less and a thickness increase of about 30 μm or less after being heated in a process furnace at a firing temperature.

According to example embodiments, a conductive paste includes a conductive component that contains a conductive powder and a titanium (Ti)-based metallic glass. The titanium-based metallic glass has a supercooled liquid region of about 5K or more, a resistivity after crystallization that is less than a resistivity before crystallization by about 50% or more, and a weight increase by about 0.5 mg/cm2 or less after being heated in a process furnace at a firing temperature. According to example embodiments, an electronic device and a solar cell may include at least one electrode formed using the conductive paste according to example embodiments.

A method for fabricating a photovoltaic device includes depositing a p-type layer at a first temperature and depositing an intrinsic layer while gradually increasing a deposition temperature to a final temperature. The intrinsic layer deposition is completed at the final temperature. An n-type layer is formed on the intrinsic layer.

A photovoltaic cell comprises a top subcell having a first band gap; a middle subcell comprising a substrate and having a second band gap, wherein the substrate comprises a first side and a second side opposite to the first side; and a bottom subcell having a third band gap, wherein the top subcell is grown on the first side of the substrate and the bottom subcell is grown on the second side of the substrate, wherein the first band gap is larger than the second band gap and the second band gap is larger than the third band gap.

A photovoltaic device including a substrate; a first electrode placed on the substrate; a second electrode which is placed opposite to the first electrode and which light is incident on; a first unit cell being placed between the first electrode and the second electrode, and including an intrinsic semiconductor layer including crystalline silicon grains making the surface of the intrinsic semiconductor layer toward the second electrode textured; and a second unit cell placed between the first unit cell and the second electrode.

A surface of a photovoltaic cell is coated with a solution that includes barium titanate to reduce reflection of sunlight that is incident on the surface. The solution may include a base of polydimethylsiloxane and carbon nanotubes. The process may be used in the fabrication of new photovoltaic cell assemblies, or to retrofit existing assemblies in situ.

Methods of forming a photovoltaic structures including nanoparticles are disclosed. The method includes electrospray deposition of nanoparticles. The nanoparticles can include TiO2 nanoparticles and quantum dots. In an example, the nanoparticles are formed on a flexible substrate. In various examples, the flexible substrate is light transparent. Photovoltaic structures and apparatus for forming photovoltaic structures are disclosed.

A novel method and apparatus for performing the method is disclosed the apparatus comprises a laser (17), at least one ink jet print head (14), means for holding a transparent substrate having a transparent conductive layer, means (22) for adjusting the relative positions of the laser and at least one ink jet print head to the transparent conducting layer (2) and a controller to control the laser and ink jet print head whereby in a first step to inkjet print one or more coarse metal borders (15) onto the deposited TCM layer and in a second step by means of a single laser ablation process, ablating tracks in both the metal border and underlying TCM layer to form a plurality of discrete electrical busbars (12) and optionally also to form electrodes in the remainder of the TCM layer.

Provided is an organic light emitting device. The organic light emitting device comprising a first light emitting part on a substrate, emitting a first light of a first wavelength, wherein the first light emitting part includes a transparent first electrode, a first organic light emitting layer, and a transparent second electrode sequentially stacked on the substrate, a second light emitting part on the first light emitting part, emitting a second light of a second wavelength, wherein the second light emitting part includes a transparent third electrode, a second organic light emitting layer, and a reflective fourth electrode sequentially stacked on the first light emitting part, and a fluorescent material disposed at least one between the substrate and the first light emitting part, and between the first light emitting part and second light emitting part.

In one embodiment, a method for controlling drive settings in a press for printing on a web of media. A drive is provided to receive the web from an upstream location and to transport the received web downstream of the drive at a controllable speed. The speed of the drive is sampled plural times while operating the drive in a tension control mode that varies the speed to maintain a desired tension in the web adjacent the drive. An optimal speed of the drive is calculated from the sampled speeds. The drive is operated in a constant velocity mode at the optimal speed during printing.

A conveying device includes a first feeder that rotatably supports a roll sheet and feeds the roll sheet to a conveying path, a second feeder that feeds a cut sheet to the conveying path, and a controller that determines whether a sheet fed to the conveying path is the roll sheet or the cut sheet based on the relationship between movement of the sheet fed to the conveying path and rotation of the roll sheet.

A surface treatment equipment is designed for forming nickel barriers on a plurality of terminals for preventing solder wicking is disclosed. The surface treatment equipment includes a retractable feeding system, a laser engraving system, an image sensor, and a control system. The retractable feeding system is utilized to transmit a strip that has the terminals. The laser engraving system is utilized to ablate the terminals. The image sensor is utilized to collect a plurality of images of the ablated terminals. The control system receives the images to perform image recognition. When a defective terminal is recognized, the control system controls the retractable feeding system to transmit in reverse and controls the laser engraving system to repeatedly ablate the defective terminal. The defective terminals can be automatically recognized by the image sensor accompanying the control system. Thus, the drawback of a human visual inspection is solved.

A method is disclosed for controlling at least one machining device which is coupled to a machine tool by means of an encoder signal, the machine tool having at least one motion control device. In order to improve the accuracy of the encoder connection, at least one additional variable which characterizes the transport is digitally transmitted from the motion control device to the at least one machining device and is used to correct the encoder signal.

A feeding and reversing mechanism for a strapping machine includes a forward-reverse wheel assembly and a tension wheel assembly which are mounted on a base and arranged in such a way to provide larger contact areas between a strapping band and the two wheel assemblies. The feeding and reversing mechanism further includes first and second spring units. The first spring unit helps to keep a suitable gap between an active wheel and a passive wheel of the tension wheel assembly for the strapping band to pass through. The second spring unit helps to move the passive wheel toward the active wheel of the tension wheel assembly, so that the strapping band can be clamped between the passive wheel and the active wheel tightly to facilitate reversing and tightening of the strapping band.

A vacuum roller for a web handling system comprises a hollow, cylindrical, rotably driven drum and an end cap threadingly mounted onto the rear end of the drum. Together, the drum and the end cap define a plurality of individual, externally communicable vacuum paths. A spherical, metal movable element is internally disposed within each vacuum path and regulates the passage of air therethrough. A plurality of magnetic elements is fixedly mounted on a stationary annular holder. In use, each magnetic element selectively displaces each movable element when disposed in close proximity thereto to the extent necessary so as to permit the passage of air through its corresponding vacuum path. As such, the vacuum roller is provided with a predefined range of suction, or vacuum zone, about the outer surface of its rotating drum that directly corresponds to the angular arrangement of the plurality of stationary magnetic elements.

To provide a wire unwinding auxiliary device capable of, compared to a conventional device, effectively preventing an unwound wire material from getting twisted, entangled or flawed. A wire unwinding auxiliary device used for guiding an unwound wire material when unwinding the wire material which is wound in a coiled shape. The device comprises a plurality of rotation members 1a-1e on which the unwound wire material is set to run therethrough, and a non-rotation member 2 provided adjacent to at least a rotation member 1a through which the wire material passes first in the plurality of rotation members 1a-1e, thereby a running path of the wire material is stabilized between the non-rotation member 2 and the rotation member 1a.

A media diverter system for directing a media sheet traveling along an input media path into either a first media path or a second media path. One or more roller assemblies are provided including a media-guiding roller having one or more grooves formed around the exterior surface, and an air source for selectively providing an air flow into one or more of the grooves, the air flow being directed between the media sheet and the exterior surface of the media-guiding roller thereby producing a Bernoulli force to draw the media sheet toward the media-guiding roller. A controller selectively activates the air source in at least one of the roller assemblies while the corresponding media-guiding roller rotates around its roller axis to draw the media sheet toward the exterior surface of the media-guiding roller, thereby directing the media sheet into either the first media path or a second media path.

A web conveying apparatus that conveys a web, includes: a transverse position displacement detection unit that detects a transverse position displacement of the web; a transverse position correction unit that corrects a transverse position of the web by a guide roller; width detection units that detect a width size in a left-right direction of the web; and a control unit that controls the transverse position correction unit in accordance with the transverse position displacement detected by the transverse position displacement detection unit and performs feedback control to position the web in a target position. The control unit changes a correction amount in the feedback control in accordance with the width size of the web detected by the width detection units.

A printing apparatus includes: a motor which drives a shaft of a roll body around which a medium is wound, in the feeding direction of the medium; a transport roller which transports the medium fed from the roll body; and a control section which supplies electric power for rotating the roll body to the motor, wherein the electric power that the control section supplies to the motor at the time of the start of the feeding of the medium is larger when the diameter of the medium that is wound around the roll body is R2 (

A debris sweep and dry assist device is for use with a strapping machine. The debris sweep and dry assist device is positioned between the strapping machine and an associated strap supply. The device includes a body having a strap inlet and a strap outlet and defining a strap path therethrough. The body has a first wall at about the strap inlet and a second wall at about the strap outlet. The body has a first manifold and a plurality of first branches extending between the first manifold and the first wall to provide a plurality of flow paths from the first manifold to the environs through the first branches. A compressed is gas directed into the first manifold and flows out of the first branches, and is directed onto strap material at a location at about the strap inlet.

A sheet conveyance apparatus includes a conveyance roller pair that has a roller with a uniform diameter in a sheet width direction and that is configured to pinch and convey a sheet, and a guide unit that is provided on an upstream side of the conveyance roller pair and that is configured to regulate a position of an edge of the sheet, wherein the conveyance roller pair conveys the sheet in a state in which the sheet is bended by the guide unit so that on a roller side with a uniform diameter in a sheet width direction, the sheet convexly bends.

The device (100) is destined to receive flanked continuous strips (1, 2) from an arrival line (L), and feed them towards a transversal cutting station (SR). The device (100) comprises: a basin (3), associated to a terminal part of the arrival line (L), destined to enable formation, in each of the strips (1, 2) of a free loop (A1, A2) in a downwards direction; deviator organs (4), at a 45° angle, provided downstream of the basin (3), destined to guide the strips (1, 2) such as to orientate them perpendicularly to the arrival direction, horizontally centered and correctly staggered in height such as to enter the transversal cutting station (SR).

In a web printer, tension on the moving web is controlled by monitoring the tension on the web between two rollers and selectively operating an actuator driving the second roller to restore the tension to an acceptable range. The operation of the actuator includes modulating the speed at which the second roller is driven.

Groups of phase shifted Pulse Width Modulation signals are generated that maintain their duty-cycle and phase relationships as a function of the period of the PWM signal frequency. The multiphase PWM signals are generated in a ratio-metric fashion so as to greatly simplify and reduce the computational workload for a processor used in a PWM system. The groups of phase shifted PWM signals may also be synchronized with and automatically scaled to match external synchronization signals.

A device for detecting a PWM wave, comprising: a PWM wave generating module, configured to generate the PWM wave; a detecting module coupled to the PWM wave generating module, configured to receive the PWM wave and to determine an electric level of the PWM wave; a timer coupled to the detecting module, configured to start a counting when the detecting module receives the PWM wave, and to interrupt the counting when the counting reaches a predetermined value, the detecting module determining whether the electric level of the PWM wave is a high electric level or a low electric level when the counting is interrupted; and a calculating module coupled to the detecting module, configured to calculate a duty ratio of the PWM wave based on a number of high electric level and a number of low electric level of the PWM wave determined within one period of the PWM wave.

A frequency synthesizer for a WLAN transceiver is disclosed that may be used to generate 5.4 GHz and 2.4 GHz signals. The frequency synthesizer may be configured to minimize VCO pulling by using VCO operating frequencies that are not integer multiples of the RF bands. Further, the frequency synthesizer may be configured to minimize interference with other frequency bands used by existing wireless systems.

A signal generator for a transmitter or a receiver for transmitting or receiving RF-signals according to a given communication protocol includes an oscillator and a mismatch compensator. The oscillator is configured to provide a signal generator output signal having a signal generator output frequency and comprises a fine tuning circuit for providing a fine adjustment of the signal generator output frequency based on a fine tuning signal and a coarse tuning circuit for providing a course adjustment of the signal generator output frequency based on a coarse tuning signal. The mismatch compensator is configured to receive the signal generator output signal and compensate a frequency mismatch between a desired signal generator output frequency and the signal generator output frequency generated by the oscillator by providing the fine tuning signal for changing the state of the fine tuning circuit of the oscillator and by providing the coarse tuning signal for changing a state of the coarse tuning circuit of the oscillator. The mismatch compensator provides the coarse tuning signal during a guard period defined in the given communication protocol, during which no RF-signals are transmitted by the transmitter or no RF-signals are to be received by the receiver, such that the state of the coarse tuning circuit is changed within the guard period.

A PWM circuit that can have two refresh rates, including: a first PWM signal generator and a second PWM signal generator; wherein the first PWM signal generator and the second PWM signal generator respectively control refresh rates in two dimensions of an output data generated from a target apparatus. A PWM signal generation method that can have two refresh rates, including: generating a first PWM signal; generating a second PWM signal; and controlling refresh rates in different dimensions of an output data generated from a target apparatus respectively by using the first PWM signal and the second PWM signal.

A rail-to-rail comparator including a first comparison unit connected to a first terminal and configured to compare differential input signals to differential reference voltages; a second comparison unit connected to a second terminal and configured to compare the differential input signals to the differential reference voltages; and an output unit configured to be driven in response to a clock signal and to generate a complementary output signal according to comparison results of the first and second comparison units.

A communications transmitter includes a baseband processor configured to generate amplitude, angle, in-phase and quadrature baseband signals and a combination modulator that is configurable to modulate in the polar domain and, alternatively, in the quadrature domain. The combination modulator includes a quadrature modulator and a separate and distinct angle modulator that is configured to serve as a local oscillator for the quadrature modulator. In one embodiment of the invention the combination modulator is configured to modulate in the quadrature domain when the transmitter is operating according to a first communications condition (e.g., first transmit power level or first modulation scheme) and is configured to modulate in the polar domain when the transmitter is operating according to a second communications condition (e.g., second transmit power level or second modulation scheme).

A device for mixing multiple (N) pulse density modulated (PDM) bit streams of a bit rate, the device comprises an input logic, an error accumulation circuit, an error correction circuit and an adder of more than N bits; wherein the device is arranged to output an output PDM bit stream that represents a mixture of the multiple input PDM bit streams; wherein the output PDM bit stream comprises a plurality of output PDM bits, wherein a certain output PDM bit of a plurality of output PDM bits that form the output PDM bit stream is generated during a certain clock cycle; wherein the input logic is arranged to select, during each fraction of the certain clock cycle, a current bit of a selected PDM bit stream, wherein different PDM bit streams are selected during different fragments of the certain clock cycle; wherein the error accumulation circuit is arranged to store intermediate values during a first fraction till a penultimate fraction of the certain clock signal and to store a last value during a last fraction of the certain clock signal.

A frequency modulating path for generating a frequency modulated clock includes a direct feed input arranged for directly modulating frequency of an oscillator, and a compensating feed input arranged for compensating effects of frequency modulating on a phase error; wherein the compensating feed input is resampled by a down-divided clock that is an integer edge division of the oscillator. A reference phase generator for generating a reference phase output includes a resampling circuit, an accumulator and a sampler. The resampling circuit is for resampling a modulating frequency command word (FCW) input to produce a plurality of samples. The accumulator is for accumulating the samples to generate an accumulated result. The sampler is for sampling the accumulated result according to a frequency reference clock, and accordingly generating a sampled result, wherein the reference phase output is updated according to at least the sampled result.

Provided is a method for transmitting data in a communication or broadcasting system using a linear block code by generating a codeword by encoding input information data bits, interleaving the codeword; outputting modulation signal-constituting bits by bit-mapping the interleaved codeword using a bit-mapping table predetermined depending on a modulation scheme and a coding rate, outputting a modulation signal by modulating the modulation signal-constituting bits and transmitting the modulation signal via a transmit antenna.

A frequency modulator includes a digitally-controlled oscillator (DCO) arranged for producing a frequency deviation in response to a modulation tuning word and a phase-locked loop (PLL) tuning word. In addition, another frequency modulator includes a DCO and a DCO interface circuit. The DCO is arranged for producing a frequency deviation in response to an integer tuning word and a fractional tuning word. The DCO interface circuit is arranged for generating the integer tuning word and the fractional tuning word to the DCO, wherein the fractional tuning word is obtained through asynchronous sampling of a fixed-point tuning word.

Provided is a method of generating a driving signal for driving a dual mode supply modulator for a power amplifier. The method includes obtaining an envelope of a complex baseband signal to be transmitted, comparing the envelope of the complex signal with a preset threshold value, when a current envelope of the complex signal is the preset threshold value or greater or when there is a result having the preset threshold value or greater in previous N comparisons, outputting a digital board output signal configured with a first logic level through a digital-to-analog converter; and when the current envelope of the complex signal is smaller than the preset threshold value and when there is no result having the preset threshold value or greater in the previous N comparisons, outputting a digital board output signal configured with a second logic level through the digital-to-analog converter.

A transmission device for transmitting a signal in a wireless communication system is provided. The transmission device includes: a serial-to-parallel converter configured to convert an input serial bit stream into a parallel bit stream having three bits; and a phase rotation symbol mapper configured to map the parallel bit stream to a symbol having phase rotation characteristics, wherein when the parallel bit stream includes first to third bits, the phase rotation symbol mapper maps the second and third bits to a complex variable and sequentially maps a real number part and an imaginary number part of the complex variable to the front part and the rear part of a symbol in this order or to the rear part and the front part of the symbol in this order.

In a method of transmitting a data stream from a transmitter in a multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) wireless communication system, where the transmitter comprises a plurality of transmit antennas, a discrete Fourier transform (DFT) is applied to the data stream to generate a plurality of symbol sequences; symbols of a first symbol sequence from the plurality of symbol sequences are paired with symbols of a second symbol sequence from the plurality of symbol sequences to generate a plurality of symbol pairs, wherein the pairing results in an orphan symbol; a space-time block code (STBC) is applied to the symbol pairs to generate a plurality of sets of STBC symbols, each set of STBC symbols being associated with a corresponding one of the plurality of antennas; a cyclic delay diversity (CDD) operation is applied to the orphan symbol to generate a plurality of CDD symbols, each CDD symbol being associated with a corresponding one of the plurality of antennas; and each one of the antennas transmits the corresponding set of STBC symbols and the corresponding CDD symbol.

A modulation method is provided. The modulation method includes the steps of receiving multiple sinusoidal signals, obtaining the maximum value of the sinusoidal signals, obtaining the median value of the sinusoidal signals, and obtaining the minimum value of the sinusoidal signals within a period to generate a difference between the maximum value and the minimum value, generating a difference according to an upper limit and a lower limit of a predetermined comparison value, and comparing the two differences to generate an optimized modulation signal.

The present invention relates to a digital modulation method and a corresponding modulator. The modulator comprises a transcoder (110) followed by a FIFO register (120) and a 2-PSK modulator (130). The transcoder codes a binary word of fixed size into a code word of variable size using a transcoding table. The transcoding table codes at least one first binary word, leading to a first number of phase transitions at the output of the modulator, into a second word of size greater than that of the first word, leading to, at the output of the modulator, a second number of phase transitions less than the first number of phase transitions.

Systems and methods for operating with oscillators configured to produce an oscillating signal having an arbitrary frequency are described. The frequency of the oscillating signal may be shifted to remove its arbitrary nature by application of multiple tuning signals or values to the oscillator. Alternatively, the arbitrary frequency may be accommodated by adjusting operation one or more components of a circuit receiving the oscillating signal.

A method for phase modulation of a carrier signal from a transmitter to a contactless transponder in which data is coded as consecutive symbols, each corresponding to a predefined number of carrier cycles, and in which a symbol time is at least two cycles of the carrier signal includes, at the transmitter, spreading a phase jump of a symbol in relation to a preceding symbol over a first part of the symbol time. The establishment of the phase jump is completed in the first part of the symbol time. The periods of the cycles are constant during a second part of the symbol time.

A modulator which has a first terminal to receive a carrier signal, a second terminal to receive a first control signal to control a frequency band of the carrier signal and a third terminal to receive a second control signal to control a modulation depth of the carrier signal.

This disclosure relates to methods and systems to reduce high voltage breakdown jitters in liquid dielectric switches. In particular, dielectric liquids have been produced that contain a suspension of nanoparticles and a surfactant to reduce the breakdown jitter. In one embodiment, the suspended nanoparticles are Barium Strontium Titanate (BST) nanoparticles.

An electromagnetic actuator comprising a core moving between a latched position and an open position, a permanent magnet, a coil designed to generate a first magnetic control flux to move the core from an open position to a latched position, and a second magnetic control flux designed to facilitate movement of the moving core from the latched position to the open position. The permanent magnet is positioned on the moving core so as to be at least partly outside the fixed magnetic circuit in which the first magnetic control flux flows in the open position, and to be at least partly inside the fixed magnetic circuit used for flow of a magnetic polarization flux of the magnet in the latched position.