The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology

Amine Bermak

Man Kay Law

Vladimir Grigorievich Chigrinov

Chi Ying Tsui

Howard Cam Luong

Chao Shi

Denis Guangyin Chen

Qian Yu

Xiaojin Zhao

Aspects describe gas sensitive field effect transistor (FET) structures, a gas sensitive FET array including the disclosed gas sensitive FET structures, and methods of manufacturing and using the same. In one example, a gas sensitive FET structure can include a body comprising a substrate layer, an intermediate layer over the substrate layer, and a passivation layer over the intermediate layer. Primary terminals disposed within the body can include at least one source terminal, at least one drain terminal and at least one gate terminal. A floating gate disposed within the body can comprise metal at a top surface of the intermediate layer. The passivation layer can be etched over the floating gate, and the floating gate can be electrically coupled to the gate terminal of the primary terminals. A sensing material layer can be positioned over the floating gate. A reset element can be included for resetting the floating gate.

Gas sensitive field effect transistors

Integration of high-fidelity readout and compressive readout channels in a signal sensor array system is provided. A high-fidelity representation of the sensor array is recovered by combining the data from both the high-resolution and compressive readout channels. The signal sensory array system uses a non-correlated-double-sampling (non-CDS) pixel block readout, random-access-reset pixel, ADC-integrated image compression, high-resolution successive-approximation-register (SAR) analog-to-digital-converters (ADC), SAR ADC self-calibration, and low-noise time-domain comparator.

Sensory array with non-correlated double sampling random access-reset pixel and multi-channel readout

The present invention provides an ultra-low power embedded CMOS temperature sensor based on serially connected subthreshold MOS operation particularly well suited for passive RFID food monitoring applications. Employing serially connected subthreshold MOS as sensing element enables reduced minimum supply voltage for further power reduction, which is very important in passive RFID applications. The temperature sensor may be part of a passive RFID tag and incorporates a temperature sensor core, proportional-to-absolute-temperature (PTAT) and complimentary-to-absolute-temperature (CTAT) delay generators, and a time-to-digital differential readout circuit. In one embodiment, the sensor is embedded inside a passive UHF RFID tag fabricated with a conventional 0.18 &#x3bc;m 1P6M CMOS process. With the sensor core working under 0.5 V and digital interfacing under 1 V, the sensor dissipates a measured total power of 119 nW at 33 samples/s and achieves an inaccuracy of +1/&#x2212;0.8&#xb0; C. from &#x2212;10&#xb0; C. to 30&#xb0; C. after calibration.

Low voltage low power CMOS temperature sensor circuit

An apparatus using reconfigurable integrated sensor elements with an efficient energy harvesting capability is described. Each sensor element has sensing and energy harvesting mode. In the sensing mode, the sensor element measures an environmental characteristic by generating electrical charge and outputs a time-encoded signal indicative of the measurement. In the energy harvesting mode, the sensor element itself is used to harvest energy from ambient energy source and makes it available to other sensor elements or circuit components. The sensing element is switched from the sensing mode to the energy harvesting mode when the electrical charge reaches a predetermined threshold. An image sensor device using asynchronous readout for harvesting energy from incident light while generating images is also described.

Method and apparatus for energy harvesting using CMOS sensor

A micropolarimeter is described for simultaneously extracting all Stokes parameters from incident light. The micropolarimeter includes at least one superpixel, which further includes three or more subpixels, each exact a different polarization components from the incident light. The micropolarimeter includes a first and second alignment layers and a liquid crystal layer disposed between the first and second alignment layers. The liquid crystal molecules of the liquid crystal layer are aligned in accordance with the first and second alignment layers to form the superpixel. A method is provided for manufacturing the photo-aligned liquid-crystal micropolarimeter array.

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Hong Kong, China

Amine Bermak