Sharif Digital Repository

An inductorless low noise amplifier (LNA) with active balun for digital TV (DTV) applications is presented. The LNA exploits a noise cancellation technique which allows for simultaneous wide-band impedance matching and low noise design. The matching and amplifier stages in the LNA topology perform single-ended to differential signal conversion with balanced output. The second and third-order nonlinearity of the individual amplifiers as well as the distortion caused by the interaction between the stages are suppressed to achieve high IIP2 and IIP3. A method for intrinsic cancellation of the second-order interaction is employed to reduce the dependence of the IIP3 on the frequency spacing... 

This research aims to propose a thermodynamic model for predicting asphaltene precipitation upon diluting a crude oil with a paraffinic solvent. To this end, a thorough mathematical formulation was carried out to derive a novel micellization model based on the associative properties of asphaltenic compounds. It was assumed that asphaltenes exist in the oil both as monomeric molecules and aggregated cores; with stabilization latter by attachment of resin on its periphery. The aggregation equilibrium was established by taking into account asphaltene's lyophobic tendency, heat of resin adsorption, and interfacial tension between micelle and oil media which is the main driving factor... 

Asphaltene precipitation is a major assurance problem posing significant technical and economic loss on petroleum industry. To tackle this issue, various treatments have been proposed and applied by industry. Amongst, inhibiting or retarding the asphaltene precipitation has been understood as the most efficient approach. In this regard, blending crude oil with chemical additives could appreciably heighten its stability. Surfactants, owing to amphiphilic nature, could keep asphaltene dissolved in crude oil by precluding self-tendency of those particles to making agglomerates. Despite importance of this subject, there is still lack of sufficient experimental data to evaluate effectiveness of... 

Nanoemulsion is a novel type of emulsified solutions holding great promises for utilizing in industrial applications. Although microemulsions have been the subject of numerous studies in past decades, however, nanoemulsions are quite virgin and merit detailed investigation to scrutinize their characteristics specific to reservoir engineering, in particular, Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR). To this end, the present study is an attempt to evaluate the effectiveness of a specific nanoemulsion for oil displacement through porous media. In this regard, flooding experiments were designed and Hexa decyl trimethylammonium bromide (CTAB), which is a cationic surfactant, was used as the emulsifying agent.... 

Despite previous researches on ion-engineered waterflooding (IEWF), its underlying mechanisms are not fully understood, particularly in presence of additives, like surfactants. This paper concerned with the contribution of Ca 2+ , Mg 2+ , SO 4 2- and Na + into altering wettability of oil-wet carbonate minerals towards water preferred state. As a mechanistic study, an experiment workflow was conducted to probe the impact of ions' concentrations in SW, either with or without sodium dodecylbenzene sulfonate (SDBS) which is an anionic surfactant. At first, contact angle (CA) measurement was carried out to evaluate the degree of wettability reversal upon treating the oil-aged calcite slabs with... 

This paper concerns extending applicability of Dehaghani association equation of state (in short DA-EOS) to model non-ideality in phase behavior caused by hydrogen bonding. Advantageously, this equation only needs two and one parameters to treat self- and cross association, respectively, which were determined for methanol/water and ethanol/water mixture in this study. In this respect, DA was coupled with PR and SRK EOS to account for physical interaction between molecules. Notably, DA-PR persistently provides more accurate prediction than DA-SRK for both aqueous methanol and ethanol solutions  

In this study, the authors investigate the performance of optical code-division multiple access (OCDMA) systems with belief propagation (BP)-based receivers. They propose three receivers for the optical fibre channel that provide a trade-off between detecting complexity and system performance. The first proposed receiver achieves a performance very close to the so-called known interference lower bound. The second receiver exhibits a considerably less complexity at the expense of a slight degradation in performance. They show that the third BP-based receiver, which is a simplified version of the second receiver, is surprisingly the same as the so-called multistage detector in OCDMA systems.... 

A 1-V CMOS current steering digital to analog converter with enhanced static and dynamic linearity is presented. The 14-bit static linearity is achieved by a novel background analog self calibration technique which is suitable for low voltage applications and does not require error measurement and correction circuits. To improve dynamic linearity at high frequencies, a new low power track/attenuate output stage is used at the DAC output. Integral and differential nonlinearities of the proposed DAC corresponding, to 14-bit specification are less than 0.35LSB and 0.25LSB, respectively. The DAC is functional up to 400MS/S with SFDR better than 71dB in the Nyquist band. The circuit has been... 

Molecular dynamics (MD) simulation was utilized to study the role of asphaltene extracted from Gachsaran (an Iranian oilfield) at the synthetic oil-water interface. In agreement with experimental data, IFTs predicted by MD simulation for heptol/brine system showed a minima at around 50 vol.% n-heptane, reflecting the highest contribution of asphaltene into the interface. At greater n-heptane fractions, IFT was increased steadily. Simulation results suggest the asphaltene propensity for remaining in the bulk heptol phase rather related to the fraction of toluene in the mixture. Heptol ingredients, i.e., toluene and heptane, act differently with respect to asphaltene, where former tends to... 

In this paper, new sequences (λn,ρn) of capacity achieving low-density parity-check (LDPC) code ensembles over the binary erasure channel (BEC) is introduced. These sequences include the existing sequences by Shokrollahi as a special case. For a fixed code rate R, in the set of proposed sequences, Shokrollahi's sequences are superior to the rest of the set in that for any given value of n, their threshold is closer to the capacity upper bound 1 - R. For any given δ, 0 < δ < 1 - R, however, there are infinitely many sequences in the set that are superior to Shokrollahi's sequences in that for each of them, there exists an integer number n0, such that for any n > n0, the sequence (λn, ρn)... 

A multi-band frequency synthesizer for In-phase and Quadrature (I/Q) LO signal generation in Digital TV tuners is presented. Using divisor numbers other than powers of 2 (2 n ) for quadrature generation, reduces the required frequency range of the VCO, hence the number of VCO circuits, in multi-band frequency synthesizers. In the proposed synthesizer, VHF, UHF and L-band frequencies are covered with only one VCO. This is achieved by using a novel divide-by-3 circuit which produces precise I/Q LO signals. The VCO tuning range in this design is 2,400-3,632 MHz which is covered by a 6-bit switched-capacitor bank. A fast adaptive frequency calibration block selects the closest VCO frequency to... 

A technique for simultaneous cancellation of noise, second-order distortion and third-order distortion in CMOS LNAs is presented. The proposed LNA topology consists of a matching stage and two common-source amplifier stages, performing single-ended to differential signal conversion with balanced output. The second and third-order nonlinearity of the individual amplifiers as well as the distortion caused by the interaction between the stages are suppressed to achieve high IIP3. A method for intrinsic cancellation of the second-order interaction is employed to reduce the dependence of the IIP3 on the frequency spacing between the interfering signals in the two-tone test. © IEICE 2009  

A fully integrated multi-band frequency synthesizer for Inphase and Quadrature local oscillator signal generation in Digital Video Broadcasting to Handheld receivers is presented. In the proposed PLL-based integer-N synthesizer, all of the allocated frequencies for DVB tuners, in VHF, UHF and L bands, are generated. Two voltage controlled oscillators cover a frequency range of 1880-3632 MHz by using switched-capacitor banks. The VCO frequency is divided by 2, 4 and 16 to generate the quadrature signals at the synthesizer output. A fast adaptive frequency calibration block selects the closest VCO frequency to the target frequency by setting the capacitor bank control code prior to the start... 

In this paper a new low-voltage two-stage class-AB line driver for ADSL applications is presented. The new proposed line-driver consists of only two stages with a new method to control the quiescent current of the output stage. The low-voltage full-CMOS high-linear line driver shows -77 dB THD for a load as low as 20 ohms. The line driver has variable gain, attenuating the input signal from 0dB to -14dB with 2dB steps. The peak to peak differential output swing is 4.2-V from a 2.5-V Supply voltage in a 0.25um standard CMOS technology  

In the present study, we investigate the effect of the hemodynamic factors of the blood flow on the cerebral aneurysms. To this end, a hypothetical geometry of the aneurysm in the circle of Willis, located in the bifurcation point of the anterior cerebral artery (ACA) and anterior communicating artery (ACoA) is modeled in a three-dimensional manner. Three cases are chosen in the current study: an untreated thin wall (first case), untreated thick wall (second case), and a treated aneurysm (third case). The effect of increasing the aneurysm wall thickness on the deformation and stress distribution of the walls are studied. The obtained results showed that in the second case, a reduction in the... 

A divide-by-3 frequency divider for Inphase and Quadrature (I/Q) LO signal generation in a multi-band frequency synthesizer is presented. Using divisor numbers other than powers of 2 (2n) for quadrature signal generation, reduces the required frequency range of the VCO in multi-band frequency synthesizers. The divide-by-3 circuit is designed in a 0.18um CMOS technology. © 2008 IEEE  

This paper presents a new architecture for a DLL based frequency synthesizer for wireless transceivers. Owing to its DLL based nature, the synthesizer generates the target frequencies with minimum phase noise. The proposed architecture takes the advantage of a combination of a frequency divider and an edge combiner to create the desired frequencies. As an example, the synthesizer is adopted to create the channel frequencies of French DVB-H/T standard. The circuit level design guidelines and power consumption trade-offs are presented. It was shown that for the mentioned standard a mere 6 stage delay line is sufficient. Simulation results confirm the analytical predictions  

A method to design a tunable low noise amplifier (LNA) for multiband receivers is proposed. This paper also presents a single-ended to differential conversion (S2DC) topology which improves the LNA linearity without degrading its noise performance. Combining input tuning with S2DC in a single stage reduces power consumption of the LNA and decreases effects of supply noise. An LNA has been designed based on the proposed method for 2.3-4.8 GHz in a 0.18 μm CMOS technology. Simulations show an IIP3 of -3.2 dBm, a less than 3.7 dB noise figure (NF), a voltage gain of 24 dB in the whole frequency range. The LNA draws 13.1 mW from a 1.8 V supply. The results indicate that the proposed tuning... 

On-chip accurate clock references are one of the essential building blocks in fully integrated Systems-On-Chips (SOC). In this paper, a low phase noise, temperature and supply voltage independent clock reference is presented. It provides the reference frequency for a biomedical implantable system. The simulated phase noise at 100 KHz offset from 2MHz carrier is 113dBc/Hz. Simulations show the frequency remains within 0.34% of the nominal oscillation frequency in the operating voltage range of 1.7 - 1.9 V without any calibration and its change in the temperature range of 20-to100C is 0.5%. The circuit consumes 77W and is designed in a 0.18m technology with 1.8V supply voltage  

A systematic procedure of simulating charge pump based delay locked loops (DLLs) represents in this paper. The presented procedure is based on the systematic modeling of the DLL components in Matlab Simulink simulator. The system has been designed for 1Hz input clock signal that by changing the whole system scale, it can be used for every other input frequencies. The simulation results in Matlab and design considerations for DLL based frequency multiplier are presented