Technical Features

December 2015

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Figure 1: Fully assembled IMR and the exploded view

By: Yesie Brama, Robotics System Architect, Infineon Technologies AG

Mobile robots are now commonly found in commercial and industrial applications. On a high level, they can be categorized into two main types: Automated Guided Vehicle (AGV): moves along predefined marked paths (e.g., wires, magnetic tapes, lasers/barcodes), guided by external means, and not fully autonomous

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Date:

08/31/2024

The impending boom in automotive IoT

Alex Tan, Marvell

The past 15 years have seen a massive shift in the way consumers communicate, not only with each other, but with the devices around them. There has been a vast array of wireless technologies introduced that aimed to connect devices and people. These connections ultimately became the foundation for the ever-evolving In

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Date:

12/13/2015

Electrolytic capacitor lifetime in power supplies

Gary Bocock, Technical Director, XP Power

Electrolytic capacitors are an essential ingredient in AC/DC power supplies, providing high Capacitance x Voltage (CV) and low Equivalent Series Resistance (ESR) in low-volume packages that simply cannot be achieved cost-effectively using alternative parts. With power density demands increasing and as the only com

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Date:

12/07/2015

LED Back Lighting Dominates Automotive Displays

Tony Armstrong, Linear Technology

Some of the key applications which drove the explosive growth of LEDs used to backlight thin film transistor (TFT) liquid-crystal displays (LCDs) included high definition (HD) TVs, portable tablet PCs, automotive infotainment displays and the myriad of handheld communication devices. However, in order to maintain th

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Date:

12/07/2015

Accurate automotive liquid-level capacitive sensing

Kishore Kumar S and Sivaguru Noopuran, Cypress Semiconductor

Monitoring fluid levels efficiently and accurately has been a challenge to automotive engineers for a long time. While knowledge of the fuel level is important to the driver, there are other fluids the vehicle itself needs to monitor, such as motor oil, brake fluid, and battery fluids. Many cars have also started to

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Date:

12/07/2015

Meeting PC Power Titanium specifications at light load

Zhihong Yu, Monolithic Power Systems

For AC/DC power supplies, there is by nature phase differences and distortion between input currents and voltages due to the existence of holding capacitors and various load features. Here, only the instantaneous product of current and voltage produces power that can actually be used by the appliance, and the pow

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Date:

12/05/2015

Assessing next-generation discretes Part II*

Dr. Thomas Barbieri, Wolfspeed, A Cree Company

In Part 1 of this discussion, we explored the functionality of a series-connected avalanche transistor pulser, specifically for the purpose of evaluating dV/dt ruggedness of SiC Schottky diodes. In this issue, the diodes are tested with the new pulser design. SiC Schottky diode dV/dt ruggedness testing With a

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Date:

12/04/2015

Safe at any speed

There is a growing debate on the issue of autonomous, or self-driving cars (let’s call them “autocars”), as people and society begin to re-evaluate and further develop the concept of what the next generation of personal mobility technology should be. Cars are on the cusp of change, as next-generation energy, dr

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Date:

12/03/2015

Kevin Parmenter, Power Systems Design Contributor

Automotive systems in flux

Kevin Parmenter, Power Systems Design Contributor

The yearly figures for electronics in the automotive and transportation market continue to grow, as vehicle tech push the envelope on quality and reliability almost as stringent as mil/aero applications. Interestingly enough the automotive market is also the largest application user/consumer of motors. This means that

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Date:

12/03/2015