<p>When the Swedish electricity market was re-regulated in 1996 the trading with electricity was exposed to competition and the net service henceforth should be comprised by a monopoly comprised by a regulation. The regulation was based on a review of the costs of the network companies. No attention were paid to if the network was efficient. The following years many of the networks were sold from the municipalities to power companies, to increasing merger prices. The increasing prices in the mergers were followed by increasing prices to the subscribers of the network services. The regulator tried to stop the fast increasing prices, but didn’t succeed. The regulation paradigm couldn’t face the new realities and had to be revised.</p><p>In 1998 the author of this thesis was commissioned by the Swedish Regulator to propose a new regulation model for the Swedish grid companies. Existing models were reviewed but none of them fulfilled the requirements from the regulator; to be self-regulating and give incentives to improved efficiency and distribution reliability. Therefore a new approach was launched. The new approach was to change perspective from a company focus to a consumer focus – a performance-based regulation.</p><p>The solution was to base the regulation of the creation of a standard asset, a Reference Network. From this a new model – the Network Performance Assessment Model (NPAM) – was defined. The Reference Network is defined by four definitions, concerning the elements and topology of a Reference Network, the Subscriber Requirements and the Objective Prerequisites. These definitions grants the transparency of the model.</p><p>The model is sharp and is run into operation in 2004. The final test of the model indicated that the Swedish network companies are overcharging their subscribers with approximately 20%.</p><p>This thesis is an explanation of the model and the definitions, and a review of the thoughts and research which formed the model. Moreover there is a discussion of some topics reported by others in articles about the model. Finally in the conclusion there are topics of simplicity and transparency.</p>

<p>The continuing shrinkage of semiconductor devices towards nanoscale features and increased functionality has prompted a strong need for high-resolution characterization tools capable of mapping the electrical properties with nanoscale lateral resolution. In this regard, scanning capacitance microscopy (SCM) scanning spreading resistance microscopy (SSRM) and Kelvin probe force microscopy (KPFM) have emerged as powerful techniques. </p><p>This thesis focuses on new applications of these techniques for the electrical characterization of III-V materials, devices and low-dimensional systems. One example is the investigation of GaAs/AlGaAs buried-heterostructure lasers with cross-sectional SCM. Several important issues have been addressed: nanoscale contrast related to local band structure, characterization of interfaces and evaluation of electrical properties of the regrown layers. These investigations demonstrate the ability of SCM for reliable, non-destructive and high resolution analysis of opto-electronic devices. </p><p>Applications of SCM and SSRM as potential in-line evaluation tool for III-V processing are demonstrated. In this scope, the first work deals with the characterization of ion beam implanted InP, a promising approach to achieve ultrashort carrier lifetimes. The changes in the local electrical properties of this material induced by annealing are tracked. SCM and SSRM measurements were crucial in identifying the local regions of different conductivity due to the non-uniform damage profiles. The results are correlated with those obtained by complementary structural, electrical and optical characterization. The second work in this category establishes the utility of SCM for evaluating the impact of dry etching on the electrical properties of InP. The highly conductive nature of the near surface damaged layer and its subsequent recovery upon annealing is evidenced. A striking correlation between the SCM signal distributions and the ideality factors of macroscopic Schottky contact is observed. </p><p>The last part deals with the electrical characterization of low-dimensional systems using SCM, SSRM and KPFM. The challenging issues motivating this work are the detection and quantification of confined carriers, the determination of band-offsets and the determination of the spatial resolution of the technique employed. The ability of SCM, SSRM and KPFM to detect carriers accumulated in InGaAs/InP quantum wells (QWs) is demonstrated. In each of these techniques, the physical mechanisms behind the contrast characteristic obtained at QWs are elucidated. The specific issues relating to the determination of the band-offsets are discussed. A new method to determine the "electrical" spatial resolution of SCM and SSRM is addressed using quantum well structures with varying inter-well spacings. Using commercial probes, sub-30 nm and sub-5 nm lateral resolution are determined for SCM and SSRM, respectively. The experimental conditions to perform high resolution measurements are identified.</p>

<p>This study was initiated to investigate if it could be feasible to supply offshore oil installations in the North Sea with electrical power from land. A prestudy of alternative converter topologies indicated that the most promising solution would be to investigate a conventional system with reduced synchronous compensator rating.</p><p>The study starts with a summary of the state of power supply to offshore installations today, and a short review of classical HVDC transmission. It goes on to analyse how a passive network without sources influences the inverter. The transmission, with its current controlled rectifier and large inductance, is simulated as a current source. Under these circumstances the analysis shows that the network frequency has to adapt in order to keep the active and reactive power balance until the controllers are able to react. The concept of firing angle for a thyristor is limited in a system with variable frequency, the actual control parameter is the firing delay time.</p><p>Sensitivity analysis showed some astonishing consequences. The frequency rises both by an increase in the active and in the reactive load. The voltage falls by an increase in the active load, but rises by an increase in the inductive load.</p><p>Two different control principles for the system of inverter, synchronous compensator and load are defined. The first takes the reference for the firing delay time from the fundamental voltage at the point of common coupling. The second takes the reference for the firing delay time from the simulated EMF of the synchronous compensator. Of these, the second is the more stable and should be chosen as the basis for a possible control system.</p><p>Two simulation tools are applied. The first is a quasi-phasor model running on Matlab with Simulink. The other is a time domain model in KREAN. The time domain model is primarily used for the verification of the quasi-phasor model, and shows that quasi-phasors is still a valuable tool for making a quick analysis of the main features when the details of the transients are of less importance.</p><p>The study indicates that power supply by HVDC transmission from land to offshore oil installations could be technically feasible, even without the large synchronous compensators normally required. It has been shown that in a network only supplied by an inverter, variations of active and reactive loads have significant influence on both voltage and frequency. Particularly it should be noted that the frequency shows a positive sensitivity to increases in load. This could make the system intrinsically unstable in the case of a frequency dependent load such as motors.</p><p>It was not a part of the study to optimize controllers, but even with simple controllers it was possible to keep the frequency within limits given by norms and regulations, but the voltages were dynamically outside the limits, though not very far. These voltage overswings take place in the first few instances after a disturbance, so it takes unrealistically fast controllers to handle them. They are partly due to the model, where the land based rectifier and the DC reactors are simulated by a constant current source, but partly they have to be handled by overdimensioning of the system.</p><p>The simulations indicate that it should be technically possible to supply an oil platform with electrical power from land by means of HVDC transmission with small synchronous compensators. Whether this is financially feasible has not been investigated. Neither has it been considered whether the necessary equipment can actually be installed on an oil platform.</p><p>Recently both ABB and Siemens have presented solutions for HVDC transmission in the lower and medium power range based on voltage source converters based on IGBTs. Fully controllable voltage source HVDC converters have properties that may be better suited than conventional line commutated current source thyristor inverters, to supply weak or passive networks, such as offshore oil installations, with electrical power. But they also have some disadvantages, and a complete technical and financial comparison must be performed in order to decide about any potential project.</p>

This study was initiated to investigate if it could be feasible to supply offshore oil installations in the North Sea with electrical power from land. A prestudy of alternative converter topologies indicated that the most promising solution would be to investigate a conventional system with reduced synchronous compensator rating. The study starts with a summary of the state of power supply to offshore installations today, and a short review of classical HVDC transmission. It goes on to analyse how a passive network without sources influences the inverter. The transmission, with its current controlled rectifier and large inductance, is simulated as a current source. Under these circumstances the analysis shows that the network frequency has to adapt in order to keep the active and reactive power balance until the controllers are able to react. The concept of firing angle for a thyristor is limited in a system with variable frequency, the actual control parameter is the firing delay time. Sensitivity analysis showed some astonishing consequences. The frequency rises both by an increase in the active and in the reactive load. The voltage falls by an increase in the active load, but rises by an increase in the inductive load. Two different control principles for the system of inverter, synchronous compensator and load are defined. The first takes the reference for the firing delay time from the fundamental voltage at the point of common coupling. The second takes the reference for the firing delay time from the simulated EMF of the synchronous compensator. Of these, the second is the more stable and should be chosen as the basis for a possible control system. Two simulation tools are applied. The first is a quasi-phasor model running on Matlab with Simulink. The other is a time domain model in KREAN. The time domain model is primarily used for the verification of the quasi-phasor model, and shows that quasi-phasors is still a valuable tool for making a quick analysis of the main features when the details of the transients are of less importance. The study indicates that power supply by HVDC transmission from land to offshore oil installations could be technically feasible, even without the large synchronous compensators normally required. It has been shown that in a network only supplied by an inverter, variations of active and reactive loads have significant influence on both voltage and frequency. Particularly it should be noted that the frequency shows a positive sensitivity to increases in load. This could make the system intrinsically unstable in the case of a frequency dependent load such as motors. It was not a part of the study to optimize controllers, but even with simple controllers it was possible to keep the frequency within limits given by norms and regulations, but the voltages were dynamically outside the limits, though not very far. These voltage overswings take place in the first few instances after a disturbance, so it takes unrealistically fast controllers to handle them. They are partly due to the model, where the land based rectifier and the DC reactors are simulated by a constant current source, but partly they have to be handled by overdimensioning of the system. The simulations indicate that it should be technically possible to supply an oil platform with electrical power from land by means of HVDC transmission with small synchronous compensators. Whether this is financially feasible has not been investigated. Neither has it been considered whether the necessary equipment can actually be installed on an oil platform. Recently both ABB and Siemens have presented solutions for HVDC transmission in the lower and medium power range based on voltage source converters based on IGBTs. Fully controllable voltage source HVDC converters have properties that may be better suited than conventional line commutated current source thyristor inverters, to supply weak or passive networks, such as offshore oil installations, with electrical power. But they also have some disadvantages, and a complete technical and financial comparison must be performed in order to decide about any potential project.

<p> </p><p>Infrared (IR) imaging devices based on energy detection has shown a dramatic development in technology along with an impressive price reduction in recent years. However, for a low-end market as in automotive applications, the present cost of IR cameras is still the main obstacle to broadening their usage. Ongoing research has continuously reduced the system cost. Apart from decreasing the cost of infrared optics, there are other key issues to achieve acceptable system costs, including wafer-level vacuum packaging of the detectors, low vacuum level operation, and the use of standard materials in the detector fabrication. This thesis presents concepts for cost reduction of low-end IR cameras.</p><p>     The thesis presents a study of detector performance based on the thermal conductance design of the pixel. A circuit analog is introduced to analyze the basic thermal network effect from the surrounding environment on the conductance from the pixel to the environment. A 3D simulation model of the detector array conductance has been created in order to optimize the performance of the arrays while operated in low vacuum. In the model, Fourier's law of heat transfer is applied to determine the thermal conductance of a composite material pixel. The resulting thermal conductance is then used to predict the performance of the detector array in low vacuum.</p><p>     The investigations of resist as the intermediate bonding material for 3D array integration are also reported in the thesis. A study has been made of the nano-imprint resists series mr-I 9000 using a standard adhesive wafer bonding scheme for thermosetting adhesives. Experiments have been performed to optimize the thickness control and uniformity of the nano-imprint resist layer. The evaluation, including assessment of the bonding surface uniformity and planarizing ability of topographical surfaces, is used to demonstrate the suitability of this resist as sacrificial material for heterogeneous detector array integration<em>. </em><em></em></p><p>     Moreover, the thesis presents research in wafer-level packaging performed by room temperature bonding. Sealing rings, used to create a cavity, are manufactured by electroplating. The cavity sealing is tested by liquid injection and by monitoring the deflection of the lid membrane of the cavities. A value for the membrane deflection is calculated to estimate the pressure inside the cavities.  </p>

<p>In this thesis a novel method for controlling a manipulator with arbitrary number of Degrees of freedom is proposed, the proposed method has the main advantages of two common controllers, the simplicity of PID controller and the robustness and accuracy of adaptive controller. The controller architecture is based on an Artificial Neural Network (ANN) and a PID controller.</p><p>The controller has the ability of solving inverse dynamics and inverse kinematics of robot with two separate Artificial Neural Networks. Since the ANN is learning the system parameters by itself the structure of controller can easily be changed to</p><p>improve the performance of robot.</p><p>The proposed controller can be implemented on a FPGA board to control the robot in real-time or the response of the ANN can be calculated offline and be reconstructed by controller using a lookup table. Error between the desired trajectory path and the path of the robot converges to zero rapidly and as the robot performs its tasks the controller learns the robot parameters and generates better control signal. The performance of controller is tested in simulation and on a real manipulator with satisfactory results.</p>

<p>Current printable memory technology are not suited for mass produc‐tion. With new inexpensive printed memory, it will be possible to manufacture cheap surveillance tags that are capable to tell the user if something has happened within a timeline. This project is within the ITC FrameProgram 7 founded project PriMeBits. The goal is to imple‐ment a write once read many memory (WORM) onto an RF‐tag together with a sensor that can sense wetness, which can be detected by EAS antitheft systems. Pre researches have been done in the fields printed capacitance, coils and WORMs, all printed with silver ink. Before implementation of a WORM onto a tag simulations and laboratory tests with adjustable resistances were made. Two different circuit models are simulated and tested. When connected to a tag and the WORM is un‐programmed, the EAS system should not trigger an alarm. But if the WORM is programmed by the sensor, the alarm should trigger. Results show that capacitances and WORMs are printable with this technique but coils are not due to high inner resistance. The simulations show that a tag built as an LCCR‐circuit is the best choice. This is also confirmed with tests done with real resistors. With WORMs connected to a tag the results show that approximately 70% of them work as intended, this is because the WORMs as of now are not completely developed. The conclusion of this project is that it is possible to implement a WORM onto a tag with further research, to make an inexpensive surveillance tag.</p> / PriMeBits

<p>Optical fibre sensors can be used to measure a wide variety of properties. In some cases they have replaced conventional electronic sensors due to their possibility of performing measurements in environments suffering from electromagnetic disturbance, or in harsh environments where electronics cannot survive. In other cases they have had less success mainly due to the higher cost involved in fibre-optic sensor systems. Intensity modulated fibre-optic sensors normally require only low-cost monitoring systems principally based on light emitting diodes and photo diodes. The sensor principle itself is very simple when based on coupling between fibres, and coupling based intensity modulated sensors have found applications over a long time, mainly within position and vibration sensing. In this thesis new concepts and applications for intensity modulated fibre-optic sensors based on coupling between fibres are presented. From a low-cost and standard component perspective alternative designs are proposed and analyzed in order to find improved performance. The development of a sensor for an industrial temperature sensing application, involving aspects on multiplexing and fibre network installation, is presented. Optical time domain reflectometry (OTDR) is suggested as an efficient technique for multiplexing several coupling based sensors, and sensor network installation with blown fibre in micro ducts is proposed as a flexible and cost-efficient alternative to traditional cabling. A new sensor configuration using a fibre to a multicore fibre coupling and an image sensor readout system is proposed. With this system a high-performance sensor setup with a large measurement range can be realised without the need for precise fibre alignment often needed in coupling based sensors involving fibres with small cores. The system performance is analyzed theoretically with complete system simulations on different setups. An experimental setup is made based on standard fibre and image acquisition components, and differences from the theoretical performance are analyzed. It is shown that sub-µm accuracy should be possible to obtain, being the theoretical limit, and it is further suggested that the experimental performance is mainly related to two error sources: core position instability and differences between the real and the expected optical power distribution. Methods to minimize the experimental error are proposed and evaluated.</p>

<p>Electrochemical Transistor(ECT) was reported by David Nilsson in 2002. Later,its dimensios were specified and a SPICE model was developed.</p><p>The main purpose of this diploma work is to check the performance of electrochemical transistors in amplifier circuits. Simple amplifier circuits were simulated using SPICE model of ECT. Lateral and Vertical structures of electrochemical transistors were patterned on orgacon sheet(provided by AGFA),with various electrolytes(EG010,MS-HEC & MS-L). Characteric curves and time responses of these transistors were studied and then were then used as an active component in single amplifier circuits. Screen printed ECT's were also checked with the best available electrolyte. Behaviour of self made and screen printed ECT's were compared on the basis of on-off ratio,slew rate,frequency response and gain. Screen printed transistors showed promising results having less deterioration with time  but  till  an  an  input  signal  frequency  of  2Hz  only. Mismatch with simulation results and Shockley's equation were other findings after data analysis.</p><p><img src="file:///C:/DOCUME%7E1/zia/LOCALS%7E1/Temp/moz-screenshot.jpg" /><img src="file:///C:/DOCUME%7E1/zia/LOCALS%7E1/Temp/moz-screenshot-1.jpg" /></p>

<p>FIR (Finite-length Impulse Response) filters are the corner stone of many signalprocessing devices. A lot of research has gone into their development as wellas their effective implementation. With recent research focusing a lot on powerconsumption reduction specially with regards to FPGAs, it was found necessaryto explore FIR filters mapping on FPGAs.</p><p>Time multiplexed FIR filters are also a good candidate for examination withrespect to power consumption and resource utilization, for example when implementedin Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs). This is motivated by thefact that the usable clock frequency often is higher compared to the required datarate. Current implementations by, e.g., Xilinx FIR Compiler suffer from highpower consumption when the time multiplexing factor is low. Further, it needs tobe investigated how exploiting coefficient symmetry, scaling the coefficients andincreasing the time-multiplexing factor influences the performance.</p>