Le contrôle non destructif (CND) a pour but de détecter et de caractériser d’éventuels défauts présents dans des pièces mécaniques. Les techniques ultrasonores actuelles utilisent des capteurs multiéléments associés à des chaînes d’instrumentations et d’acquisitions de données multi capteurs en parallèles. Compte tenu de la masse de données à traiter, l’analyse de ces dernières est généralement effectuée hors ligne. Des travaux en cours, au Commissariat à l’Energie Atomique (CEA), consistent à développer et évaluer différentes méthodes d’imageries avancées, basées sur la focalisation synthétique. Les algorithmes de calculs induits nécessitent d’importantes opérations itératives sur un grand volume de données, issues d’acquisition multiéléments. Ceci implique des temps de calculs important, imposant un traitement en différé. Les contraintes industrielles de caractérisation de pièces mécaniques in situ imposent de réaliser la reconstruction d’images lors de la mesure et en temps réel. Ceci implique d’embarquer dans l’appareil de mesure, toute l’architecture de calcul sur les données acquises des capteurs. Le travail de thèse a donc consisté à étudier une famille d’algorithmes de focalisation synthétique pour une implantation temps réel sur un instrument de mesure permettant de réaliser l’acquisition de données. Nous avons également étudié une architecture dédiée à la reconstruction d’images par la méthode de Focalisation en Tout Point (FTP). Ce travail a été réalisé dans le cadre d’une collaboration avec l’équipe ACCIS de l’institut d’Electronique Fondamentale, Université de Paris Sud. Pour ce faire, notre démarche s’est inspirée de la thématique de recherche d’Adéquation Algorithme Architecture (A3). Notre méthodologie, est basée sur une approche expérimentale consistant dans un premier temps en une décomposition de l’algorithme étudié en un ensemble de blocs fonctionnels (calculs/transferts). Cela nous a permis de réaliser l’extraction des blocs pertinents de calculs à paralléliser et qui ont une incidence majeure sur les temps de traitement. Nous avons orienté notre stratégie de développement vers une conception flot de donnée. Ce type de modélisation permet de favoriser les flux de données et de réduire les flux de contrôles au sein de l’architecture matérielle. Cette dernière repose sur une plateforme multi-FPGA. La conception et l’évaluation de telles architectures ne peuvent se faire sans la mise en place d’outils logiciels d’aide à la validation tout au long du processus de la conception à l’implantation. Ces outils faisant partie intégrante de notre méthodologie. Les modèles architecturaux des briques de calculs ont été validés au niveau fonctionnel puis expérimental, grâce à la chaîne d’outils développée. Cela inclus un environnement de simulation nous permettant de valider sur tables les briques partielles de calculs ainsi que le contrôle associé. Enfin, cela a nécessité la conception d’outils de génération automatique de vecteurs de tests, à partir de données de synthèses (issues de l’outil simulation CIVA développé par le CEA) et de données expérimentales (à partir de l’appareil d’acquisition de la société M2M-NDT). Enfin, l’architecture développée au cours de ce travail de thèse permet la reconstruction d’images d’une résolution de 128x128 pixels, à plus de 10 images/sec. Ceci est suffisant pour le diagnostic de pièces mécaniques en temps réel. L’augmentation du nombre d’éléments capteurs ultrasonores (128 éléments) permet des configurations topologiques plus évoluées (sous forme d’une matrice 2D), ouvrant ainsi des perspectives vers la reconstruction 3D (d’un volume d’une pièce). Ce travail s’est soldé par une mise en œuvre validée sur l’instrument de mesure développé par la société M2M-NDT. / Non-destructive Evaluation (NDE) regroups a set of methods used to detect and characterize potential defects in mechanical parts. Current techniques uses ultrasonic phased array sensors associated with instrumentation channels and multi-sensor data acquisition in parallel. Given the amount of data to be processed, the analysis of the latter is usually done offline. Ongoing work at the French “Commissariat à l’Energie Atomique” (CEA), consist to develop and evaluate different methods of advanced imaging based on synthetic focusing. The Algorithms induced require extensive iterative operations on a large volume of data from phased array acquisition. This involves important time for calculations and implies offline processing. However, the industrial constraint requires performing image reconstruction in real time. This involves the implementation in the measuring device, the entire computing architecture on acquired sensor data. The thesis has been to study a synthetic focusing algorithm for a real-time implementation in a measuring instrument used to perform ultrasonic data acquisition. We especially studied an image reconstruction algorithm called Total Focusing Method (TFM). This work was conducted as part of collaboration with the French Institute of Fundamental Electronics Institute team of the University of Paris Sud. To do this, our approach is inspired by research theme called Algorithm Architecture Adequation (A3). Our methodology is based on an experimental approach in the first instance by a decomposition of the studied algorithm as a set of functional blocks. This allowed us to perform the extraction of the relevant blocks to parallelize computations that have a major impact on the processing time. We focused our development strategy to design a stream of data. This type of modeling can facilitate the flow of data and reduce the flow of control within the hardware architecture. This is based on a multi- FPGA platform. The design and evaluation of such architectures cannot be done without the introduction of software tools to aid in the validation throughout the process from design to implementation. These tools are an integral part of our methodology. Architectural models bricks calculations were validated functional and experimental level, thanks to the tool chain developed. This includes a simulation environment allows us to validate partial calculation blocks and the control associated. Finally, it required the design of tools for automatic generation of test vectors, from data summaries (from CIVA simulation tool developed by CEA) and experimental data (from the device to acquisition of M2M –NDT society). Finally, the architecture developed in this work allows the reconstruction of images with a resolution of 128x128 pixels at more than 10 frames / sec. This is sufficient for the diagnosis of mechanical parts in real time. The increase of ultrasonic sensor elements (128 elements) allows more advanced topological configurations (as a 2D matrix) and providing opportunities to 3D reconstruction (volume of a room). This work has resulted in implementation of validated measurement instrument developed by M2M -NDT.

Radio astronomy is used to study stars, galaxies, black holes and gas clouds radiation at radio frequencies. Detecting extremely weak signals from deep space radio sources requires high sensitive feed system associated with large dish antennas. The key figure of merit is survey speed, or the time required to map a region of the sky to a given source flux density. Survey speed is proportional to the frequency bandwidth, the field of view or observable region of the sky, and the squared sensitivity, where sensitivity is related to reflector aperture efficiency and system noise temperature. Compared to the traditional single feed, phased array feeds with significantly expanded field of view are considered as the next generation feed for radio telescope. This dissertation outlines the design, analysis and measurement of high sensitivity L-band and mm-wave phased array feeds for the 100-meter Green Bank Telescope. Theoretical works for radio astronomy includes design guideline for high sensitivity phased array feed, fundamental frequency bandwidth limit, array antenna loss influenced by mutual coupling and beamformer coefficients and possibility of superdirectivity for radio telescopes and other antennas. These study are helpful to understand and guide the design of a phased array feed system. In the absence of dish antennas, sparse phased arrays with aperiodic structure have been developed for satellite communications. A compromise between the peak side lobe level, array element density, directivity and design complexity is studied. We have found that the array peak side lobe level can be reduced by enhancing the array element direction at the main lobe direction, increasing the array element density and enlarging the array size. A Poynting streamline approach develops to understand the properties of a receiving antenna and the mutual coupling effects between array elements. This method has been successfully used to generate effective area shape for many types of antennas and guide the design of a superdirective antenna. Motivated by this method, a superdirective antenna is experimental demonstrated.

Mobile communication has become an essential part of our daily life. We love the flexibility of wireless cell phones and even accept their lower quality of service when compared to wired links. Similarly, we are looking forward to the day that we can continue watching our favorite TV programs while travelling anywhere and everywhere. Mobility, flexibility, and portability are the themes of the next generation communication. Motivated and fascinated by such technology breakthroughs, this effort is geared towards enhancing the quality of wireless services and bringing mobile satellite reception one step closer to the market. Meanwhile, phased array antennas are vital components for RADAR applications where the antenna is required to have certain scan capabilities. One of the main concerns in that perspective is how to avoid the potential of scan blindness in the required scan range. Targeting to achieve wide-band wide-scan angle phased arrays free from any scan blindness our efforts is also geared. Conventionally, the key to lower the profile of the antenna is to use planar structures. In that perspective microstrip patch antennas have drawn the attention of antenna engineers since the 1970s due to their attractive features of being low profile, compact size, light weight, and amenable to low-cost PCB fabrication processes. However, patch elements are basically resonating at a single frequency, typically have <2% bandwidth, which is a major deficit that impedes their usage in relatively wide-band applications. There are various approaches to enhance the patch antennas bandwidth including suspended substrates, multi-stack patches, and metalized cavities backing these patches. Metalized cavity-backed patch structures have been demonstrated to give the best performance, however, they are very expensive to manufacture. In this dissertation, we develop an alternative low-cost bandwidth enhancement topology. The proposed topology is based on substrate-integrated waveguides. The great potential of the proposed structure lies in being amenable to the conventional PCB fabrication. Moreover, substrate-integrated cavity-backed structures facilitate the design of sophisticated arrays that are very expensive to develop using the conventional metalized cavity-backed topology, which includes the common broadside arrays used in fixed-beam applications and the scanned phased arrays used in RADAR applications.

In this thesis, based on the indoor channel measurements and ray-tracing modeling for the indoor mm-wave wireless communications, the challenges of the design of the radio in this band is studied. Considering the recently developed standards such as IEEE 802.15.3c, ECMA and WiGig at 60 GHz, the link budget of the system design for different classes of operation is done and the requirement for the antenna and other RF sections are extracted. Based on radiation characteristics of mm-wave and the fundamental limits of low-cost Silicon technology, it is shown that phased-array is the ultimate solution for the radio and physical layer of the mobile millimeter wave multi-Gb/s wireless networks. Different phased-array configurations are studied and a low-cost single-receiver array architecture with RF phase-shifting is proposed. A systematic approach to the analysis of the overall noise-figure of the proposed architecture is presented and the component technical requirements are derived for the system level specifications. The proposed on-chip antennas and antenna-in-packages for various applications are designed and verified by the measurement results. The design of patch antennas on the low-cost RT/Duroid substrate and the slot antennas on the IPD technologies as well as the compact on-chip slot DRA antenna are explained in the antenna design section. The design of reflective-type phase shifters in CMOS and MEMS technologies is explained. Finally, the design details of two developed 60 GHz integrated phased-arrays in CMOS technology are discussed. Front-end circuit blocks such as LNA, continuous passive reflective-type phase shifters, power combiner and variable gain amplifiers are investigated, designed and developed for a 60 GHz phased-array radio in CMOS technology. In the first design, the two-element CMOS phased-array front-ends based on passive phase shifting architecture is proposed and developed. In the second phased-array, the recently developed on-chip dielectric resonator antenna in our group in lower frequency is scaled and integrated with the front-end.

True time delay networks are one of the most critical structures of wideband phased-array antenna systems which are frequently used in self-protection and electronic warfare applications. In order to direct the main beam of a wideband phased-array antenna to the desired direction / phase values, which are linearly dependent to frequency, are essential. Due to the phase characteristics of the true-time delay networks, beam squint problems for broadband phased array systems are minimized. In this thesis, different types of true-time delay structures are investigated for wideband phased array applications and a tunable S-band true-time delay network having delay over 1ns with high resolution is developed, designed, fabricated and measured. Lower-cost, smaller occupied area, digital/analog control mechanism and ease of implementation are the other features of the developed network. High delay values with high resolutions for wideband operation are achieved through the combination of several techniques / therefore the desired S-band TTD network is constructed with the synthesis of switched-transmission lines, constant-R networks and periodically-loaded transmission lines. Higher delay states are realized by the switched-transmission lines technique, while the method of constant R-network is used for the intermediate delay states. To increase the tuning flexibility, smaller delay states are accomplished by analog-voltage controlled periodically loaded transmission lines. A step-by-step procedure is followed during the design process of the S-band true time delay network. Firstly, each method used in the TTD network is analyzed in detail and developed for PCB implementation and the use of COTS components. Then, the designed structures are verified via linear and EM simulations performed by ADS2011&reg / . After that, the effects of production tolerances are examined to optimize each design for S-band operations. Moreover, the designed structures are fabricated by using PCB technology and measured. Finally, a software code is developed in MATLAB to generate the overall cascaded network with the help of measured data.

The focus of this work involves optical and RF (radio frequency) applications of novel microactuation and self-assembly techniques in MEMS (Microelectromechanical systems). The scaling of physical forces into the micro domain is favorably used to design several types of actuators that can provide large forces and large static displacements at low operation voltages. A self-assembly method based on thermally induced localized plastic deformation of microstructures has been developed to obtain truly three-dimensional structures from a planar fabrication process. RF applications include variable discrete components such as capacitors and inductors as well as tunable coupling circuits. Optical applications include scanning micromirrors with large scan angles (>90 degrees), low operation voltages (<10 Volts), and multiple degrees of freedom. One and two-dimensional periodic structures with variable periods and orientations (with respect to an incident wave) are investigated as well, and analyzed using optical phased array concepts. Throughout the research, permanent tuning via plastic deformation and power-off latching techniques are used in order to demonstrate that the optical and RF devices can exhibit zero quiescent power consumption once their geometry is set.

The focus of this work involves optical and RF (radio frequency) applications of novel microactuation and self-assembly techniques in MEMS (Microelectromechanical systems). The scaling of physical forces into the micro domain is favorably used to design several types of actuators that can provide large forces and large static displacements at low operation voltages. A self-assembly method based on thermally induced localized plastic deformation of microstructures has been developed to obtain truly three-dimensional structures from a planar fabrication process. RF applications include variable discrete components such as capacitors and inductors as well as tunable coupling circuits. Optical applications include scanning micromirrors with large scan angles (>90 degrees), low operation voltages (<10 Volts), and multiple degrees of freedom. One and two-dimensional periodic structures with variable periods and orientations (with respect to an incident wave) are investigated as well, and analyzed using optical phased array concepts. Throughout the research, permanent tuning via plastic deformation and power-off latching techniques are used in order to demonstrate that the optical and RF devices can exhibit zero quiescent power consumption once their geometry is set.

The overall purpose of this research is to develop a real-time ultrasound based system for controlling robotic weld quality by monitoring the weld pool. The concept of real-time weld quality control is quite broad, and this work focuses on weld penetration depth monitoring and control with laser ultrasonics. The weld penetration depth is one of the most important geometric parameters that define the weld quality, hence remains a key control quantity. This research focuses on the implementation and optimization of the laser phased array generation unit and the development of signal analysis algorithms to extract the weld penetration depth information from the received ultrasonic signals. The system developed is based on using the phased array technique to generate ultrasound, and an Electro-Magnetic Acoustic Transducer (EMAT) as a receiver. The generated ultrasound propagates through the weld pool and is picked up by the EMAT. A transient FE model is built to predict the temperature distribution during welding. An analytical model is developed to understand the propagation of ultrasound during real-time welding and the curved rays are numerically traced. The cross-correlation technique has been applied to estimate the Time-of-Flight (ToF) of the ultrasound. The ToF is then correlated to the measured weld penetration depth. The analytical relationship between the ToF and penetration depth, obtained by a ray-tracing algorithm and geometric analysis, matches the experimental results. The real-time weld sensing technique developed is efficient and can readily be deployed for commercial applications. The successful completion of this research will remove the major obstacle to a fully automated robotic welding process. An on-line welding monitoring and control system will facilitate mass production characterized by consistency, high quality, and low costs. Such a system will increase the precision of the welding process, resulting in quality control of the weld beads. Moreover, in-process control will relieve human operators of tedious, repetitive, and hazardous welding tasks, thus reducing welding-related injures.

The high amount of scientific and communications data produced by low earth orbiting satellites necessitates economical methods of communication with these satellites. A volumetric phased array for demonstrating horizon-to-horizon electronic tracking of the NASA satellite EO-1 was developed and demonstrated. As a part of this research, methods of optimizing the elemental antenna as well as the antenna on-board the satellite were investigated. Using these optimized antennas removes the variations in received signal strength that are due to the angularly dependent propagation loss exhibited by the communications link. An exhaustive study using genetic algorithms characterized two antenna architectures, and included optimizations for radiation pattern, bandwidth, impedance, and polarization. Eleven antennas were constructed and their measured characteristics were compared to those of the simulated antennas. Additional studies were conducted regarding the optimization of aperiodic arrays. A pattern-space representation of volumetric arrays was developed and used with a novel tracking algorithm for these arrays. This algorithm allows high-resolution direction finding using a small number of antennas while mitigating aliasing ambiguities. Finally, a method of efficiently applying multiple beam synthesis using the Fast Fourier Transform to aperiodic arrays was developed. This algorithm enables the operation of phased arrays combining the benefits of aperiodic element position with the efficiency of FFT multiple beam synthesis. Results of this research are presented along with the characteristics of the volumetric array used to track EO-1. Experimental data and the interpretations of that data are presented, and possible areas of future research are discussed.

In this thesis, the problem of optimal resource allocation in real-time systems is studied. A recently proposed resource allocation approach called Q-RAM (Quality of Service based Resource Allocation Model) is investigated in detail. The goal of the Q-RAM based approaches is to minimize the execution speed in real-time systems while meeting resource constraints and maximizing total utility. Phased array radar system is an example of a system in which multiple tasks contend for multiple resources in order to satisfy their requirements. In this system, multiple targets are tracked (each a separate task) by the radar system simultaneously requiring processor and energy resources of the radar system. Phased array radar system is considered as an illustrative application area in order to comparatively evaluate the resource allocation approaches. For the problem of optimal resource allocation with single resource type, the Q-RAM algorithm appears incompletely specified, namely it does not have a termination criteria set that can terminate the algorithm in all possible cases. In the present study, first, the Q-RAM solution approach to the radar resource allocation problem with single resource type is extended to give a global optimal solution in all possible termination cases. For the case of multiple resource types, the Q-RAM approach can only generate near-optimal results. In this thesis, for the formulated radar resource allocation problem with multiple resource types, the Methods of Feasible Directions are considered as an alternative solution approach. For the multiple resource type case, the performances of both the Q-RAM approach and the Methods of Feasible Directions are investigated in terms of optimality and convergence speed with the help of Monte-Carlo simulations. It is observed from the results of the simulation experiments that the Gradient Projection Method produce results outperforming the Q-RAM approach in closeness to optimality with comparable execution times.