Collaborative Proposal: RTD-based Relaxation Oscillators (RTD-RO) to Increase Output Power and Overcome DC Stability Issues

提出了一个为期3年的三所大学（俄亥俄州，赖特州和得克萨斯州）的项目，以推进一类新的高效和稳定的振荡器电路的基础上量子隧穿。它将探索一类基于隧道二极管的弛豫振荡器，并将其扩展到一种新型的多米诺效应脉冲放大器设计。过去基于隧道二极管的振荡器的稳定性问题通过振荡超过负差分电阻区域来解决。这种较大的电压摆幅也提供了明显较大的输出功率。将努力通过电磁建模模拟将其工作频率扩展到最先进的水平。它们的简单性和低功耗也使它们成为物联网对象的候选者。基于隧道二极管的电子器件为节能的“绿色”电路提供了一种途径，同时具有高输出功率和前所未有的稳定性。一个全日制研究生将直接支持在俄亥俄州和赖特州。每组的候选研究生都是在伯杰实验室开始研究生涯的女大学生。补充资金的要求将申请支持1-2个本科生额外，沿着科学访问，以延续这一遗产。本项目通过推进低成本、超低功耗的射频源和稳定的射频源，为紧凑型时钟信号产生的新进展提供巨大的社会和人类利益。本项目振荡器设计的一个关键目标，传输线建模和射频测量，以开发和成熟一种新型稳定的基于隧道二极管的振荡器，该振荡器通过以下方式解决隧道二极管稳定性问题：在负微分电阻区域之外振荡。这种较大的电压摆幅也提供了明显较大的输出功率。该团队的进展，利用他们的第一份关于量子阱寿命对大信号共振隧穿二极管开关时间影响的实验测定报告，该团队现在准备推进具有高转换效率的紧凑型振荡器电路，产生大而稳定的输出功率。基于隧道二极管的电路将提供（i）解决阻碍共振隧穿二极管采用的隧道二极管稳定性问题的弛张振荡器的显著进步，以及（ii）创建全新的“多米诺放大器”，其使用逐渐更大的隧道二极管尺寸以同时增加的输出功率将每个弛张振荡器级菊花链接到下一个。在没有由弛张振荡器设计提供的稳定性的情况下，基于大隧道二极管的振荡器将太不稳定，并且因此阻止这种新颖的方法。在过去已经研究了弛张振荡器，并且如预期的那样显示出产生超过1 mW的射频输出功率，但是它们的最大（重复）振荡频率仅为50 GHz，远低于预期。这将是所提议的研究的早期主题，其中将模拟全波电磁学和非线性器件/电路相互作用，特别是检查平面传输线色散和短路反射率的影响。这些知识将被用来展示一个全新的和潜在的革命性的隧道二极管开关元件-“多米诺”脉冲放大器。多米诺放大器能够利用固有的快速隧道二极管开关来创建单边大信号增益。所有的材料，为拟议的努力将磷化铟为基础。这些材料已经产生了一些迄今为止最好的共振隧穿二极管，如峰谷电流比，峰值电流密度，最大振荡频率和开关时间。共振隧穿二极管技术的系统探索和发展在三个垂直整合的研究方向：（i）先进的外延控制和量子为基础的设备物理设计使用非平衡绿色的功能，（ii）紧凑型高功率共振隧穿二极管为基础的弛豫振荡器，（iii）新型多米诺放大器，和（iv）非线性器件，集成电路相互作用和电磁学。

A 3-year tri-university (Ohio State, Wright State and Texas State) project is proposed to advance a new class of efficient and stable oscillator circuits based upon quantum tunneling. It will explore a class of tunnel diode based relaxation oscillators and extend this to a novel domino effect pulse amplifier design. Past stability issues of tunnel diode based oscillators are addressed by oscillating beyond the negative differential resistance region. This larger voltage swing also provides for significantly larger output powers. Effort will be made to extend their operational frequency beyond the state-of-the-art through electromagnetic modeling simulations. Their simplicity and low-power consumption could also make them a candidate for Internet-of-Things objects. Tunnel diode based electronics provides a pathway for energy thrifty "green" circuitry with concurrently high output power and with unprecedented stability. A full-time graduate student will be directly supported at both Ohio State and Wright State. The shortlist candidate graduate student for each group are both female undergraduates who began their research career as undergraduates in Berger's lab. Supplemental funding requests will be applied for to support 1-2 undergraduates additionally, along with scientific visitations, to perpetuate this legacy. This project provides tremendous benefits to society and humankind by advancing low-cost, ultra-low power consumption radio frequency sources, and stable radio frequency sources for new advances in compact clock signal generation.A key aim of this project oscillator design, transmission line modeling and radio frequency measurements to develop and mature a new type of stable tunnel diode based oscillator that addresses the tunnel diode stability issues by oscillating beyond the negative differential resistance region. This larger voltage swing also provides for significantly larger output powers. Advances by this team, leveraging their first report of the experimental determination of the quantum-well lifetime influence upon the large-signal resonant tunneling diode switching time, this team now is poised to advance compact oscillator circuits with high conversion efficiencies, generating large and stable output powers. The tunnel diode based circuitry will provide (i) for the significant advancement of relaxation oscillators that address the tunnel diode stability issues which thwarted resonant tunneling diode adoption, and (ii) creation of a wholly new "domino amplifier" that daisy chains each relaxation oscillator stage to the next using progressively larger tunnel diode sizes with concurrently increasing output powers. Without the stability afforded by the relaxation oscillator design, large tunnel diode based oscillators would be too unstable, and thus prevent this novel approach. The relaxation oscillators have been studied in the past and shown to produce radio frequency output power exceeding 1 mW, as expected, but their maximum (repetition) frequency of oscillation has only been 50 GHz], well below the expectation. This will be an early topic of the proposed study where full- wave electromagnetics and nonlinear-device/circuit interactions will be simulated, especially examining the effect of planar-transmission line dispersion and short-circuit reflectance. This knowledge will then be used to demonstrate a totally new and potentially revolutionary tunnel diode switching component - the "domino" pulse amplifier. The domino amplifier has the ability to utilize inherently fast tunnel diode switching to create unilateral, large-signal gain. All of the materials for the proposed effort will be InP based. These materials have produced some of the best resonant tunneling diodes to date as measured by peak-to-valley current ratio, peak current density, maximum frequency of oscillation, and switching time. A systematic exploration and development of resonant tunneling diode technology in three vertically integrated research thrusts: (i) advanced epitaxial control and quantum-based device physics design using non-equilibrium Green's function, (ii) compact high-power resonant tunneling diode based relaxation oscillators, (iii) novel domino amplifiers, and (iv) nonlinear-device, integrated-circuit interaction and electromagnetics.