Green solid polymer electrolytes have drawn attention as multifunctional electrolyte as compared to liquid electrolyte due to their flexibility membranes. In the present work, biodegradable iota-carrageenan polymer has been chosen as the host polymer with magnesium tri-fluromethanesulfonate (MgTf2) as the salt. The polymer film was incorporated with methyl-trioctylammonium bis(trifluoromethyl sulfonyl)imide (AmNTFSI) ionic liquid to amplify the ionic conductivity via adding mobile cations and tuning the crystallinity as well as the glass temperature of the polymer. Upon the incorporation of AmNTFSI, the ionic conductivity was remarkably augmented from (1.24 + 0.01) × 10−6 S cm−1 to the maximum value of (3.20 + 0.01) × 10−3 S cm−1 at room temperature. The thermal, structural, and temperature dependence conductivity measurements of polymer films (with and without AmNTFSI) have been analyzed, and the performance as the supercapacitor electrolytes has been evaluated.

For the first time, metal phosphate, particularly nickel phosphate, Ni3(PO4)2 nanoparticle has been incorporated into gel polymer electrolyte (GPE) for the application in dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs). Poly(vinyl alcohol-co-ethylene), PVA-co-PE copolymer and sodium iodide, NaI have been employed as the host polymer and dopant salt, respectively. X-ray diffraction (XRD) studies revealed that the degree of crystallinity of the overall GPE reaches the minimum at 4 wt.% of Ni3(PO4)2 nanoparticles. The amorphous domains have boosted the mobility of the charge carriers and successfully increased the ionic conductivity from 2.27 mS cm−1 to 3.75 mS cm−1. Temperature dependence studies affirmed that the GPEs obey Arrhenius behavior in which ion hopping mechanism is dominant. This explanation was further corroborated by the results obtained from electrical modulus studies. The addition of Ni3(PO4)2 also increases both the dielectric constant and dielectric loss dramatically. Fourier transform infrared studies proved the complexation of different components found in the polymer electrolyte. Besides, the Ni3(PO4)2 nanoparticles also smoothen the morphologies of the GPE which was originally porous and rough. The efficiency of the fabricated DSSCs also nearly doubled from 3.3% to 5.8% with the incorporation of Ni3(PO4)2 nanoparticles.

Due to liquid electrolyte limitation in dye sensitized solar cells (DSSCs), GPEs were prepared and optimized. Poly(vinyl butyral-co-vinyl alcohol-co-vinyl acetate), P(VB-co-VA-co-VAc) acted as host polymer and tetrapropylammonium iodide, TPAI as dopant salt. The prepared gel polymer electrolytes (GPEs) with different TPAI salt content were characterized using electrochemical impedance spectroscopy, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy and X ray diffractogram. An optimum ionic conductivity of 1.93 mS cm−1 was obtained with 40 wt% of TPAI salt added along with the lowest activation energy of 0.064 eV. Temperature dependence ionic conductivity behaviour of GPEs were studied and found that the systems obeyed the Arrhenius behaviour in the temperature range of 303–373 K. The dielectric results studies showed typical behaviour of both

The intermittent nature of renewable energy needs ideal storage device to balance the electricity demand and supply. Specific energy, specific power, and stability of electrode play a critical role to increase better performance of supercapattery. Here, we account a unique cobalt sulfide (CoS) binder-free electrode which was modified with different metals (i.e. manganese (Mn) and copper (Cu), fabricated by hydrothermal technique on the nickel foam (NF). The morphological features portray uniform distribution of flakes with different textures after the incorporation of Mn and Cu with the optimised cobalt sulfide system, respectively. Among all electrodes, Mn-CoS-3/NF exhibits a significant boost in the rate capability at 74% compared to CoS-3/NF (75%) and Cu-CoS-3/NF (59%) electrodes with maximum specific capacitance of 2379 F/g at 1 A/g. Mn-CoS-3/NF also shows capacitance retention about 65% after 5500 cycles compared to CoS-3/NF (48%) and Cu-CoS-3/NF (55%) when performed as three electrode system configurations. The outstanding performance of Mn-CoS-3/NF as compared to the other electrodes is contributed to its high surface area, flake-like nanostructure, valence state of metal, and low internal resistance. In order to evaluate the real time performance of Mn-CoS-3/NF, supercapattery device was fabricated in a configuration of Mn-CoS-3/NF//AC/NF. Mn-CoS-3/NF//AC/NF delivered a specific energy (17.94 Wh/kg at 806 W/kg) and specific power (6405 W/kg at 4.66 Wh/kg). The capacity decayed slowly to 92% after 9000 cycles together with a coulombic efficiency of 99%, indicating good stability of the device.

This paper is on an inductance fine tuning technique which benefits from the idea of varying the number of metal plates of an inductor’s pattern ground shield (PGS) shorted to ground to change its magnetic fields. This technique is unique because the geometry and physical shape of the inductor remains untouched from its form in the process design kit (PDK) while the inductance is being tuned. The number of metal shields shorted to ground was controlled by an electronic circuit which consists of analog-to-digital converters and active switches. Both Sonnet EM simulator and Cadence Virtuoso were used for the inductor and circuit simulations. From the simulation, it was found that the inductance increased while the Q-factor decreased as more metal shields were shorted to ground. For instance, at 1.6 GHz, the simulated inductance was 8.8 nH when all metals were floated and 9.4 nH when all metals were shorted to ground. On the other hand, the simulated Q-factor was 10.4 when all metals were floated and 9.8 when all metals were shorted to ground. From both simulation and measured results, both inductance and inductance tuning range increased with frequency. From the measured results too, the inductance observed was 9.4 nH at 1.6 GHz, 10.8 nH at 2 GHz, and 13.5 nH at 2.5 GHz when all the metal shields were shorted to ground. The inductance tuning range was 6.2% at 1.6 GHz, 12.5% at 2 GHz, and 20% at 2.5 GHz. The measured results showed good correlation with the simulated results trend, but with smaller value of inductance, inductance tuning range and Q-factor.

In this paper, a low power consumption linear power amplifier (PA) for Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) application is presented. An analogue pre-distorter (APD) is integrated to the PA. The APD consist of an active inductor, driver amplifier, and a RC phase linearizer. The PA delivers more than 12dB power gain from 2.4GHz to 2.5GHz. At the center frequency of 2.45GHz, the gain of the PA is 13dB with PAE of 26.7% and maximum output power of 14dBm. The corresponding OIP3 is 27.6dBm. The supply voltage headroom of this PA is 1.8V. The propose APD serves to be a solution to improve the linearity of the PA with minimum trade-off to the power consumption.

A broadband 180 nm CMOS power amplifier (PA) operating from a frequency bandwidth of 400 MHz to 2.8 GHz is presented in this paper. The PA is integrated with an inductor-less Broadband-Pre-Distorter (BPD) to enhance its linearity for wide bandwidth. The BPD consists only of MOS transistors, resistors, and capacitors which contribute to the wideband operation thus independent of the Q factor of passive inductors which contributes to the effectiveness of many other APDs available. The integrated BPD improves the Amplitude Modulation-to-Amplitude Modulation (AM-AM) and Amplitude Modulation-to-Phase Modulation (AM-PM) deviation of the PA across maximum linear output power of 21 dBm. Utilizing a silicon area of 1.69 mm2, mounted on Roger's RO4000/FR4 PCB, the BPD-PA produces a maximum output power of more than 22 dBm for 2.4 GHz bandwidth with a minimum power gain of 15 dB. The corresponding peak power added efficiency (PAE) of more than 35% is achieved across the operating bandwidth. The fabricated BPD-PA meets the Adjacent Channel Leakage Ratio (ACLR) specification of -30 dBc at a maximum linear output power of 21 dBm (3 dB back-off from maximum output power) when tested with 20 MHz LTE signal at 1.7 GHz.

The purpose of this paper is to implement a highly linear 180 nm complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) power amplifier (PA) to meet the stringent linearity requirement of an long term evolution (LTE) signal with minimum trade-off to power added efficiency (PAE).