Multi-level switching power converters including bypass transistors and associated methods
Granted: August 10, 2021
Patent Number:
11088620
A multi-level switching power converter includes a string of N upper transistors and a string of N lower transistors, where N is an integer greater than one. The N upper transistors are electrically coupled in series between a first power node and a switching node, and the N lower transistors are electrically coupled in series between the switching node and a reference node. The multi-level switching power converter further includes N?1 flying capacitors, an inductor, a bypass…
Ultrasound sub-array receiver beamformer
Granted: August 10, 2021
Patent Number:
11086002
An ultrasound method and apparatus can include: transducer elements arranged in a sub-array for generating analog signals based on a return signal detected by the transducer elements during a receive interval; analog delay lines including individual delays unique to each of the transducer elements and calculated based on a linear delay slope for delaying the analog signals; an analog to digital converter for converting the analog signals to a digital signal; a digital beamformer with a…
Method and apparatus for driving a piezoelectric transducer with stored charge recovery
Granted: August 3, 2021
Patent Number:
11081635
A piezo driver system including a driver including a switching amplifier coupling a power port to a driver port, a battery coupled to the power port, a piezo device coupled to the driver port, where the switching amplifier provides a filtered driver signal to the driver port and returns stored charge from the piezo device to the battery. A method for driving a piezo device includes multiplying an input signal by an oscillator signal to provide a control signal, controlling a switching…
Device and method for temperature correction using a proximity sensor in a non-contact thermopile thermometer
Granted: July 20, 2021
Patent Number:
11067452
A temperature measurement device having a thermopile temperature sensor and a proximity sensor, a mobile temperature measurement device, and a method for determining a corrected temperature with a temperature measurement device are described. In an implementation, a temperature measurement device includes a semiconductor device; a thermopile temperature sensor disposed on the semiconductor device, where the thermopile temperature sensor is configured to receive radiation from an object;…
Battery cell analyzer
Granted: July 13, 2021
Patent Number:
11061076
An integrated circuit device includes a controller, a voltage source coupled to the controller, a voltage sampler coupled to the controller, a low current detector coupled to the controller; and memory coupled to the controller, where memory includes code segments executable by the controller for: (a) measuring a cell voltage to determine an initial voltage; (b) holding the cell voltage at the initial voltage using a power source; and (c) determining the leakage current of the cell by…
Systems and methods for gate driver with field-adjustable UVLO
Granted: July 6, 2021
Patent Number:
11056875
Systems and methods for gate driver with field-adjustable undervoltage lockout (UVLO) are disclosed. A gate driver system comprises a control circuit and a driver circuit. The driver circuit incorporates a field-adjustable UVLO, a control logic, and an inverter. The level of the field-adjustable UVLO is adjustable by an external circuit, which can be a resistor based voltage divider. By setting the UVLO level externally adjustable and by moving a reference ground to the external voltage…
Method and apparatus for controlling a multichannel TDM device
Granted: June 15, 2021
Patent Number:
11038611
A method for developing TDM data with embedded control data includes obtaining signal data and control data, formatting the signal data and the control data into a plurality of channels of a DIN signal, and transmitting the DIN signal on one line of a 3-bit TDM bus. A multichannel input device includes a control extractor receptive to the three-bit TDM bus and operative to extract CNTL data from the DIN data, a DAI receptive to the 3-bit TDM bus and the channel select input and operative…
System and method for reducing power consumption in an audio system by disabling filter elements based on signal level
Granted: June 15, 2021
Patent Number:
11036462
An audio system includes a digital audio interface, a first filter stage, a second filter stage, a controller, and a first path selector. The controller is communicatively coupled to the digital audio interface and configured to determine whether an audio signal received at the digital audio interface is below a first signal threshold. The controller selects one of a first signal path that passes through the first and second filter stages and a second signal path that bypasses the first…
Software intellectual property protection systems and methods for embedded platforms
Granted: June 1, 2021
Patent Number:
11023567
Presented are software intellectual property (IP) protection systems and methods that prevent potential attackers as well as customers from having access to plain text versions of both library source code and binary code. Potential attackers are prevented from reusing the software on other platforms. The protection mechanism does not impact the functionality or the performance of the library itself and does not interfere with existing software update mechanisms or application developer…
System and method for continuously verifying device state integrity
Granted: May 25, 2021
Patent Number:
11018693
Various embodiments of the invention relate to continuously verifying semiconductor device state integrity. A counter is combined to form part of the Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC) calculation for control register within the semiconductor device. The counter is initialized to zero and resets after a predetermined number of cycles. The counter value is added to the currently calculated CRC value to get a combined CRC value. Every time a CRC value is calculated for the register bank, the…
Indicator of sterilization efficacy using a data logger with cloud/software application
Granted: May 25, 2021
Patent Number:
11015983
The invention relates to a device (6) for communicating data with a data logger (28) that measures the temperature of ambient gas and logs the temperature data into a memory (55). The device (6) includes a body (73) for mounting a data logger (28) thereon, wherein the data logger (28) is disposed inside a capsule (12, 40). The data logger (28) includes: top and bottom covers (50, 51) that define an enclosed space and includes an electrical circuit (52) disposed in the enclosed space and…
System and method for performing an assay with sub-pixel sized beads
Granted: May 18, 2021
Patent Number:
11009504
A sensor system that employs sub-pixel sized beads for assays is disclosed. The sensor system includes a first plurality of sensor pixels that define a first active sensor area. The first active sensor area is configured to receive a first portion of a fluid sample. The first portion is mixed with a plurality of first functionalized beads for performing a first assay. The sensor system also includes at least a second plurality of sensor pixels that define a second active sensor area. The…
Led driver with ability to operate at arbitrarily low input voltages
Granted: May 4, 2021
Patent Number:
10999911
An LED driver with ability to operate at low input voltages is disclosed. The LED driver comprises a boost converter to boost an input voltage to a desired output voltage to power one or more LED strings. The boost converter incorporates a first controllable switch, such as a metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistor (MOSFET), IGBT, etc., for output voltage control. The boost converter receives input from an external source, such as a battery voltage, as power source for voltage…
Systems and methods for correcting lag between sensor temperature and ambient gas temperature
Granted: May 4, 2021
Patent Number:
10996112
Various embodiments of the invention provide systems and methods for accurately determining temperatures in harsh environments such as, for example, in a steam autoclave chamber during a sterilization cycle. In certain embodiments, temperature data accuracy is increased by utilizing an IC-based temperature logging device that monitors and compensates for inherent thermal delays that would otherwise cause a discrepancy between temperature as measured by a temperature sensor and the actual…
Systems and methods for polarization control using blind source separation
Granted: April 20, 2021
Patent Number:
10985843
Analog signal processing systems and methods manage polarization in coherent optical receivers to eliminate the need for ultra-fast, power-hungry ADCs and DSPs and that require digitization of the full-bandwidth signal path and result in bulky and expensive circuit designs. Various embodiments an analog polarization correction circuit that implements the equivalent of two matrix operations by combining variable and unity gain amplifiers to align polarizations of input signals to generate…
Systems and methods for software-configurable battery monitoring system
Granted: April 20, 2021
Patent Number:
10983172
Described herein are systems and methods that allow for automatic detection of the highest available cell voltage and/or location of the top voltage in a battery stack, in real-time, without having to use separate, dedicated PCBs for different battery stack configurations, and without having to manually configure PCBs based on the number of cells each battery stack has. In certain embodiments, automatic detection is accomplished by a software-configurable battery management circuit that…
Driver for high speed laser diode
Granted: April 6, 2021
Patent Number:
10971894
Various embodiments of a laser driver are described herein. In an embodiment, a laser driver system includes: an external set of inductors including a first external inductor and a second external inductor; an internal set of inductors including a first internal inductor and a second internal inductor; and a DC-to-DC convertor configured to bias a first output path defined by the first external inductor and the first internal inductor and a second output path defined by the second…
Multi-transistor device including first and second LDMOS transistors having respective drift regions separated in a thickness direction by a shared RESURF layer
Granted: March 30, 2021
Patent Number:
10964694
A multi-transistor device includes first and second lateral double-diffused metal-oxide-semiconductor field effect (LDMOS) transistors sharing a first p-type reduced surface field (RESURF) layer and a first drain n+ region. In certain embodiments, the first LDMOS transistor includes a first drift region, the second LDMOS transistor includes a second drift region, and the first and second drift regions are at least partially separated by the first p-type RESURF layer in a thickness…
Digital pulse width modulation driver system
Granted: March 16, 2021
Patent Number:
10951204
A digital pulse width modulation driver system and method can include: receiving input digital data with a digital signal processing chip on a device; converting the input digital data into pulse width modulated data; generating an amplitude signal with the digital signal processing chip; transmitting the amplitude signal and the pulse width modulated data from a transmit interface within the device to a receive interface within an analog driver chip; and amplifying the pulse width…
Method and apparatus for disabling high speed bus operation under high common mode voltage conditions
Granted: February 2, 2021
Patent Number:
10908671
An apparatus including a handshake window enabler having a pair of differential inputs and a window enablement output, a common mode detector coupled to a power input and a ground input and having a handshake inhibit output, and a handshake disabler coupled to the handshake window enabler, the common mode detector, and the pair of differential inputs. If a common mode voltage that out of range (“too high”) is detected, high speed handshake protocols are such that the bus operates a…
