A thyristor will stay conducting until the current through the device is zero (“current zero”) or perhaps slightly negative. LLNL’s approach is to use the opticondistor (“OTV”) to force this current zero in order to force the device into an “off” state. By combining a light-activated thyristor with an OTV, a noise-immune, high efficiency, high-power switching device can be constructed. The…
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The researchers’ approach leverages the concept that dopants have high diffusivities in Ga2O3; the key lies in the selection of the appropriate dopant. This LLNL invention describes two device types that employ this design:
This invention proposes to engineer the current density along the length of a laser diode to overcome the penalty associated with non-uniformity resulting from asymmetry in the gain, photon or carrier density despite having uniform contact. Optimizing the current density profile enables diode lasers to operate with greater power conversion efficiency or operate with equivalent power conversion…
This invention proposes to engineer the temperature dependence of the emission wavelength of LEDs and laser diodes. The approach is to use a strain-inducing coating to counteract the intrinsic temperature coefficient of the emission wavelength of the LED or laser diode device thereby rendering it athermal. This invention avoids additional complexity, size, weight and power dissipation of…
This invention proposes a method to overcome the key limitation of electrically pumped lasers based on AlN, AlGaN, or AlInGaN, namely the lack of suitable shallow donor and acceptor dopants. As the band gap of these materials increases (and the emission wavelength decreases), both electrons and holes require greater thermal energies in order to ionize.
Laser diode lensing effect can be substantially reduced by creating a pattern interface such that the substrate is only attached at the diode mesa. This is achieved by either creating a pattern solder joint and/or pattern substrate.
Design and construction of a photoconductive switch requires a diamond photoconductor illuminated by light of a certain excitation wavelength.
Characteristics of the LLNL-developed switch are as follows:
LLNL researchers have invented an ultrafast PCSS to drive a high-power laser diode with arbitrary pulse widths. These devices operate by supplying a high voltage (>10 kV) to one side of the switch. A short pulse of light illuminates the semiconductor, instantly turning it from highly resistive to highly conductive.
U.S. Patent No. 11,555,965 describes LLNL’s invention of “Illumination Frustums” for photoconductive switches to capture and “frustrate” the light from leaving the frustum. LLNL researcher’s latest novel invention, “Twister Oven”, achieves this by encouraging laser light absorption in a photo conductor material. Light enters the oven twisting and reflecting, making near normal incident multi…
Design and construction of a photoconductive switch requires a diamond photoconductor illuminated by light of a certain excitation wavelength. The diamond material is chosen to be doped with substitutional nitrogen to act as a source of electrons. The device architecture allows maximum light entering the aperture. The top and bottom electrodes are made of ultra-wide bandgap (UWBG)…
LLNL researchers faced this challenge by bridging the gap between VEDs and solid-state electronics (SSE). Their approach was to create a hybrid vacuum microelectronic device (VMD) architecture that combines the properties of vacuum as the electronic medium and the compact form factor and manufacturing scalability of semiconductor microelectronic chips.
Design and construction of a photoconductive switch requires a diamond photoconductor illuminated by light of a certain excitation wavelength. The diamond material is specifically doped with substitutional nitrogen, which act as a source of electrons. The device architecture allows maximum light entering the aperture. The top and bottom electrodes are made of ultra wide band gap (UWBG)…
The approach is to use a custom-designed frustrum and attach it to the optical fiber that connects to the PCSS. Light from the fiber enters the frustrum, spreads out, and enters the PCSS. Any unabsorbed light re-enters the frustrum and, because of its geometry, reflects back into the PCSS itself with only a negligible fraction escaping from the fiber. The shape of the novel frustrum is…
To address shortcomings of current liposome drug delivery systems, the patented innovation uses drug-loaded liposomes containing carbon nanotube porins (CNTPs) inserted into the liposomal membranes for the delivery of the encapsulated drugs. Short CNTPs (10 nm in length) with narrow diameter (0.8 nm) has been demonstrated to facilitate efficient fusion of lipid bilayers resulting in the…
A new approach of developing synthetic antibacterial mineral assemblages can be used as an alternative treatment when traditional antibiotics fail in clinical and agricultural settings. Mineral mixtures can be synthesized with tunable metal release and reactive oxygen species generation that are capable of killing human pathogens and promoting wound healing. One of the key components in the…
The method described in a pending patent application uses a novel thiacrown (dibenzohexathia-18-crown-6) for efficient extraction of 197m,gHg and 197gHg from irradiated Pt target foils. The separation of 197m,gHg and 197gHg from Pt foils using this novel thiacrown was found to be highly specific. No detectable amount of the Pt foil was seen in the…
Combining the principles of nanotechnology, cell-free protein synthesis and microfluidics, LLNL researchers have developed a reusable, portable programmable system that can create purified, concentrated protein product in vitro in a microfluidic device containing nucleic acids.
LLNL scientists developed novel hydrogels, which are biodegradable soft materials synthesized by a water-soluble polymer. Incorporating silver imparts antimicrobial activity to the material at low concentration compared to currently used silver nanoparticles. Our hydrogels are composed of silver ions instead of silver nanoparticles, which eliminates the toxicity concerns of modern silver…
Recent advancements in additive manufacturing, also called 3D printing, allow precise placement of materials in three dimensions. LLNL researchers have invented mechanical logic gates based on flexures that can be integrated into the microstructure of a micro-architected material through 3D printing. The logic gates can be combined into circuits allowing complex logic operations to be…
The LLNL method for optimizing as built optical designs uses insights from perturbed optical system theory and reformulates perturbation of optical performance in terms of double Zernikes, which can be calculated analytically rather than by tracing thousands of rays. A new theory of compensation is enabled by the use of double Zernikes which allows the performance degradation of a perturbed…
The technology that is available has the capability to inject realistic radiation detection spectra into the amplifier of a radiation detector and produce the all the observables that are available with that radiation detection instrument; count-rate, spectrum, dose rate, etc.
The system uses the capability of LLNL to generate the source output for virtually any source and determine…