Medical Design Briefs - February 2021 - 28

with Semtech's LoRa® and LoRa Smart
Home™ RF transceivers SX1261,
SX1262, and LLCC68.
IPDs deliver another significant benefit:
increased reliability. By creating a literal
circuit within a small LTCC package, variability and potential points-of-failure are
all but eliminated when compared with
mounting many discrete components.
According to Carmona, material development is the key to being able to create
the entire circuit in such a small package.
The product utilizes a novel proprietary
ceramic material in an LTCC manufacturing process designed to improve performance to High-Q levels.

The process to manufacture IPDs is
similar to the technology already used to
create multi-layer SMD component parts
such as capacitors and inductors. However, LTCC manufacturing allows the circuits to be embedded in as many as 40
separate layers in a three-dimensional
package that is still very low profile.
Because IPDs require much less board
space, IoT devices with RF circuitry can
be designed in much smaller form
factors.
" With PCB real estate at a prime, the
size and placement of the passive components are critical because as everything gets smaller it becomes increas-

ingly difficult to place more components on the board, " explains
Carmona. " There fore, design engineers are looking to component manufacturers to deliver miniaturized solutions that occupy next to no real board
space. "
Beyond size, a smaller PCB can also
impact the aesthetics of a product, allowing for slim, low profiles. The elimination of components on a 10:1 or greater
basis also reduces the overall weight of
devices, even if that savings is measured
in tenths of grams.
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New Semiconductor Detector Shows Promise for
Medical Diagnostics
Detector can identify
radioactive isotopes with
high resolution.
Northwestern University
Evanston, IL
Northwestern University researchers
have developed new devices based on a
low-cost material to aid in the detection
and identification of radioactive isotopes. Using cesium lead bromide in
the form of perovskite crystals, the
research team found that they were
able to create highly efficient detectors
in both small, portable devices for field
researchers and in very large detectors.
The results are more than a decade in
the making.

Northwestern professor Mercouri
Kanatzidis, who led the research, said
that in addition to being less costly than
typical devices, the new method for
detecting gamma rays is also highly capable at differentiating between rays of different energies. This method allows
users to identify legal versus illegal
gamma rays. Detectors like these are critical for medical diagnostics imaging.
" Using the perovskite material, we
have achieved high resolution in energy
detection for gamma rays using a pixelated detector design, " Kanatzidis says.
" This takes us a step closer to creating
electronic systems for medical diagnostics and imaging, airport security, and
more. " The study was published in the
journal Nature Photonics. Kanatzidis is the

The research created highly efficient detectors in both small, portable devices for field researchers
and in very large detectors. (Credit: Northwestern)

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Charles E. and Emma H. Morrison
Professor of Chemistry in the Weinberg
College of Arts and Sciences. He has a
joint appointment with Argonne National Laboratory.
In past research, the team compared
performance of the new cesium lead
bromide detector to the conventional
cadmium zinc telluride (CZT) detector
and found it performed as well in detecting gamma rays. But new research that
improved crystal sizes and leveraged pixels rather than planar electrodes has
advanced the spectral resolution well
beyond that of conventional designs,
from around 3.8 to 1.4 percent, detecting energy even from very weak sources.
Radioactive isotopes emit gamma rays
that differ slightly in energy, often differing by just a few percentage points.
Using the new material, users can better
identify the source of gamma rays by pinpointing differences down to a few percentage points.
In addition, using even slightly
impure materials typically makes detectors less efficient or nonfunctional, and
producers of devices must seek ultrapure CZT to produce effective readings.
To the researchers' surprise, their own
material could have 5-10 times more
impurities than CZT and still perform,
making it easier and cheaper to produce. Resolution is also critical to medical imaging like SPECT scans.
Kanatzidis says there's a great deal of
interest in the field, especially given the
cost and safety implications of malfunctioning equipment. But progress in this
Medical Design Briefs, February 2021

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Medical Design Briefs - February 2021

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