In this paper, we present a Double-Anchoring Based Tone Mapping (DABTM) algorithm for displaying high dynamic range (HDR) images. First, two anchoring values are obtained using the double-anchoring theory. Second, we use the two values to formulate the compressing operator, which can achieve the aim of tone mapping directly. A new method based on accelerated K-means for the decomposition of HDR images into groups (frameworks) is proposed. Most importantly, a group of piecewise-overlap linear functions is put forward to define the belongingness of pixels to their locating frameworks. Experiments show that our algorithm is capable of achieving dynamic range compression, while preserving fine details and avoiding common artifacts such as gradient reversals, halos, or loss of local contrast.

This paper presents a fully digital gain control system with a new high bandwidth and wide dynamic range power detector for DVB-S2 application. Because the peak-to-average power ratio (PAPR) of DVB-S2 system is so high and the settling time requirement is so stringent, the conventional closed-loop analog gain control scheme cannot be used. The digital gain control is necessary for the robust gain control and the direct digital interface with the baseband modem. Also, it has several advantages over the analog gain control in terms of the settling time and insensitivity to the process, voltage and temperature variation. In order to have a wide gain range with fine step resolution, a new AGC system is proposed. The system is composed of high-bandwidth digital VGAs, wide dynamic range power detectors with RMS detector, low power SAR type ADC, and a digital gain controller. To reduce the power consumption and chip area, only one SAR type ADC is used, and its input is time-interleaved based on four power detectors. Simulation and measurement results show that the new AGC system converges with gain error less than 0.25 dB to the desired level within 10 µs. It is implemented in a 0.18 µm CMOS process. The measurement results of the proposed IF AGC system exhibit 80-dB gain range with 0.25-dB resolution, 8nV/ input referred noise, and 5-dBm IIP3 at 60-mW power consumption. The power detector shows the 35 dB dynamic range for 100 MHz input.

We propose a CMOS image sensor that realizes wide dynamic range imaging and nonlinear representation of I/O characteristics. The proposed image sensor controls the integration time for each pixel based on the brightness distribution of objects. The histogram at the end of the integration is estimated from the early intermediate photodiode values that are read out to an external circuit. Using the estimated histogram, the imaging parameters, which control the integration time pixel-by-pixel, are optimized in the external circuit. According to the imaging parameters, the intermediate photodiode value is compared with the threshold and reset to the starting value depending on the comparison result. These processes repeat several times. At the end of the integration, the photodiode value is reconstructed by using the imaging parameters. Then, wide dynamic range images with adapted I/O characteristics are obtained. We have fabricated a prototype with a size of 6464 pixels using a 0.35-µm 2-poly 4-metal CMOS process. In this paper, we explain the principle of the proposed sensor and discuss the system architecture and its operation. The experimental results obtained using the prototype are also presented, and we verify its effectiveness.

This paper proposes effective energy feature normalization methods for robust speech recognition in noisy environments. We first develop an energy subtraction method and a modified method for the Log-energy Dynamic Range Normalization (ERN) using inverse function. We then present the hybrid method combining the energy subtraction and the modified ERN. Using Aurora2.0 database for representative evaluations, a significant performance improvement over the ERN method is demonstrated.

Adaptation process of retina helps human visual system to see a high dynamic range scene in real world. This paper presents a simple static local adaptation method for high dynamic range image compression based on a retinal model. The proposed simple model aims at recreating the same sensations between the real scene and the range compressed image on display device when viewed after reaching steady state local adaptation respectively. Our new model takes the display adaptation into account in relation to the scene adaptation based on the retinal model. In computing local adaptation, the use of nonlinear edge preserving bilateral filter presents a better tonal rendition in preserving the local contrast and details while avoiding banding artifacts normally seen in local methods. Finally, we demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed model by estimating the color difference between the recreated image and the target visual image obtained by trial and error method.

A second-order CMOS continuous-time bandpass filter with a tuneable 4-12 MHz center frequency (fc) is presented. The Design has been done by using a new second-order block which is based on Gm-C method. This Gm-C filter achieves a dynamic range of 30 dB for 1% IM3, and Q equal to 58 at 12 MHz, while dissipating only 10.5 mW from 3.3 V power supply in 0.35 µm CMOS process. The on-chip indirect automatic tuning circuit uses a phase-locked loop which sets filter center frequency to an external reference clock.

A new wide-dynamic-range CMOS image sensor with pixel-level analog-to-digital (A/D) converters is proposed. The pulse-counters in the sensor are arranged outside the pixel area in order to reduce pixel size, which is a key requirement for making high-definition cameras. A new scheme called variable threshold operation is also presented as a suitable readout operation method for the sensor. Experimental measurements on a prototype sensor show that the prototype can obtain linear output response proportional to illumination by applying the new readout operation.

A technique for improving the input power dynamic range and extinction ratio of wavelength converters based on cross-gain modulation in a semiconductor optical amplifier is presented.

This paper presents an improved architecture of the multistage multibit sigma-delta modulators (ΣΔMs) for wide-band applications. Our approach is based on two resonator topologies, high-Q cascade-of-resonator-with-feedforward (HQCRFF) and low-Q cascade-of-integrator-with-feedforward (LQCIFF). Because of in-band zeros introduced by internal loop filters, the proposed architecture enhances the suppression of the in-band quantization noise at a low OSR. The HQCRFF-based modulator with single-bit quantizer has two modes of operation, modulation and oscillation. When the HQCRFF-based modulator is operating in oscillation mode, the feedback path from the quantizer output to the input summing node is disabled and hence the modulator output is free of the quantization noise terms. Although operating in oscillation mode is not allowed for single-stage ΣΔM, the oscillation of HQCRFF-based modulator can improve dynamic range (DR) of the multistage (MASH) ΣΔM. The key to improving DR is to use HQCRFF-based modulator in the first stage and have the first stage oscillated. When the first stage oscillates, the coarse quantization noise vanishes and hence circuit nonidealities, such as finite op-amp gain and capacitor mismatching, do not cause leakage quantization noise problem. According to theoretical and numerical analysis, the proposed MASH architecture can inherently have wide DR without using additional calibration techniques.

An audio signal level compressor is presented, which is based on the approximation algorithm using an interpolating polynomial. To implement a compression characteristic in a digital audio system, a power calculation with fractional numbers is required and it is difficult to be performed directly in digital circuits. We introduce a polynomial expression to approximate the power operation, then the gain calculation is easily performed with a number of additions, multiplications and a division. Newton's interpolation formula is used to calculate the compression characteristics in a very short time and the obtained compression characteristics are very close to the ideal ones.

In this paper, a novel methodology for designing and analyzing high performance sigma-delta leapfrog modulators for ultra-high resolution analog-to-digital (A/D) converters is presented. The less sensitive topology, the leapfrog topology, in component variations is analyzed by considering the noise transfer function (NTF). By using theoretical analysis, the loop coefficients are constrained to a small, clear and definite range called the stable region (SR). With the output voltage limited within 2 V, an absolutely stable region (ASR) is obtained. A program that analyzes and generates the required coefficients is constructed for easily designing this topology. For a 256 over-sampling ratio (OSR) and the coefficients from ASR, the signal to noise ratio (SNR) and dynamic range (DR) are 105 dB and 100 dB, respectively. In accordance with the behavior simulation results, the system is not only stable and efficient but also suitable for high-resolution applications.

Radio on fiber transmission technique using a conventional intermediate frequency (IF)-band Surface Acoustic Wave (SAW) filter has been proposed in order to satisfy the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) specification for International Mobile Telecommunications-2000 (IMT-2000) cellular systems. For the 3GPP specification, a key issue is to expand the dynamic range limited by clipping distortion of laser diode. In order to expand the dynamic range, for the down link, a narrow bandpass SAW filter is introduced after optical transmission, because the SAW filter can suppress the distortion caused by clipping of laser diode and improve the performance of adjacent channel leakage power ratio. For the up link, an optical modulation index (OMI) of a laser diode is optimized to improve the noise figure (NF) performance by controlling the gain of an amplifier between the antenna and the laser diode. As a result, both power control dynamic range of more than 44 dB in the down link and dynamic range of more than 97 dB in the up link were achieved in 6 km optical transmission. Other important parameters, such as Error Vector Magnitude, Reference Sensitivity Level, and so on in the 3GPP specification, were also satisfied.

A mapping circuit in order to have a wider input dynamic range is proposed. MOSFET's connecting between power supply lines are employed to construct the mapping circuit. SPICE simulation is shown to evaluate the proposed circuits. With the proposed mapping circuit, two-MOSFET subtractor has a rail-to-rail input voltage. As an application, an OTA consisting of subtractors is realized by employing the proposed mapping circuits to have a rail-to-rail input voltage range.

We propose a high-sensitivity and wide-dynamic-range position sensor using logarithmic-response and correlation circuit. The 3-D measurement system using the proposed position sensor has advantages to applications, for example a walking robot and a recognition system on vehicles, which require both of availability in various backgrounds and safe light projection for human eyes. The position sensor with a 64 64 pixel array has been developed and successfully tested. We describe the sensitivity of position detection as SBR (Signal-to-Background Ratio). The minimum SBR of the sensor is -13.9 dB lower than standard sensors. High sensitivity under -10 dB SBR is realized in a dynamic range of 41.7 dB in terms of background illumination. Experimental results of position detection and 3-D measurement in a strong background illumination are also presented.

Two novel linearization processes in electro-absorption-modulator (EAM) are proposed and demonstrated. These two modulation schemes are used to compensate the nonlinear component of the EAM by controlling the DC bias voltages of the each EAM separately. The simulations on the nonlinearity of EAM and linearization process are performed in both time and frequency domains. From a serially cascaded modulation simulation, a reduction of 16 dB in IMD3, 45 dB in IMD5 and the following increase of 15 dB in linear dynamic rage (LDR) are achieved. In dual-parallel modulation experiment at 8 GHz, a reduction of 23 dB in IMD3 and the following increase of 15.1 dB in LDR of are achieved compared to those of a single EAM operation.

Analog inverter is one of the most useful building blocks in analog circuits. This paper proposes an analog inverter consisting of a p-channel MOS (PMOS) and an n-channel MOS (NMOS) inverter and presents an application to all-pass filter realizations. The proposed circuit has a wide dynamic range by combining PMOS and NMOS inverters. When the proposed analog inverter is applied to an all-pass filter, the circuit configuration becomes simpler and occupies less chip area and power consumption.

This paper overviews fiber-oriented wireless communication systems, particularly in the area of microcell systems. The benefits of fiber-oriented wireless systems are discussed focusing on an application board scheme to facilitate new service deployment in light of intelligent networks. Dynamic range improvement technologies to remove interference are highlighted. Overall system performance is calculated for an economical FP-LD. Furthermore, effective modem use and a potential diversity technique are introduced. This strategy will play a role in realizing flexible fiber-optic subscriber networks.

A specific signal in most of actual environmental systems fluctuates complicatedly in a non-Gaussian distribution form, owing to various kinds of factors. The nonlinearity of the system makes it more difficult to evaluate the objective system from the viewpoint of internal physical mechanism. Furthermore, it is very often that the reliable observation value can be obtained only within a definite domain of fluctuating amplitude, because many of measuring equipment have their proper dynamic range and the original random wave form is unreliable at the end of amplitude fluctuation. It becomes very important to establish a new signal processing or an evaluation method applicable to such an actually complicated system even from a functional viewpoint. This paper describes a new trial for the signal processing along the same line of the extended regression analysis based on the Bayes' theorem. This method enables us to estimate the response probability property of a complicated system in an actual situation, when observation values of the output response are saturated due to the dynamic range of measuring equipment. This method utilizes the series expansion form of the Bayes' theorem, which is applicable to the non-Gaussian property of the fluctuations and various kinds of correlation information between the input and output fluctuations. The proposed method is newly derived especially by paying our attention to the statistical information of the input-output data without the saturation operation instead of that on the resultantly saturated observation, differing from the well-known regression analysis and its improvement. Then, the output probability distribution for another kind of input is predicted by using the estimated regression relationship. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed method is experimentally confirmed too by applying it to the actual data observed for indoor and outdoor sound environments.

This paper describes a fiber-optic microcell radio system with a spectral delivery switch to meet traffic demands. Optical link performance is discussed from the view points of link loss and noise figure aimed at system design. The theoretical carrier-to-noise ratio (CNR) performance is shown as a function of the input electrical power of the laser and the received optical power. Improvement of dynamic range defined by both CNR and intermodulation distortion is proposed by using the frequency modulation (FM) technique. The experimental results using the proposed technique indicate that the performance is much better than that of conventional methods. Moreover, economical diversity planning delivery methods over fibers are presented. This strategy will provide more cost effective and flexible networks.