ELMOS Semiconductor SE

A light receiver circuit with compensation of propagation times has at least one light sensor, one control circuit, one connecting line to a TDC circuit, and a test circuit. The test line is connected to a test signal source. The test circuit connects the test line to the control circuit and forwards the test signal to the control circuit. The control circuit routes a measurement signal of the light sensor to the TDC circuit and a test signal to the connecting line and to the TDC circuit to evaluate the test signal and propagation time of test signal from test circuit to TDC circuit. The light sensor array further includes a plurality of light receiver circuits of such kind. The invention also relates to a Lidar receiver for capturing optical events with a light sensor array with a TDC circuit and a test signal source and with a timecode generator.

In a safety switch off of an electric consumer in a vehicle, the current consumption of the consumer is monitored in its active state by a main monitoring unit with respect to a safety switch off threshold which, when reached or exceeded, results in switching off the electronic switch. In a further operating state, in which the current consumption of the line leading to the consumer is lower than in its active state, the current consumption is monitored by an auxiliary monitoring unit with respect to the rate of changes. When the consumer is in the further operating state, the main monitoring unit is deactivated or operated in standby mode. When the consumer is in the further operating state, the main monitoring unit is activated, when the rate of changes in the current consumption reaches a threshold value and/or falls short of or exceeds a voltage range.

A method is disclosed for determining an electrical signal characteristic indicative of the magnitude of and/or change in an impedance that varies in response to a magnetic, electric, or electromagnetic field affected by an approaching object. The method includes performing measurements over at least one group of measurement intervals, each group preceded by at least one compensation interval. A sinusoidal excitation voltage is applied to the impedance during each interval, inducing a measuring current. A compensation current is determined during the compensation interval and subtracted from the measuring current of at least one subsequent measurement interval to generate an analog evaluation current. The evaluation current serves as a signal representative of the impedance's magnitude and/or change in the impedance.

A device for controlling an ultrasonic transducer, includes: a transformer including a first primary-side terminal and a second primary-side terminal, and two secondary-side terminals, to which an ultrasonic transducer can be connected; a first low-side switch arranged between a first node and the first primary-side terminal of the transformer, and a second low-side switch is arranged between the first circuit node, and the second primary-side terminal of the transformer; a first high-side switch arranged between a second node and a first primary-side terminal of the transformer, and a second high-side switch arranged between the second node and a second primary-side terminal of the transformer; and a switch control unit for alternating switching the high-side switches and the low-side switches. An energy source with two terminals can be connected directly or indirectly to the first node and the second node. The switch control unit switches between first and second control phases.

A method for transmitting data from an ultrasonic sensor to a computer system includes forming a feature vector signal from an electric reception signal; recognizing signal objects in the reception signal and classifying the signal objects according to predetermined signal object classes. The signal objects are forms or sequences of forms. At least one object parameter allocated to the signal object and one symbol for the signal object class are allocated to each signal object, or for each signal object, at least one signal object parameter and a symbol object are determined. The method further includes determining a chirp value as an allocated signal object parameter. The method further includes transmitting the symbol and the at least one signal object parameter to the computer system as data of a recognized signal object, wherein the at least one signal object parameter includes a signal object parameter indicating the chirp value.

A method for transmitting data from an ultrasonic sensor to a computer system includes forming a feature vector signal from an electric reception signal; recognizing signal objects in the reception signal and classifying the signal objects according to predetermined signal object classes. The signal objects are forms or sequences of forms. At least one object parameter allocated to the signal object and one symbol for the signal object class are allocated to each signal object, or for each signal object, at least one signal object parameter and a symbol object are determined. The method further includes transmitting the symbol and the at least one signal object parameter to the computer system as data of a recognized signal object.

Provided is a control system which is configured to provide control and/or regulating signals, comprising a system bus with a system controller, wherein the system controller is configured to execute system functions of the control system; a measurement bus with a measurement controller, wherein the measurement controller is configured to execute measurement functions for acquiring and/or processing measurement data and/or output functions for adapting and/or outputting control and/or regulating signals, wherein the measurement controller includes or is a deterministic, programmable finite-state machine and is configured such that the measurement functions and/or output functions executable by the measurement controller are fully simulatable, and wherein the measurement controller is operable using a predetermined program code, wherein the measurement controller has a ROM memory and the predetermined program code is provided in the ROM memory; and a bus interface providing a communication connection between the system bus and the measurement bus.

A method for transmitting data from an ultrasonic sensor to a computer system includes forming a feature vector signal from an electric reception signal; recognizing signal objects in the reception signal and classifying the signal objects according to predetermined signal object classes. At least one object parameter allocated to the signal object and one symbol for the signal object class are allocated to each signal object, or for each signal object, at least one signal object parameter and a symbol object are determined. The method further includes transmitting the symbol and the at least one signal object parameter to the computer system as data of a recognized signal object, wherein the transmission of the at least one symbol of the recognized signal object class includes a transmission of a signal object class of a signal object including a predefined temporal sequence of other signal objects.

A secure microcontroller for controlling devices in automobiles comprises a semiconductor substrate, memory elements, at least one internal bus, at least one 8/16/32/64-bit microcontroller core, one or more data interfaces and at least one quantum process-based generator for true random numbers. The memory elements, the data interface, the quantum process-based generator and the microcontroller core are connected to the internal bus. The quantum process-based generator generates and provides a random number at the request of the microcontroller core. The microcontroller core generates a key using a program from one or more of its memory elements and the random number. The microcontroller core uses a program from one or more of its memory elements and the key to encrypt and decrypt data which it exchanges with devices external to the secure microcontroller. The semiconductor substrate integrally comprises the sub-devices of the secure microcontroller mentioned herein.

A device comprises a quantum random number generator, and further comprises following device parts: a first SPAD diode, a second SPAD diode, an optical fiber which optically couples the first SPAD diode and the second SPAD diode to one another, an amplifier and/or filter, an analog-to-digital converter, a comparator, a time-to-digital converter, and an entropy extraction device converting output values of the time-to-digital converter into first and second values and generates random bits therefrom.