There is a growing trend for studies run by academic and nonprofit organizations to have regulatory submission requirements. As a result, there is greater reliance on REDCap, an electronic data capture (EDC) widely used by researchers in these organizations. This paper discusses the development and implementation of the Rapid Validation Process (RVP) developed by the REDCap Consortium, aimed at enhancing regulatory compliance and operational efficiency in response to the dynamic demands of modern clinical research. The RVP introduces a structured validation approach that categorizes REDCap functionalities, develops targeted validation tests, and applies structured and standardized testing syntax. This approach ensures that REDCap can meet regulatory standards while maintaining flexibility to adapt to new challenges. Results from the application of the RVP on recent successive REDCap software version releases illustrate significant improvements in testing efficiency and process optimization, demonstrating the project’s success in setting new benchmarks for EDC system validation. The project’s community-driven responsibility model fosters collaboration and knowledge sharing and enhances the overall resilience and adaptability of REDCap. As REDCap continues to evolve based on feedback from clinical trialists, the RVP ensures that REDCap remains a reliable and compliant tool, ready to meet regulatory and future operational challenges.

We describe an ultra-wide-bandwidth, low-frequency receiver recently installed on the Parkes radio telescope. The receiver system provides continuous frequency coverage from 704 to 4032 MHz. For much of the band ( ${\sim}60\%$ ), the system temperature is approximately 22 K and the receiver system remains in a linear regime even in the presence of strong mobile phone transmissions. We discuss the scientific and technical aspects of the new receiver, including its astronomical objectives, as well as the feed, receiver, digitiser, and signal processor design. We describe the pipeline routines that form the archive-ready data products and how those data files can be accessed from the archives. The system performance is quantified, including the system noise and linearity, beam shape, antenna efficiency, polarisation calibration, and timing stability.

The prospect of large-area electronics on polymers, for flexible applications requires a study of thin film fracture mechanisms. To fabricate thin-film transistor (TFT) backplanes on polymer foils the substrate must first be passivated to protect the polymer substrate from chemicals used during processing and to protect the TFTs from substrate out gassing. Silicon nitride (SiNx) is commonly used for this purpose since it tends to adhere well to polymers and is easily deposited by PE-CVD. When rigid thin films such as SiNx are deposited onto compliant substrates, such as polymer foils, stresses caused by built-in strains and the mismatch in coefficients of thermal expansion can cause fracture. The deposited thin films may fracture, and also the polymer substrate below. Using focused-ion beam milling and scanning electron microscopy we analyzed two distinct thin film fracture morphologies for SiNx films on two different types of polymer substrate. One had a relatively low, the other a relatively high coefficient of thermal expansion. For both SiNx/substrate systems the SiNx was under residual compressive stress and the substrate under tension. In one case the compressive stress in the thin films cause them to debond, buckle, and crack. In the other case the tensile stress in the substrate causes it to tear, followed by the fracture of the SiNx film above.

Interest is widespread in flexible thin-film transistor backplanes made on clear polymer foil, which could be universally employed for a variety of applications. All ultralow process temperatures, plastic compatible thin film transistor (TFT) technologies battle short or long term device instabilities. The quality and stability of amorphous silicon thin-film transistors (a-Si:H TFTs) improves with increasing process temperature. TFT stacks deposited at less than 250°C by radio frequency plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (RF-PECVD) exhibit higher threshold voltage shifts after gate bias stressing than stacks deposited at ∼300°C in the active matrix liquid-crystal display (AMLCD) industry [1]. Therefore, optically clear plastic (CP) substrates are desired that tolerate high process temperatures. The first step in a-Si:H TFT fabrication on a polymer is the deposition of a planarizing barrier and adhesion layer. For this purpose we have been using silicon nitride (SiNx) grown by PECVD.

This paper discusses the substrate preparation and SiNx deposition for the process temperature of 250°C. We study the mechanical strain in the SiNx film on the CP substrate, as a function of RF power. Earlier work has shown that SiNx films deposited at low RF power are under tensile strain, and become increasingly compressed as the deposition power is raised [2]. Additionally, at very high deposition power the substrate is bombarded at the beginning of film growth to achieve good film adhesion. The goal is to identify the correct processing conditions at which the total mismatch strain between the film and the substrate is minimized, to keep the film/substrate composite flat and avoid mechanical fracture as well as peeling due to poor adhesion. Optimal deposition conditions were identified to obtain crack-free SiNx barrier layers. The barrier layers were tested by fabricating a-Si:H TFTs on them at 250°C.

We have fabricated TFTs of nanocrystalline silicon (nc-Si) at 150°C on clear polymer substrates (coefficients of thermal expansion, α∼45 to 55ppm/K), on Kapton® 200E (α=17ppm/K), and on Corning 1737 glass (α=3ppm//K) for comparison. Because thermally stable polymers, such as Kapton® 200E polyimide, have glass transition temperatures as high as 325°C, they are candidates for direct substitution of display glass. The stresses developed in the substrate and device layers, due to à, are reduced by decreasing the thickness of the active layers, by cutting the layers into islands separated by exposed substrate, and by designing stresses, via plasma conditions, into the SiNx passivating layers. By using these three techniques we have made nc-Si TFTs on high Tg, and high α, clear polymer foils with electron mobilities of up to 18cm2/Vs. When integrated with bottom-emitting organic light emitting diodes, such devices will allow for a 10x reduction in pixel TFT areas, compared to TFTs of amorphous silicon.