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Newborn screening for inborn errors of metabolism: a systematic review. Health Technol Assessment 1997; 1(11). NHS R&D HTA Programme T he overall aim of the NHS R&D Health Technology Assessment (HTA) programme is to ensure that high-quality research information on the costs, effectiveness and broader impact of health technologies is produced in the most efficient way for those who use, manage and work in the NHS. Research is undertaken in those areas where the evidence will lead to the greatest benefits to patients, either through improved patient outcomes or the most efficient use of NHS resources. The Standing Group on Health Technology advises on national priorities for health technology assessment. Six advisory panels assist the Standing Group in identifying and prioritising projects. These priorities are then considered by the HTA Commissioning Board supported by the National Coordinating Centre for HTA (NCCHTA). This report is one of a series covering acute care, diagnostics and imaging, methodology, pharmaceuticals, population screening, and primary and community care. It was identified as a priority by the Population Screening Panel (see inside back cover). The views expressed in this publication are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the Standing Group, the Commissioning Board, the Panel members or the Department of Health.

Oxide‐based resistive switching devices are a leading contender for the next generation memories. Before use, each device has to go through a conditioning process called electroformation which has been suggested to be initiated by the accumulation of oxygen vacancies. Here, experimental evidence is presented which shows that both Ta2O5‐x‐ and TiO2‐x‐based crossbar devices, exhibit characteristic electronic instability leading to a reversible constriction of the current flow to a narrow filament prior to permanent change. Thus, it is asserted, electroformation is initiated through purely electronic and reversible events, to be followed later by structural changes in the material, like oxygen vacancy redistribution. Furthermore, the electronic instability responsible for electroformation also gives rise to negative differential resistance (NDR) and that this characteristics appears to involve two distinct mechanisms: a thermal one in which Joule heating causes resistance to decrease as current increases and a second electronic mechanism that appears not to require Joule heating for NDR. Using a combination of thermometry and thermal modeling, a self‐consistent temperature and filament radius as a function of power are found for the 5 μm cross‐bar devices. In the thermal NDR regime, the filament appears to be ∼500 nm in diameter and has a peak temperature of ∼300 °C, while in the adiabatic regime, the estimated filament diameter is much smaller (<50 nm) and the maximum temperature inside it exceeds 800 °C.

Capacitance−voltage characteristics of high quality Pt Schottky diodes fabricated on oxygen-vacancy-doped SrTiO3 single crystals were used to obtain the oxygen vacancy profiles within one microns of the Pt interface. Computer simulations based on solving the drift-diffusion equations for electrons and ionized vacancies were performed to understand the experimentally observed oxygen vacancy profile’s time-evolution at room temperature and 0 V applied bias. Building upon this understanding, the diode’s room temperature profile evolution under −35 V applied bias was analyzed to yield a vacancy mobility value of 1.5 × 10−13 cm2/V·s at an electric field of 500 kV/cm. This mobility is 8 orders of magnitude too low to produce nanosecond resistance switching in thin film devices. The applicability of the results to oxygen-migration-based resistance switching is discussed relative to recent observations and modeling.

Large-angle magnetization dynamics investigated by vector-resolved magnetization-induced optical secondharmonic generationWe present a measurement technique for performing spatially resolved ferromagnetic resonance and directly imaging quantized magnetostatic modes in magnetic samples that undergo high frequency magnetic drive fields ͑up to 8 GHz͒. The dynamic response of a 50ϫ50 m 2 permalloy structure ͑100 nm thick͒ under a 7.04 GHz highly nonuniform drive field was measured as a function of the dc bias field using this technique. The magnetization variation observed indicates that quantized magnetostatic mode waves appear at certain bias fields, with the number of nodes decreasing with an increase in the bias field. We tentatively assign the indices of each mode using the Damon-Eshbach ͑DE͒ model. Similar modes have been observed for a similar sample geometry using an inductive measurement and they showed good agreement with the DE model. However, the result measured using this technique showed some discrepancy with the DE model and the spatial patterns observed are more complicated than simple one-dimensional standing waves. This complexity suggests that analysis beyond that of the DE model is required to explain the observations.

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In this study, in situ electrical biasing was combined with transmission electron microscopy (TEM) in order to study the formation and evolution of Wadsley defects and Magnéli phases during electrical biasing and resistive switching in titanium dioxide (TiO2). Resistive switching devices were fabricated from single-crystal rutile TiO2 substrates through focused ion beam milling and lift-out techniques. Defect evolution and phase transformations in rutile TiO2 were monitored by diffraction contrast imaging inside the TEM during electrical biasing. Reversible bipolar resistive switching behavior was observed in these single-crystal TiO2 devices. Biased induced reduction reactions created increased oxygen vacancy concentrations to such an extent that shear faults (Wadsley defects) and oxygen-deficient phases (Magnéli phases) formed over large volumes within the TiO2 TEM specimen. Nevertheless, the observed reversible formation/dissociation of Wadsley defects does not appear to correlate to resistive switching phenomena at these length scales. These defect zones were found to reversibly reconfigure in a manner consistent with charged oxygen vacancy migration responding to the applied bias polarity.

Optical field confinement in a ridge waveguide nanostructure (“C” aperture) designed for ultrahigh-density recording was observed using an apertureless near-field scanning optical microscope. The aperture was fabricated on a commercial edge-emitting semiconductor laser as the light source. High-contrast near-field images at both 1× and 2× lock-in detection frequencies were obtained. The emission patterns are in agreement with theoretical simulation of such structures. A 90 nm×70 nm full width half maximum spot size was measured and is comparable to the ridge width of the aperture.