IEEE EMC-Phoenix

Date: Wednesday, January 20th, 2010
Place: Garcia's Mexican Restaurant at Embassy Suites Hotel
Address: 4400 South Rural Road, Tempe, Arizona
Address: Just South of U.S. 60 on West side of Rural Rd.
Time: 5:30PM Social, 6PM Dinner (order off the menu), 7PM Meeting 

Title: Platform Interference in Wireless Systems 

Speaker: Kevin Slattery, Intel, Manager for Advanced Signaling and Interference Technologies

Abstract: 

With the advent of mobile computing, wireless communication has become an integral part of the compute platform. Who would now consider buying a laptop without wireless? At the same time, what were once simple communication devices such as cell phones are now adding functions which require subsystems ordinarily associated with compute devices. So what’s the big deal? The problem is these devices were never intended to coexist. Communications devices have not been designed with high speed digital logic in mind . High Speed digital logic has never included communications as a design vector. The end result is that these devices don’t work well together and much shoehorning is currently undertaken to make them cohabit in the same device. That shoehorning generally incurs costs in terms of product delays and additional mitigation solutions. It is a sobering thought that 3dB of noise can reduce the performance of your communications system by 50%. It is even more sobering that 20 or even 30dB of noise is common on some devices. This talk has two main intentions including an education in what RF interference is and as a reference source for identifying noise related issues and mitigating them in your current or future design.

Biography:  

Mr. Slattery is presently with Intel in Oregon and is the manager for the Advanced Signaling and Interference Technologies team in the Corporate Technology Group. He has been working in the field of EMI/EMC for 18 years and has developed measurement techniques and analytical approaches for the evaluation of high speed processors, chipsets, LAN and display electronics.  Mr. Slattery has been one of the pioneers in developing near field measurement techniques for the scanning of integrated circuits providing some of the first surface field distributions of high spatial resolution. He was also one of the pioneers in the use of broadband radiated emissions techniques with VLSI GHz TEM cells designed specifically for measuring integrated circuits. Both the near field scanning and GTEM measurements have become IEC standards. In addition, he works on RF interference mitigation, EMI/EMC and high speed clocking issues. He has over 35 publications in the fields of EMC and RFI.  Previously, he was with DaimlerChrysler EMC in Huntsville, Alabama where he built an advanced EMI/EMC research capability. He has also worked in high energy physics at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center where he was responsible for particle beam timing systems in storage rings and in beam transport systems in the linear accelerator.

Reservations: To help us get an accurate headcount, please send an email to Harry Gaul (harry.gaul@ieee.org).   There is no charge for meetings, but you pay for your own meal and drinks. Since we order off the menu, we do not need an exact number, so if you decide at the last minute, please come anyway. You don’t need to be an IEEE or EMC Society member to attend -- all are welcome. 

Special Notice to IEEE Student Members: Present your IEEE Student Member card at the meeting and get your meal for free including drinks (except for alcoholic beverages).

Future Meeting:

Last Meeting:

The final IEEE EMC Phoenix Chapter meeting of 2009 was held on Monday, November 16th 2009 at Garcia’s Mexican Restaurant in the Embassy Suites Hotel at Rural Road and US-60 in Tempe, AZ.   The meeting began with the customary social hour starting at 5:30 pm, with dinner at six. We had an excellent attendance, completely filling the meeting room.  

After we all had our fill of Garcia’s Mexican food, chapter chairman Harry Gaul called the meeting to order at 7:05 pm. Harry explained that next year’s agenda is already getting full, with three speakers lined-up for the first half of the year.  As usual, we are always searching for interesting speakers for our chapter meetings.  If you have any ideas for speakers, please contact one of the chapter officers.

Harry also mentioned that we would be open to inviting vendors to present a 5-10 minute sales pitch for their products at our meetings, provided that they pay for the food and drinks!  At that point we proceeded with the annual officer elections.  The membership unanimously agreed to keep the officers the same:  Harry Gaul as Chairman; Daryl Gerke as Vice Chairman; Glen Gassaway as Secretary and Jim Dykema as Treasurer. We then continued with our customary round table introductions and the call for EMC employment/employers. 

After the general chapter business was completed, Harry introduced the evening speaker:  Bill Kimmel from Kimmel-Gerke consultants. Bill received his BSEE with distinction from the University of Minnesota, and has worked in the electronics field for over 40 years. His experience ranges from electronic design and systems engineering to technical management with industry leaders like Control Data Corporation and Sperry Defense Systems.   His EMC experience includes the design/test/qualification of military systems to MIL-STD-461 and NACSEM 5100 (TEMPEST) and commercial systems to FCC Part 15 and IEC/CISPR. He has solved EMI problems in computer systems, medical devices, industrial controls, vehicles, telecommunications systems, and more. He has several years experience in radiation hardened circuits and high speed memories for computers.  He is a Registered Professional Engineer, an active member of the IEEE, and a NARTE certified EMC and ESD Engineer. 

Bill began his presentation entitled:  “ESD as an EMI problem”.  He talked about situations where ESD becomes a problem, mentioning that the EU and Pacific Rim are largely maritime climates and have fewer issues with ESD than North America, where industrialized areas are often located in very dry climates. He mentioned that the primary cause of ESD failure is excess voltage between signal and ground pins on chips, causing ground bounce. It is important to divert ESD currents away from chips through shielding and filtering. It is also important to realize that ESD can follow two paths: direct or indirect discharge. Bill then presented the Ten Keys to ESD control, including avoiding static buildup, preventing the discharge from occurring, the use of multi-layer boards, filtering critical lines, filtering critical circuits, internal wire routing, use of metal connector backshells, omitting pigtails as shield terminations, using the right shielding material and error correction in software.   Bill’s presentation was chock-full of excellent design hints!  Our thanks for Bill for a very enlightening presentation.  After the presentation, Harry presented Bill with a 2010 Arizona Highways calendar. 

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