2013 Activities
Thursday, September 19, 2013 at National Instruments, 4600 Patrick Henry Drive, Santa Clara, CA 95054
Title: “Beacon Satellite Scintillation from Sputnik to Cubesat”
Speaker: Charles L. Rino, Visiting Scholar Boston College Institute for Scientific Research
Abstract:
Starlight scintillation has been observed for as long as humans pondered the nighttime sky. Like its invisible radio and acoustic counterparts scintillation is a nuisance and a scientific curiosity that can be exploited for remote sensing of propagation media. Since the launch of Sputnik, artificial earth satellites have provided multiple frequency radio sources that propagate through the earth’s ionosphere and atmosphere. Because these radio transmissions carry critical information the potential degradation imposed by scintillation is a serious problem. On the other hand, the same radio transmissions have provided a means of measuring the near-earth environment. For example, the refraction of radio transmissions during an occultation can be used to measure the atmospheric refractivity profile and extract its vapor content, which is critical to global weather forecasting.
This talk will trace the history of beacon satellite scintillation from its inception with the launch of Sputnik to modern times. Our ability to exploit propagation phenomena has progressed apace with the development of modern computation resources. The scintillation phenomenon as it affects system performance is well understood. The current challenge is to understand the onset of severe ionospheric disturbances triggered by solar storms. Examples of the extreme disturbance that occur will be presented to illustrate computation capabilities and the challenges that remain.
Biography:
Charles L. Rino received his BS and MS in Electrical Engineering from UC Berkeley in 1965 and 1966. He received his PhD in information and computer science from UC San Diego in 1970. He conducted research in radio propagation and ionospheric physics at SRI International from 1970 until 1986, when he joined the Mission Research Corporation as a Chief Scientist. In October 1987, he joined Vista Research as Staff Scientist, and later served as Vice President until he retired in 2009. In 1989 he was elected an IEEE Fellow for contributions in wave propagation and ionospheric physics. He is the principal author on over 50 papers on ionospheric physics, radio propagation, and surface scattering. His IEEE Press book, The Theory of Scintillation with Applications in Remote Sensing, was published in 2011. He currently works part time as and engineering consultant. He is also a docent volunteer at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View California.
Thursday, May 23, 2013 at Cogswell College, 1175 Bordeaux Drive, Sunnyvale, CA 94089
Title: “Patenting Antennas and Wireless Technology”
Speaker: Steve Bachmann
Abstract:
The talk presented a look at the top issues to consider when attempting to obtain patent protection for antennas and other wireless technologies. Points covered included the do’s and don’ts for antenna patents and antenna patenting strategies. Tips for protecting everything from individual antennas to antenna systems were provided. The recent change in US Patent Law was also discussed with respect to how it may effect antenna patent protection in the future.
Biography:
Thursday, April 25, 2013 at Cogswell College, 1175 Bordeaux Drive, Sunnyvale, CA 94089
Title: “Complete Electromagnetic Simulation Technology for Antennas and Antenna Systems”
Speaker: Dr. Martin Schauer
Abstract:
“This talk discusses various solver technologies to address the increasing need of modeling and simulation of antennas and antenna systems. For an application range from electrically small Near-Field-Communication (NFC) antennas to electrically large reflector antennas, the numerical algorithms of Method-of-Moments (MoM), Finite-Elements (FEM), Finite-Integration-Technique (FIT) and Shooting-Bouncing-Ray (SBR) are introduced and their advantages/trade-offs discussed. The applications presented throughout the talk will provide insightful guidelines of best-practice modeling and simulation approaches to the audience. ”
Biography:
Martin Schauer received the Ph.D. degree in Electrical Engineering for his research on computational electromagnetics from the Technical University Darmstadt, Germany in 2005. Since 1999 he is with Computer Simulation Technology (CST), where he developed 3D electromagnetic simulation software until 2005. Currently he is working as an engineering manager for CST of America in the San Francisco Bay area. His main interests are numerical methods and their application in the areas of Microwaves and RF.
Tuesday, March 26, 2013 at Cogswell College, 1175 Bordeaux Drive, Sunnyvale, CA 94089
Title: Solution of Extremely Large Integral Equations in Computational Electromagnetics
Speaker: Professor Levent Gurel, IEEE Distinguished Lecturer
Abstract:
Accurate simulations of real-life electromagnetics problems with integral equations require the solution of dense matrix equations involving millions of unknowns. Solutions of these extremely large problems cannot be achieved easily, even when using the most powerful computers with state-of-the-art technology. Some of the world’s largest integral-equation problems in computational electromagnetics have been solved at Bilkent University Computational Electromagnetics Research Center (BiLCEM). Most recently, we have achieved the solution of 550,000,000×550,000,000 dense matrix equations! This achievement is an outcome of a multidisciplinary study involving physical understanding of electromagnetics problems, novel parallelization strategies (computer science), constructing parallel clusters (computer architecture), advanced mathematical methods for integral equations, fast solvers, iterative methods, preconditioners, and linear algebra.
In this presentation, following a general introduction to our work in computational electromagnetics, I will continue to present fast and accurate solutions of large-scale electromagnetic modeling problems involving three-dimensional geometries with arbitrary shapes using the multilevel fast multipole algorithm (MLFMA) and parallel MLFMA. Some of the complicated real-life problems (such as, scattering from a realistic aircraft) involve geometries that are larger than 1000 wavelengths. Accurate solutions of such problems can be used as reference data for high-frequency techniques. Solutions of extremely large canonical benchmark problems involving sphere and NASA Almond geometries will be presented, in addition to the solution of complicated objects, such as metamaterial problems, red blood cells, and dielectric photonic crystals. Solving the world’s largest computational electromagnetics problems has important implications in terms of obtaining the solution of previously intractable physical, real-life, and scientific problems in various areas, such as (subsurface) scattering, optics, bioelectromagnetics, metamaterials, nanotechnology, remote sensing, etc.
Biography:
Prof. Levent Gurel (Fellow of IEEE, ACES, and EMA) is the Director of the Computational Electromagnetics Research Center (BiLCEM) at Bilkent University, Ankara, Turkey. He received the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) in 1988 and 1991, respectively, in electrical and computer engineering. He joined the IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center, Yorktown Heights, New York, in 1991. Since 1994, he has been a faculty member in the Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering of the Bilkent University, Ankara, where he is currently a Professor, and a Visiting/Adjunct Professor at UIUC since 2003. Among the recognitions of Prof. Gürel’s accomplishments, the two prestigious awards from the Turkish Academy of Sciences (TUBA) in 2002 and the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TUBITAK) in 2003 are the most notable. Prof. Gürel is currently serving as an associate editor of Radio Science, IEEE Antennas and Wireless Propagation Letters (AWPL), Journal of Electromagnetic Waves and Applications (JEMWA), and Progress in Electromagnetics Research (PIER). He is named an IEEE Distinguished Lecturer for 2011-2013 and invited to address the 2011 ACES Conference as a Plenary Speaker.
Thursday, Feb 21, 2013 at Texas Instruments, 2900 Semiconductor Dr., Santa Clara, CA 95051
Title: Advanced EDA Tools for Multi-Radio High-Frequency Accurate IC Design
Speaker: Yasser Hussein, PedaSoft
Abstract:
Advances in technology have enabled the possibilities to integrate multi-band and multi-mode radios into single packaged chips covering the diversity of communication standards from 2G GSM, 3G UMTS, to 4G LTE and LTE-advanced as well as WLAN, BT, and GPS impart unique challenges on the RF CAD/EDA due to the high complexity and integration of such chips. Existing EDA tools to model/simulate RF-chip performance, model the active and passive components separately. Subsequently, the designer uses simple calculations (or co-simulation) to approximate the performance of the overall RF design. Such calculations or methodologies were somewhat effective in the past but result in grossly inaccurate results for today’s complex chips. The consequence is excessive design cycles (typically 3 to 4), high costs and ultimately lost time-to-market opportunities. For today’s complex chips, a designer needs to simulation the IC package as a whole to include electromagnetic coupling, interference, and radiation.
The focus in this talk will be on the challenges and requirements as well as the latest trends on multi-radio EDA. Detailed overview and comparison will be provided of today EDA tools with emphasis on PedaSoft’s tools. Design challenges and examples will be given including PA design, switch design, and integrated antenna switch module design.
Biography
Dr. Yasser Hussein received his Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ in 2003. From 2003 to 2006, he was a Member of Research Staff at Stanford University’s SLAC. During the Spring of 2005, he was a Lecturer with the Electrical Engineering Department, Stanford University, where he developed and lectured a new course concerning advances in RF modeling and design. From 2005 to 2007, he led the RF design team and was the principle technical contributor for Intel’s Wireless Laminate Module (WLM) technology and product development that integrated the radio, including the power amplifier, and the base band in a single packaged laminate module for the first time at Intel. In 2007, he joined PedaSoft, a start-up company, where he is now the Chief Technology Officer.
Dr. Hussein is an IEEE Senior Member, nominated member for the US National Committee of the International Union of Radio Science (USNC-URSI), nominated member for Sigma Xi, Listed in Who’s Who in America, reviewer for several journals including IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Techniques, Antennas and Propagations, Microwave Magazine, and Magnetics. He has a book chapter on advanced RF design and more than 25 lead-author publications in refereed Journals and conference proceedings, as well as a patent pending at USPO. He has been a speaker for more than 40 talks on advanced RF design including invited talks at Intel, Analog Devices, Sigrity, Skyworks, Triquint, Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL-Caltech.), and several IEEE societies (MTT-S & AP-S) including Santa Clara and Silicon Valley Chapters, and MTT Symposia.