Design

Overview of EMI Shielding Compounds

Electromagnetic radiation that adversely affects device performance is generally termed EMI (ElectroMagnetic Interference). Interference takes many forms such as distortion on a television, disrupted/lost data on a computer, or “crackling” on a radio broadcast. Many electronic devices not only emit electromagnetic fields which might cause interference in other systems, but they are also susceptible to stray external fields which could affect its performance. As a result, they must be shielded to ensure proper performance.

Utilities operating nuclear power plants have been dealing with electromagnetic interference (EMI) problems for over two decades. Many early problems that affected the operation of instrumentation and control (I&C) equipment in plants stemmed from the use of wireless transmission devices (WTDs) (e.g., radio walkie-talkies, cellular phones, etc) inside the plant in the vicinity of system cabinets and cable trays carrying bundles of cables. A simple and partially effective method of reducing EMI events caused by WTDs has been to mark off exclusion zones around system cabinets and areas where I&C equipment is installed. The use of these zones has presented some problems for existing plants. For example, some plants have had to expand the area of some zones that became ineffective upon the use of new WTDs that evidently presented an increased risk to the operation and EMI protection of I&C equipment. The sizes of some expanded zones are larger than 2,000 square feet. In addition, some zones encroach upon human traffic areas used by plant personnel to move from area to area within a plant.

There may be a better use for PCB planes than to just distribute power, namely to provide shielding.

Antenna characteristics, such as input impedance are considerably deviated from those in free space when another antenna is located in the vicinity of the antenna. This often causes system degradation problems. In this article, effects of a parasitic wire located beneath the slotted ground plane are investigated on the coupling between monopole antennas above the ground plane. The method of moments is applied to the problem and a combined matrix formulation that includes mutual coupling effects between the elements located in both regions is newly introduced.  It is shown that a wire beneath the ground plane considerably affects coupling characteristics between two monopoles above the ground plane when the slot resonates.

A case study describing the influence of TFT LCD graphics on automotive radiated emissions testing and its impact to the FM band receiver. The underlying root-cause of the EMI issue is determined using a novel technique that decodes the display’s graphics into the transmitted RGB data and predicts the data’s impact to radiated emissions. The countermeasure implemented to resolve the issue is equally novel and does not involve any hardware optimizations. The use of test images to be used in component level EMC testing is also discussed.

Electromagnetic interference (EMI) filters are often used on automotive 13.8 VDC power networks to reduce high-frequency noise from being conducted off the printed circuit boards (PCB) and resulting into EMI problems. The filter performance is difficult to predict and often compromised at high frequencies due to parasitics associated with the filter itself, or the PCB layout. The power line filters with Surface Mount Technology ferrite and Multi Layer Ceramic Capacitors are attractive solutions for mitigation of RF noise in high-density automotive PCBs. A lumped-element SPICE model is introduced for optimized π-filter design, including frequency-dependent ferrite component model. The PCB implementation of EMI filter is outlined for optimum filter performance.

Military EMC design can be particularly vexing. Multiple environments combined with multiple threats lead to multiple requirements. The threat levels, and the resulting requirements, are usually more stringent than found in the commercial world.

A worldwide epidemic of counterfeit electronic components is flooding the market and affects the supply chains of all industries. It is estimated that the financial loss due to counterfeit components is over $10 billion per year. Counterfeiting itself becomes profitable when scrapped components, components from recycled products or inexpensive components can be “remarked” and sold as a new, more expensive, higher reliability version. Much of the effort today has not been placed on preventing counterfeiting but rather screening components to identify and remove counterfeits before they are used in a finished product.