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archives
Wednesday 10
 "Metalenses - flat surfaces that use nanostructures
to focus light - promise to revolutionize optics by replacing the bulky, curved
lenses currently used in optical devices with a simple, flat surface. But, these
metalenses have remained limited in the spectrum of light they
can focus well. Now a team of researchers at the Harvard John A. Paulson School
of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) has developed the first single lens
that can focus the entire visible spectrum of light - including white light - in
the same spot and in high resolution. This has only ever..."
ARRL Handbook for Radio Communications
2018 Available
 You would be hard pressed to find a better
single source for basic to mid-range level source for electronics information than
the
ARRL Handbook for Radio Communications. Such has been the case
since its first publication in 1926. This fully revised 95th edition has been
extensively updated, and includes significant new content, including digital
processing and Software Defined Radio techniques. Antennas, power supplies,
frequency conversion, filters, amplifiers, grounding, safety, and many other
topics are covered. Buy one for yourself and one for a friend. I just checked
and my newest personal edition 2012 - tempus fugit...
 Being the birthday of Dr. Robert W.
Wilson, there is no better occasion to post this article about the "sugar-scoop" antenna used by the two Bell Telephone Labs
engineers (the other being Dr. Arno A. Penzias) who serendipitously discovered
the cosmic microwave background radiation (CMBR) believed to be a signature of
"The Big Bang." The pair were investigating an unexplained hiss in the
background of the very low noise receiver attached to the antenna. That
microwave energy was constant and came from all areas of the sky, regardless of
where the antenna was pointed. They eventually deduced that the signature was
consistent with...
 Skyworks Solutions today introduced
Sky5™, its suite of solutions that will support 5G wireless
communications and enable a multitude of new and previously unimagined
applications across mobile and Internet of Things (IoT) ecosystems. With decades
of experience in developing innovative connectivity platforms for each previous
generation of wireless standards, Skyworks is leveraging its vast technology
portfolio, systems expertise, leadership scale and strong customer relationships
to accelerate the deployment of 5G. Skyworks' Sky5™ solutions...
 Another new year is upon us already. If you resolved
to find a new job or improve your current job in 2018, then there's time like the
present to begin.
High-Paying Jobs You Can Get with an Associate Degree is an example
of a unique and useful subject since there are a lot of people who either cannot
afford the time and money needed to earn a Bachelors degree, or simply do not want
the sort of job where a higher degree is required. For a lot of jobs, being labeled
a "professional" is just a way to have yourself exempted from labor laws...
-
How to Ask for Your Job Back and Get Rehired, by Alison Doyle
-The Rules for Job Searching are Different in January, by Vicki
Salemi
-
Ways Your LinkedIn Feed Can Lead to a Job, by Arnie Fertig
 "Giving gadgets brains will be a hot theme
at the
2018 Consumer Electronics Show set to open in Las Vegas, with
device makers big and small touting hardware with 'smarts.' Whether it's a
doorbell or refrigerator, a TV set or a toothbrush, chances are it will be
connected to digital assistants powered by artificial intelligence aiming to
anticipate needs or desires. 'I think you're going to see the year of smart,'
said Jack Gold, a technology analyst with J. Gold Associates. One of the
largest..."
Tuesday 9
 "Researchers in the USA have been studying
III-nitride resonant tunneling diodes (RTDs) at room temperature and below. The
team from Cornell University, University of Notre Dame, and University of Utah,
reports: 'Resonant tunneling transport via the ground state and first excited state
over a wide temperature window is demonstrated for the first time in
III-nitride RTDs. These findings represent a significant step
forward in resonant tunneling, intersubband-based physics..."
 UHF RFID technology is being adopted by a variety
of applications such as inventory control tracking, race timing, attendee tracking,
access control, and more. A significant challenge for RF / microwave designers is
performance degradation of UHF RFIDs due to RF interference. Professor Wang-Sang
Lee and his team at Gyeongsang National University in Korea used NI AWR Design Environment,
specifically Visual System Simulator™ design software, to consider theEMI effects
of an RFID signal and to analyze the impact of RF interference...
 Hewlett Packard introduced their electronic
HP-35 Scientific Calculator in 1972. It was not the world's first
pocket-size electronic calculator - that distinction went to the Busicom
LE-120A. However it was the first to be designed for the science, engineering,
and financial communities with its many built-in math functions. Its use of
Reverse Polish Notation might have scared off many would-be users who were
easily confused by anything other than the traditional notation (algebraic) that
mimics written form; i.e., 2 + 3 = 5 (ALG), as opposed to 2 3 + [=]
5 (RPN). Wisely, HP...
 Does your company make products that RF Cafe
visitors use, like RF and microwave filters, amplifiers, couplers, mixers, etc.,
simulation software, test equipment, or provide design services, educational material,
etc? If so and you are in the habit of publishing
Press Releases, Product Updates, Product Announcements, etc.,
you are welcome to send them to me for consideration for posting on RF Cafe.
With typically 6,000 to 10,000 website visitors each weekday, the exposure can
be pretty good. A quick scan of the current RF Cafe homepage will...
 ERZIA produces microwave and millimeter wave
modular amplifiers and integrated
assemblies operating from Low frequencies up to 100 GHz. Our catalogue of
standard amplifier modules comprises more than 100 different models, having also
a high capacity of customization for amplifiers and integrated assemblies. Some
of our products have space heritage and are used in aerospace, commercial,
military and scientific systems, having a wide range of final applications and
focusing in excellent performance and reliability. Please contact ERZIA today to
learn more...
 "An electricity-conducting, environment-sensing,
shape-changing machine the size of a human cell? Is that even possible? Cornell
physicists Paul McEuen and Itai Cohen not only say yes, but they've actually built
the 'muscle' for one. With postdoctoral researcher Marc Miskin at the helm, the
team has made a robot exoskeleton that can rapidly change its shape upon sensing
chemical or thermal changes in its environment. And, they claim, these microscale
machines ' equipped with electronic, photonic and chemical payloads ' could
become a powerful platform..."
Monday 8
 Aethercomm designs and manufactures RF and Microwave
amplifier modules, subsystems and systems. The majority of our work is custom. The
reliability and effectiveness of thousands of Aethercomm products has been tested
and proven in combat, helping to protect and save the lives of our warfighters.
Aethercomm is looking to fill an RF Test Technician, Production position. Essential
Duties and Responsibilities include the following: A thorough understanding
and be able to demonstrate all of the RF and DC testing that is completed in support
of production hardware...
 Uh-oh -- "More than 15 inches (40 cm) has
blanketed sand dunes across the small town of Ain Sefra, Algeria. It is the second
time snow has hit in nearly 40 years, with a dusting also recorded in December 2016.
But this
snowfall which hit yesterday, is much deeper than the fleeting
shower little more than a year ago. Locals, who endure temperatures of 37C in
summer, were stunned as dense snow settled on the town, known as 'the gateway to
the desert.' Children made snowmen and even..."
 I was first introduced to the concept of
receiver noise figure at the start of my engineering career in
1989 at General Electric AESD in Utica, NY. During my four years in the U.S. Air
Force working on airport surveillance and precision approach radars, I do not
recall having ever heard the term noise figure or noise temperature. We did
signal to noise and signal sensitivity measurements as part of the normal
maintenance, but the terms never arose. Ditto for my courses at the UVM. We
never did cascade parameter calculations for noise figure, intercept points,
compression points, etc. That is primarily the realm of practicing...
Please take a few moments to visit the
everythingRF website to see how they can assist you with your
 project. everythingRF is a product discovery
platform for RF and Microwave Products and Services. They currently have 169,552
Products from more than 1040 Companies across 258 Categories in our database and
enable engineers to search for them using their customized parametric search
tool...
 "After all the relaxation and overindulgence
of the holiday season, most people have returned to the office and are back into
the working groove. Looking ahead to 2018, workers in some countries are facing
a far longer shift than others. According to the OECD, Mexicans
work the most hours out of any country every year, 2,246 on
average. That's 467 more hours than the average American every year and for less
than a fifth of the pay. Even though the South Korean government has scrambled
to reduce working hours in recent years..."
 "For the first time, physicists have
built a two-dimensional experimental system that allows them to study the
physical properties of materials that were theorized to exist only in
4-dimensional space. An international team of researchers from Penn State, ETH
Zurich in Switzerland, the University of Pittsburgh, and the Holon Institute of
Technology in Israel have demonstrated that the behavior of particles of light
can be made to match predictions about the four-dimensional version of the
'quantum Hall effect'..."
Sunday 7
 At least 10 clues with an asterisk (*)
in this
crossword puzzle are pulled from this past week's (1/1 - 1/7)
"Tech Industry Headlines" column on the RF Cafe homepage
(see the Headline Archives page for help). For the sake of all the avid
cruciverbalists amongst us, each week I create a new technology-themed crossword
puzzle using only words related to engineering, science, mathematics, chemistry,
physics, astronomy, etc. Enjoy...
Friday 5
 Engineering and science magazines, websites,
and discussion panels frequently report on and lament the lack of
women and minorities in both realms. You might think this is a
relatively new concern since, but as evidenced by this 1972 Popular Electronics
tidbit the effort to attract women and minorities into the fields has been going
on for half a century. At the time, women and minorities made up about 2% of
undergraduates in engineering curricula. The proportion was 20% as of 2015
according to a recent report by the ASEE. During that same time period (1970),
according to the National Center for Education...
 "Researchers at TU Delft and University of
New South Wales have designed a scalable
quantum computing architecture based on widely used
complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) manufacturing techniques. The
approach encodes information in the spins of individual electrons confined in
quantum dots, and could allow the development of large-scale computers
incorporating millions of qubits. For now, the state of the art in quantum
computing is represented by devices with a few..."
 Pasternack has unveiled a new line of
phase locked oscillators (PLO) that deliver accurate and stable
output frequencies with low phase noise and spurious performance, making them ideal
for use in radar and other exciter or frequency generation applications. Pasternack's
20 new phase locked oscillator models are offered with popular fixed output
frequencies of 50, 100, 500, 1000, 2000, 4000 and 6000 MHz. Typical performance
for these PLOs includes excellent phase noise of -105 dBc/Hz at 10 kHz offset, a
buffered...
 As mentioned often here on RF Cafe,
especially with an ever-increasing amount of devices and appliances with "no user
serviceable parts inside," the demand for electronics technicians is as great today
as it was decades ago. Associated equipment is significantly different now and a
lot more of it consists of swap-out modules and assemblies rather than performing
repairs in the field. However, there still exists a significant amount of
legacy electronics everywhere, and it all needs to be
maintained until upgrades are installed. There...
 Raghav Kapur, of the
everything RF website, has written a short article about the major
acquisitions and mergers of 2017. "The year of 2017 saw a host
of mergers and acquisitions taking place round the year in the RF & Microwave
industry.  The
zeal to become global power-houses for some and the need to boost their
technological supremacy for others resulted in a number of mergers and
acquisitions. While Broadcom's unsuccessful acquisition bid for Qualcomm
remained the highlight of all, Keysight's acquisition of Ixia and Qualcomm's
acquisition bid for NXP also proved to be be industry..."
 "The ability to work-out the
Casimir force between arbitrarily-shaped objects could be one
step closer thanks to work done by physicists in the U.S. The team used an atomic
force microscope to measure the force between two gold-coated spheres. This is unlike
most experiments today, which are limited to measuring the Casimir force between
a flat surface and a sphere. The research could lead to a better understanding of
the Casimir force in complicated geometries - something that would be very..."
Thursday 4
 "Before we get to already-anticipated 6G,
this coming year will see all eyes on 5G, which is only just starting to emerge
from R&D labs, and will continue to develop and get implemented over the next
half a decade. There's no denying the dramatic ways in which mobile and wireless
computing have changed the world; whether in how people work, learn, play or
socialize. Many can't get through a productive day without mobile connectivity,
and yet, technologically, we're still at the very earliest stages of 'continuous
computing' or “ubiquitous..."
 Passive repeater antennas have been used
for a long time to overcome line-of-sight-limitations of many - if not most - of
the radio communications universe. Properly designed and implemented
passive repeaters can exhibit very high levels of efficiency,
and in some cases can actually provide gain by focusing signals impinging on a
large panel of multiple wavelength dimensions onto a smaller transmitter or
receiver antenna. That is known as aperture gain. Optical telescopes are a good
analogy where for the same level of magnification at a given wavelength, a
larger aperture (refractive lens or reflector mirror) results in a brighter
image at your retina or CCD...
 "The technique can use multiple metals and
substrates and is compatible with existing
electro-hydrodynamic printing technology, which is already
used in many manufacturing processes that use functional inks. However, instead
of ink, the process uses molten metal alloys with melting points as low as 60°C.
The team has demonstrated the technique using three different alloys, printing
on four different substrates: one glass, one paper and two stretchable polymers.
'Flexible electronics hold promise..."
 The good folks at Copper Mountain Technologies
collaborated with Microwave Journal to offer you this eBook titled, "Precision Antenna Measurement Guide." According to Microwave
Journal editor Patrick Hindle, "Antenna measurements are difficult to make
due to their multi-directional nature, their cables/connections to equipment and
interfering signals in the environment. The measurement setup, surrounding
environment and physical connections all need to be carefully specified and
setup, paying close attention to the instruments and materials used." Follow
this link to download the eBook...
 "Weyl particles are not particles which can move on their own (like
electrons or protons), they only exist as 'quasiparticles' within a solid material.
Now, for the first time, such Weyl particles has been found in a special kind of
material, which is particularly interesting for novel technological applications:
scientists have measured Weyl fermions in a material with highly correlated electrons.
Surprisingly, these fermions move very slowly, despite having no mass. There was
great excitement back in 2015, when it was first possible to measure these 'Weyl
fermions' - outlandish..."
Wednesday 3
 "Open Garden on Monday announced the launch
of a new
peer-to-peer service that allows users to share Internet connections
and unused plan data for free, with compensation in a new Ethereum cryptocurrency
as an extra incentive. The company is offering the service through an app that
can be downloaded from Google Play. The system requires no hardware other than
an Android phone to participate in the Internet access sharing. The typical
customer will used the service for sharing a home or small business Internet
service, or to connect..."
 "Forecasts are mostly just guessing plus
math" - Dilbert,
12/1/2017. It was part of a dialog with the Pointy-Haired Boss who compelled
Dilbert to prepare a financial report for him...
 "Back in January, Telstra launched the world's
first gigabit LTE network in partnership with Ericsson, Qualcomm and Netgear.
Based off the LTE Advanced specification, gigabit LTE networks have three
fundamental building blocks: 4×4 multiple-input, multiple-output, multi-channel
carrier aggregation and 256 QAM. Since Telstra's launch, there are now 43 global
operators in 25 countries in various phases of deploying the bridge technology
that lays the groundwork for 5G. Off the top, it's important to note that
gigabit..."
 Sprague Electric engineer Benedict Rosen,
discusses how the characteristics of a circuit in need of protection against RF
interference needs to be considered when selecting filter components. He points
out that attempting to hang a shunt
feedthrough capacitor on the input and/or output of a low
impedance (e.g., 50 Ω) RF circuit could make the situation worse, depending on
whether the circuit is strongly capacitive or inductive in its out-of-band
region. Sprague was a major manufacturer of all sorts of capacitors qualified
for use in military and aerospace systems, so they put a lot of effort into
characterizing device parameters over a wide range of voltage, current, power,
temperature, mechanical, and frequency environments...
 Triad RF introduces a GaN amplifier, the
TA1203. The unit
operates from 4.4 GHz to 5.0 GHz, has 44 dB of gain, and produces
over 50 W PSat! DC input voltage can vary from +10 to +14 V and only draws
8 A at peak power. Do the math! That is 47% efficient! The module measures 6.1 x
3.3x 0.8 inches and is in stock. This class AB GaN module is designed for both
military and commercial applications. It is capable of supporting any signal
type and modulation format...
 "Fuel-efficient ships that produce no wakes
could soon be a reality thanks to computer simulations of 'water cloaks' done by two researchers in the U.S. Yaroslav Urzhumov
and Dean Culver of Duke University have shown that ions present in ocean water
can be accelerated by electromagnetic waves in such a way that any turbulence
created by sea-going vessels is cancelled out. Their work offers new
opportunities for creating ships with greater propulsion efficiency - and could
also be..."
Tuesday 2
Please welcome
Copper Mountain Technologies
as RF Cafe's newer advertiser. Copper Mountain Technologies develops innovative
and robust RF test and measurement solutions for engineers all over the world.
 Copper Mountain's extensive line of unique form
factor Vector Network
Anaalyzers include an RF measurement module and a software application which
runs on any Windows PC, laptop or tablet, connecting to the measurement hardware
via USB interface. The result is a lower cost, faster...
 This thoroughly updated 4th edition guide
by Ulrich Rohde, Jerry Whitaker, and Hans Zahnd offers comprehensive explanations
of the science behind today's
radio receivers along with practical guidance on designing, constructing,
and maintaining real-world communications systems. It explores system planning,
antennas and antenna coupling, amplifiers and gain control, filters, mixers, demodulation,
digital communication, and the latest SDR technology. This is a perfect companion
to RF Cafe's
Wireless System Designer software.
 Monostable multivibrator, one-shot multivibrator,
monocycle multivibrator - it's a matter of semantics, although
the circuit designer doesn't necessarily think so. The distinction, evidently,
is that this monocycle multivibrator uses a positive-going pulse as a trigger
and the output in its rest (stable) state is a digital "0" (low). A mere 2 mA of
current flows since all the unijunction transistors (UJTs) are turned off. A
UJT, to refresh your memory, is not used as a linear amplifier because of its
regenerative, negative resistance operating region that causes it to effectively
lock into a fully on or fully off conduction state until an external stimulus
causes...
 Aethercomm designs and manufactures RF and Microwave
amplifier modules, subsystems and systems. The majority of our work is custom. The
reliability and effectiveness of thousands of Aethercomm products has been tested
and proven in combat, helping to protect and save the lives of our warfighters.
Aethercomm is looking to fill a Senior RF Engineer position. Essential Duties
and Responsibilities include the following: Design, simulation, and verification
of DC and RF electronic designs to meet the commitments of the Engineering and...
 Anatech Electronics, a manufacturer of RF and
microwave filters, has published a
special newsletter for the end of the year. In it, Sam Benzacar
talks about all the good stuff in the queue for WiFi in 2018. There can be no doubt
that the number of WiFi-connected devices in the average home (10, per Sam's letter)
is growing at a rapid rate. Nest thermostats, Echos (Alexa AI), webcams, cell phones,
notebook computers, smart AC receptacles, WiFi-controlled light bulbs, among many
others. IEEE 802.11ax is providing 1024QAM modulation...
 "Researchers at TU Delft and University of
New South Wales have designed a scalable
quantum computing architecture based on widely used complementary
metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) manufacturing techniques. The approach encodes
information in the spins of individual electrons confined in quantum dots, and could
allow the development of large-scale computers incorporating millions of qubits.
Computing milestone For now, the state of the art in quantum computing is represented
by devices with a few dozen qubits: as of..."
Monday 1
 A full-featured RF system cascade parameter
and frequency planner that includes filters and mixers for a mere $45.
Wireless System Designer™ is the next phase in the evolution
of RF Cafe's long-running series, RF Cascade Workbook. Built in MS
Excel, using Wireless System Designer is a cinch and the format is
entirely customizable. It is significantly easier and faster than using a
multi-thousand dollar simulator when a high level system analysis is all that is
needed. An intro video takes you through the main features...
 "Physicists at the University of Basel have
succeeded in cooling a
nanoelectronic chip to the unfathomable temperature of less than
3 millikelvin. Researchers from the Department of Physics and the Swiss Nanoscience
Institute in collaboration with scientists from Germany and Finland used
magnetic fields to eliminate heat from the electrical connections as well as the
chip itself. Scientists all over the world have been working on techniques to
reach as close to zero as possible. Absolute zero..."
 This report, "Mapping the Swamp," provides an objective insight into how tax
dollars compensate the 1.97 million civil service Federal employees across the nation
(not inc'l military), who on average receive 10 paid
holidays, 13 sick and 20 vacations days/year. Data is culled from publically available
information (some not disclosed). This
Map gives names and salaries of individuals
(enter zip code, click pin to see what your Fed neighbor
makes). Average pay -- Engineer $108,768; Librarian $95,915; Lawyer $136,006;
Photographer $80,125. Notable quote: "You cannot advance the people's agenda unless
you drain the swamp in Washington, D.C." -
Rep. Nancy Pelosi (2006)
 Simmonds Precision Products, a company in
Vergennes, Vermont, which I worked for for a couple years prior to quitting to attend
the University of Vermont full-time to finish my electrical engineering degree,
had as one of their main products
capacitance-based fuel measurement systems for military and
commercial aircraft. As was common in the era, they made not only the
capacitance probes and associated electronics, but also the cockpit displays and
power supplies. Being a test technician at the time, I got a pretty good
exposure to the complexities of such a fundamentally simple principle as using
the...
 "One good indication the
satellite industry is undergoing a major transformation: In a
nail-biting race, Greg Wyler, the entrepreneur behind the satellite internet company
OneWeb, earned the title of 'Most Powerful Person in Telecom' in FierceWireless'
battle of the CEOs, edging past T-Mobile CEO John Legere and beating other industry
heavyweights like Apple's Tim Cook and Verizon's Lowell McAdam. It was a title
that came after Wyler was deemed the industry's top rising star for 2017. One
could argue it's a simple popularity contest, but a strong theme in Wyler's
rise..."
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