Thursday 15
"BAE Systems Australia today welcomed the announcement
by the Minister for Defence, Senator the Hon Marise Payne and the Minister for Defence
Industry, the Hon Christopher Pyne that the Company has been selected to upgrade Australia's
long-range high frequency radar network. The
Jindalee Operational Radar Network (JORN) protects Australia's coastal
approaches through a network of three remote radars in Queensland, Western Australia
and the Northern Territory. The radars play a vital role in supporting the Australian
Defence Force's air and maritime ..."
"Viasat has announced the availability of the ViaSat-2 satellite communications (SATCOM) service for government,
defense and military applications. The service leverages the most advanced communications
satellite, ViaSat-2, along with innovations in ground networking technologies, that will
deliver significant performance advantages over any other commercial or U.S. Department
of Defense (DoD) SATCOM system. In early March 2018, Viasat conducted a ViaSat-2 SATCOM
system demonstration ..."
Mac and Barney discuss with some degree of trepidation
the alarmingly increasing rate at which new
electronics technology is being developed and marketed. As service shop owner and
technician, respectively, they needed to constantly educate themselves on new components
and circuits in order to stay current and be efficient enough to turn a profit. Mac recounts
his lengthy background beginning with the days of mainly battery-powered AM radios, and
progressing through AC-DC, FM and all-band (shortwave) radio, B&W television and
the color TV, CB radios, and a new breed of appliances with electronic controls ...
"The U.S. communications agency says tiny Internet
of Things satellites from
Swarm Technologies could endanger other spacecraft. On 12 January,
a Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) rocket blasted off from India's eastern coast.
While its primary cargo was a large Indian mapping satellite, dozens of secondary CubeSats
from other countries traveled along with it. Seattle-based Planetary Resources supplied
a spacecraft that will test prospecting tools for future asteroid miners ..."
Innovative Power Products introduces their latest
90° SMD Coupler that operates over the full 690 – 6000 MHz. band. Our new
Model IPP-7148, handles 130 watts CW and comes in a small
SMD Style package which is only 0.50 x 1.00 x 0.167 inches. The IPP-7148 will combine
two signals up to 130 Watts CW of total output power. This coupler has very good amplitude
balance across the whole band and insertion loss of <0.80 dB. The VSWR is less
than 1.35:1 with greater than 16.5 dB of Isolation making them ideal for commercial,
industrial or military ...
"China's twin-launch Chang'e 4 mission to the
far side of the moon will place a pair of microsatellites in lunar orbit this spring
'to test low-frequency radio astronomy and space-based interferometry.' The two satellites,
unofficially called
DSLWP-A1 and DSLWP-A2 (DSLWP = Discovering the Sky at Longest Wavelengths
Pathfinder), could launch this spring. The pair represent the first phase of the Chang'e
4 mission, which involves placing a relay satellite in a halo orbit to facilitate communication
with the Chang'e 4 lander and rover ..."
Wednesday 14
"A new method to produce large, monolayer single-crystal-like
graphene films more than a foot long relies on harnessing a 'survival
of the fittest' competition among crystals. The novel technique, developed by a team
led by the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory, may open new opportunities
for growing the high-quality two-dimensional materials necessary for long-awaited practical
applications. Making thin layers of graphene and other 2D materials on a scale required
for research ..."
Photodiodes and phototransistors were relatively
new on the electronics scene in 1969 when this article appeared in Electronics World
magazine. Prior to semiconductor light detectors, vacuum phototubes did the job in cameras,
motion sensors, light level detectors, medical imaging equipment, etc. High voltages
and the large volume for containing components supporting vacuum tubes created hazards
(especially with medical equipment), inconvenience, and high cost. What we take for granted
nowadays in terms of price, performance ...
"Temperatures below 3 millikelvin can be maintained
for seven hours. High-tech refrigerators have been used to reach temperatures as close
to absolute zero as possible - 0 kelvin or −273.15 °C. Physicists aim to cool
equipment to as close to absolute zero as possible, because these extremely low temperatures
offer the ideal conditions for quantum experiments, and allow entirely new physical phenomena
to be examined. A
nanoelectronic chip was successfully cooled to a temperature lower
than 3 millikelvin using ..."
Rohde & Schwarz is offering at no cost a variety
of reference charts (posters) for hanging on your lab or office wall, and some handy-dandy
Pocket Guides.
In the current age of (seemingly) paperless offices and laboratories, opening a cardboard
package from R&S containing the pictured items caused me to wax nostalgic over the
days when sales reps handed out such materials during workplace meetings and at trade
shows. Wall charts are still fairly easily obtained, but the spiral-bound pocket guides
are more rare. Maybe soon we'll be seeing the resurrection of cardboard slide rule calculators ...
Triad
RF Systems announces the TA1014 is a lightweight and high power linear power amplifier
that works from 1400-1600 MHz. The TA1014 is compatible with high data rate signals
such as 4k video, making it ideal for mobile sports broadcast applications, as well as
anywhere that high power and portability are key. This amplifier also boasts an impressive
40 watts of output power for its small size. This class AB GaN module is designed
for both military and commercial applications. It is capable of ...
"U.S. researchers have made on-chip inductors
smaller by adding 'kinetic inductance' to conventional magnetic inductance. The work
cuts the size of 10-50 GHz inductors by a third. Kinetic inductance arises from
the physical momentum of charge carriers resisting the change in current direction associated
with a change in electric field, according to the team, from the University of California,
Santa Barbara. Any kinetic inductance created appears in series with the conventional
magnetic inductance of the inductors ..."
Tuesday 13
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Although the article's title specifies "electronic
hobbyist," the advice applies equally well to students and professional technicians and
engineers. A few of the
tools are no longer available from the original manufacturers, but modern equivalents
- often of better design and quality - are available. If you are nostalgic for the originals,
though, you can always look for them on eBay; there's not much you cannot find there
if you wait long enough. To show how much times have changed, get a load of (pun intended)
that pistol-shaped soldering gun. Can you imagine the mayhem that would ensue if it ...
"It's probably no surprise that the
job outlook for engineers is positive. In a January Bureau of Labor
Statistics report, employment in the electrical and electronics space is expected to
grow seven percent by the year 2026. To capitalize on the country's economic growth,
organizations are expanding and looking for more workers to fill traditional roles in
addition to new and emerging positions. As such, the engineering market is experiencing
a lower unemployment rate compared to the national average, with tens of thousands of
jobs expected to ..."
The
Link Gain Calculator is
RFOptic's helpful online tool to calculate the link gain and the optical predicted parameters
for RFOptic's RFoF programmable product line. It is designed for the programmable RFoF
family - 2.5 GHz, 3 GHz, 4 GHz and 6 GHz. It is designed for the users of programmable
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be set up to meet their required RFoF link budget. They also have a useful
Radar Testing
Directory with webinars, white papers, tutorials, and more ...
"For most of the world a motorcycle or a scooter
is a basic means of transportation. Cheap to purchase and operate, and easy to park on
crowded city streets, commuting on two wheels is a way of life. This is especially in
emerging markets where a motorcycle or scooter is an attractive alternative to a bicycle,
a public bus, or walking. In the 1950s and 1960s in the U.S., motorcycles had a utilitarian
purpose too, but somehow, during the 1980s and 1990s, motorcycles, and in particular
U.S.-built
Harley Davidson motorcycles, became lifestyle ..."
Monday 12
"According to researchers at Oregon State University's
College of Engineering, vertical structures are difficult to print with a liquid metal
due to the low viscosity and high surface tension of the gallium alloy. The team in the
college's Collaborative Robotics and Intelligent Systems Institute put nickel nanoparticles
into galinstan, a liquid metal alloy, to thicken it into a paste with a consistency suitable
for additive manufacturing. According to the team, the resulting rheological modification
of the liquid metal ..."
David Corman, of Anokiwave, has a good article
on
silicon phased array antennas. This concept, using printed arrays,
is gaining popularity for providing steerable beams in WiFi hotspots, Bluetooth, small
cells, etc., where a dense communications environment generates too much ambient signal
presence for long enough range. Now, implementation in silicon for mm-wave antenna arrays
is being investigated. "Using active antennas allows highly-directive antenna beams to
be formed by physically-small apertures, which helps offset the higher path loss associated ...
To be or not to be - that is the question: Whether
'tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous bi-annual clock
shifts, or to take up arms against a sea of contradicting justifications for and against
the existence of DST, and by opposing, end it. Twice each year, a majority of the western
world is subject to a manmade disruption in circadian and habitual cycles with an inane
one-hour clock change on and off of "Daylight
Saving(s) Time" (DST). Some historians claim that Benjamin Franklin joked about DST
in the 18th century, but it was New Zealander George Hudson who proposed the modern day
clock ...
Since
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"In the original
Maxwell's demon thought experiment, a demon makes continuous measurements
on a system of hot and cold reservoirs, building up a thermal gradient that can later
be used to perform work. As the demon's measurements do not consume energy, it appears
that the demon violates the second law of thermodynamics, although this paradox can be
resolved by considering that the demon uses information to perform its sorting tasks.
It's well-known that when a quantum system is continuously ..."
Sunday 11
For the sake of all the avid cruciverbalists amongst
us, each week I create a new
technology-themed crossword puzzle using only words from my custom-created lexicon
related to engineering, science, mathematics, chemistry, physics, astronomy, etc. You
will never find among the words names of politicians, mountain ranges, exotic foods or
plants, movie stars, or anything of the sort. You might, however, see someone or something
in the exclusion list who or that is directly related to this puzzle's theme, such as
Hedy Lamar or the Bikini Atoll, respectively ...
Friday 9
"The original arguments Congress made for 'springing
ahead' have been thoroughly debunked. So why are they still being used today? One hundred
years after Congress passed the first daylight saving legislation, lawmakers in Florida
this week passed the 'Sunshine Protection Act,' which will make daylight saving a year-round
reality in the Sunshine State. If approved by the federal government, this will effectively
move Florida's residents one time zone to the east, aligning cities ..."
IEEE COMSOC is conducting a 4 day, intermediate
level
Intensive Wireless Communications Course covering 7 key areas. Tuesday,
April 10th through Friday, April 13th from 9:00 am to 3:00 pm EDT. Attend this
20-hour course online via WebEx. Instructor Alan Bensky will cover basic radio engineering
fundamentals, propagation, smart antennas, beam forming, radio receiver characteristics,
multiple access technologies, cellular network architecture and evolution through LTE
and LTE, Wi-Fi security in GSM through LTE and more ...
"Cornell University has demonstrated a GaN phase-transition
FET based on loading a metal-oxide-semiconductor high-electron-mobility transistor (MOS-HEMT)
with a vanadium dioxide (VO2) resistor. The combination enabled very low leakage along
with sub-thermionic subthreshold steep-switching behavior. The researchers comment: 'This
first demonstration of ultralow-leakage steep switching in GaN phase-FETs using integration-friendly
ALD VO2 opens the door ..."
Robert Radford's (not to be confused with Robert
Redford) "Electromaze"
is a unique - and weird - sort of word puzzle that appeared in the April 1966 issue of
Popular Electronics magazine. You will probably want to print out the maze grid
and find an old guy who should still have a pencil stowed away somewhere you can borrow
to use for filling in the boxes. Note that in my opinion the answer given for clue number
2 is technically wrong. What say you? ...
The New Rohde & Schwarz
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2 or 3 Channels, 33.6 W each. 0 V to 32 V and 0 A to 3 A per
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overpower and over-temperature protection. USB and optional LAN or W-LAN interface. Starting
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of functions that are usually not found in this class of power supplies. All operating
conditions of all channels are ...
Martin Rowe, over at EDN, has been "Mr. Test &
Measurement." I knight him with that title based on his many years writing for the long-ago
absorbed trade magazine Test & Measurement World. Mention of this article
was motivated by the photo of the small anechoic measurement enclosure by
octoScope. Note that it is not
a TEM cell, which is characterized by its tetrahedral shape and accommodates a wide range
of frequencies. octoBox is a special purpose, limited range test environment. As with
so many things these days, you can outfit just about any T&M setup with mostly prefabricated
components ...
"A new laser system that can make precise measurements
of distance at record-breaking speed has been unveiled by researchers at Germany's Karlsuhe
Institute of Technology (KIT) and the Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL)
in Switzerland. Made using optical frequency combs, the system can measure the surface
profile of a speeding bullet. Modern technologies such as aerial drones, observation
satellites, self-driving cars and manufacturing robots need to make rapid, highly-accurate
measurements of distances to ..."
Thursday 8
Microwave Journal's Technical Education Webinar
Series is presenting "Design Innovations in 5G mm-Wave FEMs and Phased Arrays." Date: March
14, 2018, Time: 11am ET. Sponsored by: GlobalFoundries. "5G is the new generation of
radio systems and network architecture. It will deliver faster data rates, lower latency
connectivity and higher bandwidths in the millimeter wave (mm-Wave) bands (28, 39, 60,
86 GHz, …) to support many different applications including: 5G handsets, wireless infrastructure,
WiGig, ADAS, small cells and LEO/GEO broadband ..."
The initial part of this article, The Sarasota
Mystery, appeared in the previous issue (March). Mr. Minto is still scratching his
head over hydronic communications ...
After reading both this article and "The
Sarasota Mystery First Follow-Up" article in the April 1966 issue of Popular
Electronics, I'm convinced that the inventor Wallace Minto either did not understand
the phenomenon he describes, or he's out to punk the reader. If this initial article
had been printed in the April issue rather than March, it almost certainly would have
to have been a Fool's scam. Minto believes he has discovered a new form of electromagnetic
propagation that exploits molecular / atomic properties of water to transmit the signal
- without attenuation and without picking up noise. If it ...
"Here's what I'd like to know: Is
short-range wireless really radio? Most of the wireless standards
we use daily are considered short-range technologies. The question is, just what is short
range? For standards like Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, ZigBee, Z-Wave, and others, it ranges from
a few feet up to 100 meters or so. The range varies widely with frequency, power level,
antennas, as well as many environmental conditions. These are radio technologies. Then
there are some wireless tech that have a very short range. Short ..."
ConductRF's
FPA RF Cable Assemblies
provide a cost effective high performance solution for applications typically supported
by Semi-Rigid or high cost flexible precision cables. Multi-layer shielded cable provides
both flexibility and form-ability by combining a flexible spiral foil over which is a
tin plated copper braid which can be formed. This create a half-way situation, but with
added benefits of lower costs, improved performance and enhanced shielding. Flexible
Low Loss RF cables with direct solder connectors. Custom marking available on ...
"The government announced plans to study the possibility
of sharing or clearing a 100 megahertz swath of spectrum for high-speed mobile broadband.
David Redl, administrator of the National Telecommunications and Industry Administration,
said in a Feb. 26 blog post that 100 MHz in the
3450-3550 MHz band, used by the Department of Defense for military
radar, could be a key asset in expanding the U.S. broadband spectrum inventory. Under
the Spectrum Pipeline Act, passed in 2015 with the budget bill, agencies can ..."
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