Electro-Mechanical Structures for Channel Emulation

Abstract

Channel emulators are used to evaluate communication system performance either in absence of the real channel or to test the system's response for varying channel characteristics. For high speed differential digital channels bandwidths in excess of 20 GHz are common making it difficult to recreate the channel performance by electronic means such as FIR filters. An alternative solution is using a low loss short transmission line and having its properties modified by mechanical means. Passive structures are robust, have a frequency range only limited by the low loss trace, do not add noise, cannot be damaged by ESD and are very economical. This paper describes two electro-mechanical structures for introducing loss and nulling into the frequency response of a channel. The first part describes the design of a mechanically tuned quarter-wavelength stub filter that can be used to emulate the resonances of a channel. In the second part, an electromechanical structure, consisting of Bragg grating and lossy materials, is constructed to emulate the loss behaviour and the resonances of a channel.

Meeting Name

2014 IEEE International Symposium on Electromagnetic Compatibility (Aug. 3-8, Raleigh, NC)

Department(s)

Electrical and Computer Engineering

Research Center/Lab(s)

Electromagnetic Compatibility (EMC) Laboratory

Keywords and Phrases

Frequency response; Alternative solutions; Channel characteristics; Channel emulators; Communication system performance; Electro-mechanical; Passive structures; Quarter-wavelength; Short transmission lines; Electromagnetic compatibility

International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)

1077-4076

Document Type

Article - Conference proceedings

Document Version

Citation

File Type

text

Language(s)

English

Rights

© 2014 Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), All rights reserved.

Publication Date

01 Sep 2014

Link to Full Text

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