Bench Talk

Wide bandgap (WBG) technologies, such as gallium nitride (GaN), play a crucial role in answering the demand for greater efficiency, performance, and reliability of high-voltage systems.

From automotive radar to industrial automation, mmWave sensors can radically increase precision sensing of range, velocity, and object angle. With the ability to penetrate plastic, drywall, glass, and other materials even in challenging environmental conditions, mmWave Sensors will find their way into the next generation of autonomous vehicles, industrial processes, and more.

When I was young, as most aspiring engineers do, I dreamed of going to outer space, specifically Mars. And I thought the only way to get there was aboard the NASA space shuttle. The cancellation of the shuttle program crushed that boyhood dream of mine, or so I thought. The recent commercialization of satellites and launch services, that may someday provide space exploration, has kept that dream alive for all of us. With some new innovation and the decades of experience out there I believe they will be able to make this dream a reality.

Last month, I received a customer complaint about high-frequency spikes on the output of a DC/DC converter. I first reviewed the part’s schematic locations, and all of the necessary noise filtering was in place. High-quality input bypass caps were right at the power train, the correct main waveform snubber was in place, and the output had the needed high-frequency bypass caps.

Designing power supplies for factory-automation equipment such as programmable logic controllers , transmitters, automation machinery and human machine interfaces can come with a lot of challenges. Even as processing power continues to increase, printed circuit board (PCB) area and overall equipment sizes tend to remain the same. To meet these strict space constraints, power-supply designs should be compact but also operate efficiently and quietly; heat and noise are absolutely not permissible. In addition, there are multiple industrial power-supply requirements, including a wide-input voltage range, a small solution size and the ability to operate at a high temperature range. Power-supply designers must keep component counts and costs down while providing a reliable solution that doesn’t require a lot of debugging. So starting with an integrated and robust device is a high priority.