Technical Features

December 2016

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Figure 1: The connected nature of today’s vehicles requires efficient power chips to manage their many intelligent devices and connections

Why Automotive Qualification Still Matters in the Age of Software-Defined Vehicles

Craig Callahan (VP Quality), Wade Cole (Sr. Director HPA & CSG Quality) and David Schnaufer (Corporate, Technical Marketing Manager) at Qorvo

Today’s vehicles can include more than 100 electronic control units and millions of lines of code, supporting a range of functions, including infotainment, navigation, driver assistance, and powertrain control. As the shift to software-defined vehicles (SDV) accelerates, electronic components face heightened expectation

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Date:

12/03/2025

Dynamic power scaling

Bruce Petipas, Analog Devices

In today’s data acquisition systems (DAQs), performance boundaries are continually being pushed. System designers require higher speed, lower noise, and better total harmonic distortion (THD) performance; all of which are possible but none of which are free. These performance improvements typically co

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Date:

12/07/2016

The EPCOS PQSine active harmonic filter

Music to my ears

Dr. Richard Michelson, EPCOS, a TDK Company

To a non-engineer, the word “harmonics” has a beautiful sound – one that to many conjures up an image of a concert with instruments playing beautiful music. The harmony is what combines with the melody to turn the composition into something complex and beautiful rather than being just a simple tune. However, when most

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Date:

12/07/2016

The creepage distance is the shortest path between two conductors along the surface of an isolator (typically a PCB)

Safety vs. performance

Srivatsa Raghunath, Infineon Technologies

When designing a switch-mode power supply (SMPS) operating losses and the ability to dissipate heat are critical selection criteria for MOSFETs. The standard TO-220 package is generally good at dissipating heat and the wide range of heatsinks and forced-air cooling options available can easily improve this. Le

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Date:

12/04/2016