A TRANSMISSION-LINE SIMULATOR FOR EMC IN COMPLEX ELECTRONIC SYSTEMS (EMCSIM)

Specifying electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) is a crucial step in th e performance evaluation of electrical and electronic systems. This pa per describes a circuit formulation for the EMC assessment of large an d complex systems. The proposed method is based on breaking the actual structure down into an aggregation of multiport devices: lumped-param eter circuits and distributed-parameter multiports. The multiconductor transmission line (MTL) model is used for the description of signal p ropagation along system interconnects: uniform, twisted and shielded l ines are considered. Accurate prediction models (including line losses and dispersion) are utilized for the quantitative evaluation of both intrasystem compatibility and susceptibility to radiated interference. The description of the network topology makes use of the concept of a n incidence matrix which is widely used in lumped-circuit theory. It i s extended here to the more general case of distributed networks. The entire analysis is carried out in the frequency domain and a transient response is obtained by using inverse Fourier and Laplace transforms. Noteworthy characteristics of the method can be seen in the simplicit y and effectiveness of the prediction models and in the minimal effort required for system description. The proposed method is especially si gnificant for complex systems, where the number of connecting structur es can be quite large.