Electronic products defense spending on the radar AI, robotics, big data, cybersecurity, and resilience top priorities april 2018

APRIL 2018 DEFENSE SPENDING Also in this issue on the RADAR AI, robotics, big data, cybersecurity, and resilience top priorities page System integration considerations for heart rate sensing designs p13 AI alters auto design challenges p16 Modern portable devices require a new breed of LDOs p18 Advanced battery packages empower next-generation systems p21 An AspenCore Publication ELECTRONICPRODUCTS.COM Perfect match #REDFIT PCIM Europe Hall Booth 229 REDFIT IDC is a solderless reversible direct plug-in connector with SKEDD technology and n SKEDD Direct Plug-in Technology insulation displacement connection The SKEDD contacts are plugged directly into the plated n IDC Connection through-holes of a PCB n Solderless Solution n Simple to Plug & Unplug A complete part and a potential error source is eliminated This results directly in higher n Min 10 Mating Cycles process reliability, savings in space, material and process costs n Reverse Polarity Protection www.we-online.com/REDFIT CONTENTS Vol 60, No 9 April 2018 14 26 EDITORIAL STAFF Bolaji Ojo Global Editor-in-Chief Richard Quinnell Editor-in-Chief, richard.quinnell@aspencore.com • electronicproducts.com Majeed Ahmad Kamran Contributing Editor FEATURES Patrick Mannion Contributing Editor COVER STORY Mil/Aero Electronics Defense spending opens door to system technology innovations 13 Discrete Semiconductors System integration considerations for heart rate sensing designs 16 Automotive AI alters auto design challenges 21 Giulia Fini Graphic Designer Giulia Fini Cover Design Batteries Advanced battery packages empower next-generation systems SHOW WRAP-UPS Embedded World The expanding IoT: a visit to Embedded World 25 APEC APEC’s growth reflects the health of the power industry Product Trends: Packaging, Cabinets & Enclosures 27  Product Roundup: Electromechanical Components 29  New Products: 31  1-847-564-9453 Reprints ( Wright’s Media) 1-877-652-5295 • FAX: 516-667-2301 Victor Alejandro Gao Chairman Greg Rivera Group Publisher Electronics Group 31 Power Sources 32 Packaging & Interconnections Product Mart 32  APRIL 2018 • electronicproducts.com • ELECTRONIC PRODUCTS Subscriber Service Fax TEL: 516-667-2300 Outlook (Technology News): 6  The key to smarter, faster AI likely found by modeling moth brains Physicists to build laser so powerful it could rip apart fabric of space  tips on how to properly document a design so others can follow http://bit.ly/2FpMJ18 1-866-813-3752 Garden City, New York 11530 Publisher’s Perspective: Tribute to an American classic 5   attery sensor allows for Li-ion batteries to be B charged five times faster http://bit.ly/2FuOAhs Subscriber Service 1225 Franklin Avenue, Suite 400 Viewpoint: Fluffing the cloud 4   oogle’s new quantum processor aims to outperG form supercomputers http://bit.ly/2FuOS7U Lauren Heller Production Designer Published by AspenCore TOUCH POINTS ONLINE MUST-READS Nicole DiGiose Technical Content Manager Pam Fuentes Business Planning Analyst LDO Regulators Modern portable devices require a new breed of LDOs 23 Lori O’Toole Chief Copy Editor Max Teodorescu Digital Content Manager POWER DEVICES SPECIAL 18 Alix Paultre Contributing Editor SCAN TO DOWNLOAD EP CALCULATOR APP: Electronic Products Magazine (USPS 539490) (ISSN 0013-4953)— Published monthly by AspenCore, 1225 Franklin Avenue, Suite 400, Garden City, NY 11530 Periodicals postage paid Garden City, NY and additional mailing offices Electronic Products is distributed at no charge to qualified persons actively engaged in the authorization, recommendation or specification of electronic components, instruments, materials, systems and subsystems The publisher reserves the right to reject any subscription on the basis of information submitted in order to comply with audit regulations Paid subscriptions available: U.S subscriber rate $65 per year, years $110 Single issue, $6.00 Information contained herein is subject to change without notice No responsibility is assumed by the publisher for its accuracy or completeness Postmaster: Send address changes to Electronic Products, PO Box 489, Skokie, IL 60076-0489 Phone: 847-559-7317 ©2018 by AspenCore ALL RIGHTS RESERVED Publications Mail Agreement Number 40012807 Return Undeliverable Canadian Addresses to: Station A PO Box 12, Windsor, ON N9A 6J5 COVER IMAGE: SHUTTERSTOCK BEHLMAN AC POWER SOLUTIONS > RUGGED > ADAPTABLE > FLEXIBLE > MODIFIABLE > RELIABLE The right AC power SOLUTION at the right price Behlman has an ultra-reliable AC power supply or frequency converter that can be configured for your exact needs Our rugged rack-mounted and portable units deliver AC power at a low cost per watt – making us the choice for military and industrial applications for over 60 years > Avionics & aircraft 400Hz > Frequency conversion (50Hz, 60Hz or 400Hz) > Production test > Facility power > > > > Oil & gas exploration Railroad signaling Simulators & trainers Airborne, shipboard, ground and mobile The Power Solutions Provider : 631-435-0410 6065-Behlman-KnifeAd-ELECTRONIC-PRODUCTS-7.875x10.5.indd : sales@behlman.com : www.behlman.com 2/6/18 9:50 AM VIEWPOINT Fluffing the cloud T he electronic design engineering field is a fantastic place to be at any given point and especially so in these modern times The past two decades saw the groundwork laid for these exciting times in technologies like organic LEDs, wide-bandgap semiconductors, and the digital infrastructure These and other advanced core technologies enable and empower new solutions to serve existing application spaces and create and develop new ones APRIL 2018 • electronicproducts.com • ELECTRONIC PRODUCTS This synergistic development aspect of electronic design was very apparent these past weeks at the APEC and Embedded World shows as engineers from around the globe came together in San Antonio, Texas, and Nuremberg, Germany, to exchange ideas and look at the latest in embedded systems The booths at both events were crammed with the latest solutions available for applications both mature and speculative, and at each (some visitors, including me, bounced between both), there was a buzz of activity as company reps and visitors played with the demonstrations and bounced ideas off of one another The energy was palpable at each of the venues, and the energy of all of those people dealing with one another in these public marketplaces was palpable In this issue, we’ve pulled together some very cool examples of the latest technologies from both shows, and we hope this foments new ideas for new solutions with you One of the notable aspects of any new technology is that any given group of engineers will tell you several more applications than you thought of when developing it, and the number and quality of these new technologies are providing the foundation of the remaking of society The cloud and IoT are shaping society in fundamental ways, and you are the ones shaping the devices in it and the infrastructures supporting it Every device that you make is a voice in the great chorus of development moving society forward, and these exhibitions are the concert halls One positive aspect of Embedded World, for example, was the fact that most booths contained functional demonstrations of technology and not just displays of components and parts In the area of wireless, one of the trends that we observed was the final filling in, or in the words of the headline, the “fluffing out” of the cloud There are a lot of wireless devices using wired or sub-gigahertz proprietary wireless systems, for example, and bringing them into the IoT is the true “final mile” of the cloud Solutions shown ranged from multi-protocol wireless modules and Continued on page 20 PUBLISHER’S PERSPECTIVE Tribute to an American classic In this month’s perspective, our publisher, Victor Gao, pays tribute to an American classic and delves into our proudly old-fashioned journalistic values BY W VICTOR GAO Publisher and Managing Director The ASPENCORE Group IMAGE: PIXABAY N EW YORK — American readers of this column are prone to recognize the name E.B White, a 20th-century author best known for his children’s books such as “Stuart Little” and “Charlotte’s Web.” A resident of this great American city, White was also a prolific columnist for the classic humor, literature, and journalism magazine The New Yorker And in a prose entitled “Unwritten” in April 1930, White observed in his signature self-deprecating style that the work of a writer always represented a choice — the choice of what to write and what not to Which brings me to the subject of our column this month: Why does a journalist write at all? At ASPENCORE, our editorial mission is to bear witness and to celebrate human achievement as manifest through advancement in technology and engineering While every one of our journalists makes their own personal choice as to why and what they write, as a publishing house, we encourage an intention to affirm or, if the writing starts out decrying an injury or injustice on behalf of our readers, that by the end, it arrives at a constructive juncture Sometimes, that takes the form of questioning a dubious claim in a manufacturer’s new product introduction campaign Other times, it could be the critique of a business trend we believe is over-hyped, a technical achievement that is under-recognized, or an important workplace issue that would not have found its voice had it not been for the help of these pages Of course, a great deal of how this mission is achieved is left intentionally undirected and uncoordinated be- tween the house and our writers As a gentle reader wrote in response to this column last month, today’s publishers face a pivotal task to transform the economics of publishing so the important reporting can be done without fear of loss of funding, which we have seen happen to some of our fellow At ASPENCORE, our editorial mission is to bear witness and to celebrate human achievement as manifested through advancement in technology and engineering and you, the reader, are here to judge both the house and our writers on our respective merits This is what editorial independence means to us publishing houses in the industry And yet as much as ASPENCORE as a commercial concern must make money, we strive even harder to always make sense To achieve this duo of aims, at ASPENCORE, we rather like the good old system at The New Yorker, as described by White in another column: The writers write as they please, and the magazine publishes as it pleases When the two pleasures coincide, something gets into print When they don’t, the reader draws a blank And you, the reader, are here to judge both the house and our writers on our respective merits This is what editorial independence means to us While we are on the subject of editorial policy, we expect to share some exciting news soon about how we will extend our remit this year to introduce both more depth and more diversity to the topics covered in our titles We will give you a snippet of our redesign efforts, with a greater focus on longer, less frequent, but more thought-provoking pieces that delve into an issue without the pressures of a daily publishing cadence To find out more, please check back in this column next month By the time these words go to print, many of our readers will be wheels-up to a productive conference in Münich, Las Vegas, or Shanghai or will have just returned Here is to safe and pleasant journeys for all on the road As ever, if you have a comment or want to whisper us a story tip, you can find me at victor@aspencore.com, or contact your favorite ASPENCORE writer directly From all of us at ASPENCORE, thank you for your support ☐ ELECTRONIC PRODUCTS • electronicproducts.com • APRIL 2018 OUTLOOK Innovations impacting products, technology, and applications The key to smarter, faster AI likely found by modeling moth brains Biological systems rarely anything like this Instead, they are commonly organized as feed-forward cascades The beginning of the cascade in hawk moths is a set of about 30,000 chemical receptor neurons (RNs), which feed signals into an antennal lobe (AL) The AL contains roughly 60 isolated clusters of cells (called glomeruli — it pays to enhance your word power!), each of which focuses on a single odor stimuli feature The AL, the researchers say, is inherently noisy The researchers liken the AL to a pre-amplifier, “providing gain control and sharpening of odor representations.” Signals from the AL are forwarded to a structure called the mushroom body (MB) The MB contains roughly 4,000 cells (Kenyon cells) associated with forming memories Signals go through two more ancillary structures (each numbering in the tens of cells), the function of which is believed to be to read out the signals from the MB These sparser structures act as noise filters, the researchers wrote Noise isn’t eliminated but is sufficiently reduced for the purpose of effective learning The process does not work at all without octopamine, described as a neuromodulator Release of the chemical is triggered by a reward — for example, the moth finding sugar to consume When a moth finds a reward, the octopamine that is released stimulates enhanced activity in the AL and MB The practical effect of this enhanced activity is to strengthen the connections between correlated neurons in the moth’s neurological system The mechanism is called Hebbian learning; the extent to which the strength of neuronal connections can be changed is called Hebbian plasticity The UW researchers built a mathematical model that mimics all of this, and their neural models of moths learned quickly with minimal simulated odor inputs Their results are similar to the behavior that they observe in the moths, strongly suggesting that they have an accurate model If so, that will have ramifications both for biology and for neural networks That the behavior of the model was so similar to that of actual biological systems encouraged the researchers to expect that they might now have a clearer understanding of the mechanisms at work in living creatures The olfactory/neurological systems of moths are structurally similar to those of many other creatures, the researchers noted Their work also suggests a new path to explore for machine learning “Specifically,” they wrote in their paper, “our experiments elucidate mechanisms for fast learning from noisy data that rely on cascaded networks, sparsity, and Hebbian plasticity.” Brian Santo Physicists to build laser so powerful it could rip apart fabric of space A vacuum might not be empty at all; it might only seem empty on balance That balance would be between electrons and their anti-matter counterparts, positrons According to theory, any vacuum is filled with such electron-positron pairs These pairs APRIL 2018 • electronicproducts.com • ELECTRONIC PRODUCTS would be undetectable because they wouldn’t interact with anything — with the possible exception of the beam from a 100-petawatt laser Which is one of the reasons why Chinese researchers are about to begin building a 100-PW laser These researchers propose to pulse IMAGE: WIKIMEDIA COMMONS R esearchers at the University of Washington have developed a relatively simple neural network that mimics biological neural systems The performance of the new neural-network model points to the possibility of building AIs that are less complex yet far more efficient at learning because of it At the same time, the research, published in the arXiv repository, yielded new insight into how living creatures learn — or at least how some creatures learn some things The most common path to emulate the effectiveness of biological neural systems has been to create increasingly complex artificial intelligences with increasingly complicated machine-learning capabilities Biological systems that outperform AIs sometimes aren’t all that complex, however, and living creatures often learn far more quickly than AIs using significantly fewer experiences to learn than AIs require data sets Starting with these observations, UW researchers resolved to devise a relatively simple neural-network model that mimics the relatively uncomplicated structure of a moth’s neurological system The University of Washington has been analyzing insect biology for decades; this research team chose moths because UW labs have already thoroughly mapped their neurological systems They already knew that moths can learn smells after experiencing them only a few times Despite the relative simplicity, however, it remained unclear precisely how moths’ neurological systems worked when learning Most neural networks operate on the principle of backpropagation With this technique, the weights between neurons (essentially the strength of the connection between them) are constantly recalculated through a process of feeding outputs back into the system so that inputs and outputs can be compared and adjusted against each other OUTLOOK IMAGE: SHUTTERSTOCK an incredibly powerful beam for a few trillionths of a second through a vacuum with the expectation that it will induce electron-positron pairs to break apart Positrons are ephemeral, but the electrons would remain It would look like producing something out of nothing The proposed process is being described as “breaking the vacuum.” The formula E=MC2 suggested two things One is that mass can be turned into extraordinary amounts of energy Scientists followed that lead in a number of directions, including the development of the atomic energy The formula also suggests that it’s possible to translate energy into mass, though doing so is considered significantly harder Breaking the vacuum would be a rare instance of it The Shanghai Institute of Optics and Fine Mechanics in China currently holds the record for the most powerful laser In 2016, the Shanghai Superintense Ultrafast Laser Facility (SULF) achieved a burst of 5.3 PW The institute is currently preparing to nearly double its record by using SULF to emit a 10-PW pulse by the end of this year It is also planning to build a 100-PW laser called the Station of Extreme Light (SEL), which could come online as early as 2023 Photon energy from the device could reach 15 keV European researchers were thinking about building a 200PW laser but have held off even planning such a beast until they turn on a 1-PW laser in Prague this year and then build two more facilities that would take intermediate steps toward 100 PW or more, reported Science Russia is building the infrastructure to support a proposed 180-PW laser called the Exawatt Center for Extreme Light Studies (XCELS) Japanese researchers, who held the record with a 2-PW pulse before the Chinese eclipsed them, have proposals for a 30-PW device, according to Science Breaking the vacuum would be spectacular, but high-energy lasers could be useful in other applications as well They have been used for particle acceleration, inertial confinement fusion, radiation therapy, and for secondary-source generation of X-rays, electrons, protons, neutrons, and ions, according to physicists at Cambridge University A paper that they wrote in 2015 explains the different types of high-energy lasers China’s SEL would be an OPCPA laser Brian Santo ELECTRONIC PRODUCTS • electronicproducts.com • APRIL 2018 COVER STORY Mil/Aero Electronics Defense spending opens door to system technology innovations BY MIKE MACPHERSON Vice President, Strategic Planning, Curtiss-Wright Defense Solutions www.curtisswright.com T he U.S Department of Defense’s (DoD’s) 2018 National Defense Strategy (NDS) said it clearly: “Our backlog of deferred readiness, procurement, and modernization requirements has grown in the last decade and a half and can no longer be ignored We will make targeted, disciplined increases in personnel and platforms to meet key capability and capacity needs.” With that in mind, Congress increased the FY 2018 defense budget to $700 billion — an increase of $108 billion This article will lay out some of the areas where that budget will be spent and what areas may present opportunities for designers to innovate to close current and future technology gaps AI, big data, and robotics critical but need to be affordable The technological priorities called out in the NDS will drive a significant increase in R&D spending to close technology gaps in advanced computing, artificial intelligence (AI), and autonomy and robotics Among the priorities for modernizing key defense capabilities cited in the NDS that commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) vendors are well-positioned to support are: • New investments in cyber-defense and the continued integration of cyber-capabilities into the full spectrum of military operations • Investments in C4ISR to develop resilient, survivable, federated networks and information ecosystems • Advanced autonomous systems, AI, and machine learning For developers of military embedded COTS electronics solutions, this additional spending promises increased support for technologies that address resilience, lethality, and readiness Designers of defense and aerospace systems and platforms desire to continuously introduce advanced technology that provides the warfighter with an indisputable advantage in the battlefield These technologies range from sensors, computing, and networking to electromechanical systems However, advanced technology by itself isn’t enough It also needs to be affordable, reliable, and sustainable The warfighters’ lives depend on the tech- The new technologies will provide new capabilities upon which the warfighter will surely become dependent As such, they must also feature the defenses needed to ensure that their network and computing environments are protected against adversaries and so remain operationally effective nology, and history has proven that if a soldier can’t trust their technology, they will abandon it New spending on advanced computing will result in improvements for leveraging big data analytics, enabling the warfighter immediate access to all of their critical information Such access will require the use of cloud-computing technologies to enable data access by any device, wherever the soldier is located, at any time it’s desired More than that, to bring the power of machine learning (ML) for AI to the network edge will require far greater local processing capability in order to deliver real-time data and solve the cloud’s inherent latency and bandwidth limitations Investments in AI and ML will provide capabilities that disrupt battlefield applications such as intelligence, APRIL 2018 • electronicproducts.com • ELECTRONIC PRODUCTS surveillance, reconnaissance (ISR), and electronic warfare (EW) Supporting these new capabilities will require advances in heterogeneous high-performance embedded computing (HPEC) technologies Embedded systems for use on semi- and fully autonomous unmanned platforms, whether on the ground, in the air, or at sea, will require the development of low-power, ultra-small form-factor (USFF) processing, networking, full-motion video, and data-storage solutions It’s estimated, for example, that a fully autonomous car will require 50 to 100 times the compute power needed to support today’s advanced driver-assistance systems The overarching investment strategy described in the DNS is to bring these advanced technologies to the battlefield in order to provide a force multiplier that gives warfighters a strategic and tactical advantage over the adversary That said, it’s not enough to just deploy new technologies, it’s also necessary to ensure that those technologies are brought into the battlefield in a way that protects and secures them with the resiliency that they need to survive enemy attempts to disable or disrupt their intended operation Ensuring operational effectiveness in the field: GPS The new technologies will provide new capabilities upon which the warfighter will surely become dependent As such, they must also feature the defenses needed to ensure that their network and computing environments are protected against adversaries and so remain operationally effective An example of an advanced technology upon which the warfighter has become dependent is GPS When introduced as part of the DoD’s Second Offset strategy in the mid-1970s, GPS provided a significant advantage in the battlefield thanks to its ability to deliver accurate 20 SPECIAL Power Devices MAX38902 PSRR VS FREQUENCY AT 25°C (VIN = 3.7 V, VOUT = 3.3 V, IOUT = 400 mA) MAX38902A NOISE VIN = V VOUT = 2.5 V IOUT = 100 mA 1.0E-6 100.0E-9 10.0E-9 10.0E+0 100.0E+0 1.0E+3 10.0E+3 100.0E+3 MAGNITUDE (dB) NOISE (VRMS/√Hz) 10.0E-6 10 –10 x 100-nF 0201 BYP CAP X 4.7-µF 0402 INPUT AND OUTPUT CAP –20 –30 –40 –50 –60 –70 –80 –90 –100 100 1K 10K 100K 1M 10M FREQUENCY (Hz) FREQUENCY (Hz) Fig 5: MAX38902A/B noise performance Fig 6: MAX38902A/B PSRR accidental input shorts, making the system more fault-tolerant High-reliability applications Industrial and automotive applications are characterized by a wide operating temperature range Here, a lead-frame package, more tolerant of temperature-induced PCB surface mechanical stress, may be preferred In this case, a modern TDFN package (A and B versions) provides a solution that is roughly half the footprint and two-thirds the height of a more traditional SOT23-5 or similar package (Fig 4) Low noise performance Fig shows the spectral noise density of this family of devices With a figure of merit as low as 30 nV/√Hz), it is an excellent choice for many low-noise applications High PSRR performance Fig shows the PSRR profile from 100 Hz to 10 MHz With a figure of merit as high as 62 dB, this family is an excellent choice for analog or digital noise-sensitive applications Conclusion Fluffing the cloud Continued from page SoCs to hard-wired intelligent modules for everything from old “early-adopter” houses full of semi-intelligent disconnected wired subsystems to devices intended to cost-effectively upgrade a manufacturing facility to Industry 4.0 What this means for you is that there are more possibilities and opportunities than ever before Just about anything you can imagine in three dimensions can be realized in an object of some kind Software is more powerful than ever before, and design tools can even output C code for those who are better at thinking with their hands Development kits and reference designs are abound, enabling those with a concept but without a staff to properly develop that idea with completely operational subsystems that provide all the functionality LDOs have come a long way since their initial introduction by adapting to the needs of evolving applications We reviewed the classic LDO parameters and discussed its improvements moving from a bipolar to CMOS implementation Next, we discussed the challenges of reverse-current protection and the miniaturization required by many modern portable applications A new family of LDOs (MAX38902A/B/C/D) solves the former problem with a new power train architecture and the latter problem with the adoption of wafer-level packaging options For challenging application environments such as industrial and automotive applications, traditional lead-frame package technology is also available The availability of multiple versions of the basic LDO supports different applications This gives system designers several “go-to” LDOs that can be leveraged to save significant cost and development time ☐ desired for the final product This development is also empowering the components and magnetics industry as those industries are being challenged to step up to address the new needs of the advanced topologies in the newest generation of devices Better capacitors, improved magnetics, and better PCB construction not only address the demands of the latest semiconductor materials and IC designs, they also provide empowering aspects of their own, enabling engineers to leverage the benefits with one another to achieve their goals This movement forward is also placing severe demands on the test and measurement industry at every level Test has achieved a level of importance in the design industry previously only hinted at and now is a critical aspect of design, development, and manufacture Manufacturers now test at every point of the chain APRIL 2018 • electronicproducts.com • ELECTRONIC PRODUCTS from idea to product, and this benefits the engineer, the company, and the consumer The big issue in test is that a test device has to be “better” than the system that it is testing Just as a ruler can only measure something more accurately than another ruler if their lines are closer together, a test device can only measure a system if it is faster and has a higher bandwidth and a higher memory than the item tested The test industry has responded with a plethora of fantastic gear that can measure quickly, widely, and deeply with a memory both big enough and fast enough to measure anything attached to it So take a look in these pages, and see the latest in embedded and power technology in our reports on Embedded World and APEC These devices and solutions will empower not only your designs but the next level of electronic device development Alix Paultre Power Devices SPECIAL 21 Advanced battery packages empower next-generation systems BY ALIX PAULTRE Contributing Editor O ne of the most discussed and stressed-over aspects of the latest revolution in portable, worn, autonomous, and remote electronics is the battery The problem is that people pay both too much and not enough attention to it They pay too much to the size, and less to the need, the capability, and the functionality Design engineers understand the importance of selecting the most optimized solution for their application, especially when the device has demanding power requirements Selecting the right battery solution will directly affect the performance of the device and the experience for the end user Understanding battery chemistry and cell selection as well as battery management systems will guide the proper battery selection and or design Size: Does it matter? When it comes to energy storage, does the size of the battery matter? Actually, size isn’t as important as safety or operational reliability, among other things Pure power isn’t necessarily the silver bullet to a design’s needs It’s an easy out to address every range or operating time issue by adding a bigger or supplemental battery, and a brisk aftermarket in several application spaces exists to just that But it often isn’t enough The issue is being able to provide the energy that the system requires to fulfill the primary functionality for a reasonable time at a price point both acceptable to the consumer and able to generate a profit However, in many cases, when designing a custom battery, size is a key driver With device manufacturers, battery requirements are often an afterthought and an important component to ensuring that the design engineers can provide a battery supporting the mechanical requirements in the form factor that is needed We recently spoke to VARTA about the issues facing engineers developing products and battery choice Arkadiy Niyazov, Project Manager at VARTA Microbattery, explained that for many engineers, it isn’t battery capacity as much as it is form factor and functionality Arkadiy points out, “A custom battery pack often serves the customer better because it allows for an optimal solution for not only the power requirement but also safety and functionality.” For example, in the rapidly-changing Li-ion battery industry, the traditional 18650 cell size is not the only choice New options such as the 21700 and 26650 have now become more readily available, providing design engineers with more choices to meet the form, fit, and function needed to support the mechanical specifications of the end device while still delivering the energy required by the system When it comes to energy management today, it often isn’t how big the battery but how efficient the system it drives In a hypothetical case of two identical batteries in two nearly identical IoT wearable medical systems, the one with better antenna matching will have a significantly longer battery life than that of the system less elegantly designed Another example can be found in the coming wave of disruptive power electronics based on wide-bandgap semiconductors, with not only higher efficiencies but also higher power densities, smaller sizes, and reduced cooling requirements Buy or build? One of the most fundamental questions in embedded design engineering is whether to procure subsystems off the shelf, custom-made, or do-it-yourself In the case of modular subsystems like batteries, this can be a very difficult question to ask oneself Not only are standard battery sizes readily available, they are a mature interface that has strong customer and industry support Fig 1: This VARTA battery pack was created for a human robotics project Providing a view from the field, Stefan Hald, Field Applications Engineer (Power Pack Solutions) at VARTA said, “I see a lot of requests from specialty spaces because they need to meet the redundant electrical and thermal safety and protection demanded by the application The battery has to be as small as possible, but there also has to be redundancy and monitoring functionality included We are also seeing a lot of requests for LED indicators for operational status, failure codes by blinking, and the like.” Consumer products with a relatively large form factor have the hardest decision to make, as there is enough room to accommodate a standard battery without concerns of packaging or size compromises This also applies to products that have evolved in form factors that already have accommodated themselves to legacy battery adoption One way to sidestep the issue is to both, create a custom battery solution that also can work with off-the-shelf cells Companies with the assets to so usually it for maximum market penetration while providing both an upgrade path for customers and an accessory sales channel to support it Video game controllers and cameras come to mind, both high-use (high-power-drain) products with a customer base ranging from entry-level newbie to passionate professional This is obviously not possible for every manufacturer, hence the difficulty of the decision On the “soft” side, multiple power options benefit both the manufacturer and consumer for marketing and practical ELECTRONIC PRODUCTS • electronicproducts.com • APRIL 2018 22 SPECIAL reasons Standard batteries are often the default choice unless there are form-factor concerns that preclude use of off-the-shelf batteries Until recently, form-factor issues were the primary reasons that manufacturers went with a custom solution Often, user acceptance and form factor go hand in hand A single thin removable battery appeals to the customer while also providing form factor and internal functionality to the manufacturer For example, this 1,590-mAh VARTA EasyPack SLIM measures 5.2 mm max and has a CE Marking, a UL 2054 Listing, and IEC62133 Edition compliance This kind of solution is often the best of both worlds as it is a “standard custom” kind of solution that multiple products from multiple vendors can share Packing in functionality The advantages of an optimized battery solution, however, can far outweigh the additional costs involved in designing a custom power pack into your product As Stefan over at VARTA pointed out, the most popular add-on functionalities currently involve the battery itself, such as fuel gauging and safety monitoring However, the ability to add functionality to a device by putting it in its battery pack lets designers provide features in a novel way that allows easy binning, scalability, and upgradability to the customer One of the biggest problems is the previously mentioned aftermarket add-on batteries Many of these off-brand overthe-counter batteries have no security or safety technology integrated at all; there is often no way to tell if a store-bought battery is a real one from the manufacturer or just a tootsie roll wrapped in a label thrown together by scammers There are many stories of counterfeit bad batteries destroying products via agents from leaked acid to catastrophic thermal runaway (a fancy way to say, “It caught fire”) The first benefit of a custom pack is that you can add an RFID chip for inventory and counterfeit detection, a battery-monitoring IC to watch the charge state and thermals, or buy a chip that has both of those functionalities and more Once you open the battery pack to drop in a chip, your horizons broaden Power Devices significantly That chip could be a simple safety and security device, or it could be one of the new crops of IoT wireless ASICs, or it could be a complete SOC that lets you tailor your entire product line by the kind of battery pack it takes When designing a custom battery, design engineers need to understand cell technology for an application based on what is the best technical fit, which, in some cases, can have very demanding power requirements Additionally, understanding cell technology trends will directly impact the direction for a particular design including availability of cells and new cell sizes such as Li-ion 26650 and 21700 Choosing the appropriate BMS is equally as important as they can have simple electronics to measure cell voltage or more complex BMS that affects the battery life and performance as well as ensuring safety Another example can be found in the area of robotics Fig shows a VARTA battery pack that was created for a human robotics project that required advanced functionalities like fuel gauging and safety monitoring The design included sophisticated casting to withstand the mechanical forces certification according to UL, a custom cell holder for production assembly and cell positioning, and highly customized PCM for electrical control, battery safety, and performance Robots must not only operate remotely, they must be able to detect low-battery situations accurately and quickly enough to address them in real time either by reducing power needs or returning to base for recharge Wireless functionality The aforementioned wireless functionality can be implemented in many ways Just integrating a cheap paper RFID tag in the label would go a long way toward reducing counterfeit risks as well as providing users with product information like pack capacity and may even give the device being powered a rudimentary interface to first-level battery functions like amount of charge and temperature In areas where there are options for the user such as near-field communication (NFC) payments, it is possible to add APRIL 2018 • electronicproducts.com • ELECTRONIC PRODUCTS regional functionality to a device via the battery to address local or proprietary communication protocols Many places are now accepting NFC pay, but some manufacturers may not wish to deploy that functionality across their entire product line This also applies to internal security devices for internal company resources that may vary from location and facility The other major wireless functionality is wireless charging Once thought of for longer-ranged applications, wireless charging is rapidly becoming a final-inch solution to eliminating batteries Adding independent wireless-charging capability to your product’s battery pack delivers multiple benefits Not only does this enable the user to buy multiple battery packs and charge the unused packs with the same wireless power interface, it allows the manufacturer to offer users of popular legacy products an upgrade path to wireless charging Optical functionality When one thinks of batteries, lights usually come into the situation as loads More often today, that light is an internal LED showing charge state In the future, that LED could also transmit optical data, from troubleshooting information to augmented reality codes that would let users fight virtual dragons emanating from the back of their phones These embedded LEDs (or in the future, possibly OLED coatings) can also be used for aesthetic purposes as well as practical, or both Status LEDs could be made to blink in time with music or other data (gaming) to enhance the smart-device experience, for example The key is that once you open the box to adding a light, there is nothing restricting you to only one function for it, especially because most additional functionality can be added in code Looking forward Electronic engineers have more and more choice when designing and specifying their battery packs, with more options for security and functionality than ever before Understanding all of them (work with your supplier!) will help you greatly in achieving your product design goals ☐ SPECIAL 23 Embedded World Wrap-Up The expanding IoT: a visit to Embedded World BY ALIX PAULTRE Contributing Editor T he most notable thing about Embedded World, the leading international exhibition for embedded technology, is the buzz of activity everywhere The bringing together of engineers, ideas, and technology makes for an exciting and busy event In its 16-year existence, Embedded World has provided a place where the world’s engineering community can come together and work on solutions for things both great and small Larger yet again in 2018, the show brought together over 1,000 companies in six exhibition halls to show their wares to over 32,000 visitors from 78 countries The event’s associated conferences also demonstrated the vibrancy of the industry with 2,176 participants and speakers from 52 countries This combined effort to show, educate, entertain, and create an environment to exchange ideas and solutions makes the show a must-see for any company serious about participating in the embedded engineering space In the buzz, many application areas were discussed — from automotive to the smart home to intelligent medical devices to Industry 4.0 All of these application spaces are expected to eventually all connect in the cloud as part of the IoT, and the exhibition floor is where that reality is being created Solutions both wired and wireless were presented to automate and integrate all aspects of society that involve powered systems This final integration of all powered devices into the IoT is the true “final mile,” as even legacy technology is brought into the fold using methodologies from multi-protocol wireless devices that can talk to sub-gigahertz proprietary systems to wired devices that can completely replace the older systems in place This final integration of all powered devices will further increase the ability to communicate, coordinate, and operate in better and more useful ways ry and 128 Kb of SRAM (80 Kb available for the user) The IoD-09 can be programmed with the 4D Systems Workshop4 integrated development environment (IDE) or through the Arduino IDE Workshop4 provides powerful graphics using the GFXdloIoD09 graphics library specifically for the IoD-09 series through a drag-and-drop-style graphical user interface (GUI) The IoD-09 Starter Kit comes with an IoD display module, 4D-UPA programmer, and a 4-GB micro-SD card Printed Circuit Boards from Prototype to Production 4D Systems One thing that people expect from an intelligent system is a control screen everywhere that input is needed 4D Systems is serving that need with its Internet of Display modules, and their 0.9-in WiFi-enabled IoD-09 series of 80 x 160 TFT LCD displays can display full color images, animations, and icons The new modules come in two variants: through-hole (IoD09TH) and surface-mount (IoD-09SM) The module is designed around the ESP8266 systemon-Chip (SoC) from Espressif It comes with 802.11 b/g/e/i support as well as WPA/WPA2, WEP/TKIP/AES, and STA/ AP/STA+AP/P2P operational mode support There are six GPIOs available allowing digital input/output as well as various communication protocols Available interfaces include SPI, I2C, UART, and one-wire communications A micro-SD slot allows the use of off-the-shelf high-capacity memory cards from GB to a maximum of 32 GB FAT16 and FAT32 file accesses are supported The module also comes with Mbit of flash memo- Quick turns from hours On time or FREE FREE Laser SMT Stencil with every prototype order Instant online quotes: 4777 Sunrise Blvd Suite G Fair Oaks, CA, USA Phone: (916) 241-9062 www.pcb-pool.com ELECTRONIC PRODUCTS • electronicproducts.com • APRIL 2018 24 SPECIAL Lattice Semiconductor Part of the effort to drive continued adoption of 60-GHz wireless technology, Lattice Semiconductor expanded its Lattice Snap wireless connector product family, based on SiBEAM 60-GHz technology, to enable manufacturers to easily integrate short-range, highspeed 60-GHz wireless links into their products To simplify the design process further, Lattice included the Snap modules, which are compliant with regulatory requirements in several jurisdictions, in their Snap evaluation kit for fast prototyping and time-to-market The Snap modules offer 12-Gbps full-duplex bandwidth at sub-frame latencies, making this technology ideal for the replacement of physical connectors, such as USB By eliminating the connector, the industrial designs of new products can be optimized by making them thinner, lighter, and environment-proof, all while maintaining a robust and highspeed connection Key features of the Snap modules include fully-integrated power regulation, timing, 60-GHz antenna design, and regulatory compliance Nexperia With the demands being placed on power systems and the growing competition from wide-bandgap devices, the pressure is on silicon to rise to the challenge With that in mind, Nexperia, the former Standard Products division of NXP, released the NextPower 100-V family of power MOSFETs with a low reverse recovery charge (Qrr) and parts that are qualified to 175°C in the LFPAK56 (PowerSO8) package Recommended for high-efficiency switching and high-reliability applications, the devices have 50% lower RDS(on) and a strong avalanche energy rating and feature low body diode losses with Qrr down to 50 nC, resulting in lower reverse recovery current (IRR), lower voltage spikes (Vpeak), and reduced ringing, which allows for further optimised dead-time The new NextPower 100-V MOSFETs are available in three packages: TO220 and I2PAK through-hole devices and Embedded World Wrap-Up the widely acclaimed LFPAK56 package (SMT) All package variants feature Tj(max) of 175°C and fully meet the extended temperature requirements of IPC9592, making NextPower 100-V MOSFETs especially suitable for telecom and computing applications In its 16-year existence, Embedded World has provided a place where the world’s engineering community can come together and work on solutions for things both great and small ADLINK Of course, you can’t have an IoT without an intelligent infrastructure using secure and robust platforms, preferably with a minimal footprint ADLINK Technology introduced an industrial IoT-ready combination embedded controller and IoT gateway The MXE-210 offers a small footprint and is fully operable in harsh environments from –40°C to 85°C, making it an ideal choice for industrial automation, transportation, agriculture/ aquaculture, and smart city applications Functioning as both a gateway and embedded controller, the MXE-210 bridges the gap between operations technology (OT) and information technology (IT) data interchanges, with support for third-party manufacturers via industry-standard compliances Support is included for Modbus, EtherCAT, DDS, MQTT, and CANOpen by Vortex Edge Connect, as well as Wi-Fi, BT, LoRa, 3G, and 4G LTE for data communication and wireless connectivity As a controller, the MXE-210 leverages the same protocols to directly communicate with and manage any standard industrial device The MXE-210 gateway’s single embedded SIM (e-SIM) automatically switches between regional networks, enabling a more secure and robust alternative to multiple SIM cards currently to deliver data as rolling stock moves APRIL 2018 • electronicproducts.com • ELECTRONIC PRODUCTS between regions The pre-installed e-SIM also eliminates time spent swapping out installed SIM cards The MXE-210 Series further supports a wide range of comprehensive security measures, providing protection from the inside out with the benefits of TPM 2.0, Intel Boot Guard, and UEFI Secured Boot In addition, the MXE-210 comes equipped with an Intel Atom x7-E3950/ x5-E3930 processor, one DisplayPort, two USB 2.0 ports, two USB 3.0 ports, two GbE ports, two COM ports (RS232/422/485), two mPCIe slots, one USIM slot, one mSATA, one SATA-III, one micro-SD slot, and support for DINrails and wall-mounting Optional extras include audio mic-in, line-out support, eight isolated DIs with interrupt and eight isolated DOs, and two additional COM ports (RS232/422/485) Silicon Labs Wireless IoT devices can’t properly serve their applications if the battery is dead from inefficient operation Silicon Labs introduced a new Wi-Fi portfolio to simplify the design of power-sensitive, battery-operated Wi-Fi products such as IP security cameras, point-of-sale terminals, and consumer healthcare devices Optimized for exceptional energy efficiency, the WF200 transceivers and WFM200 modules support 2.4-GHz 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi Developers can speed time-to-market and miniaturize battery-operated Wi-Fi products with the WFM200, the world’s smallest pre-certified system-in-package (SiP) module with an integrated antenna Silicon Labs’ WF200 transceiver provides a cost-effective option for high-volume applications with the flexibility to meet unique system design requirements, such as external antennas Benefits include low transmit (TX: 138 mA) and receive (RX: 48 mA) power, 200-µA average Wi-Fi power consumption (DTIM = 3), and a link budget of 115 dBm for long-range Wi-Fi transmissions The x 4-mm QFN32 transceiver and 6.5 x 6.5-mm LGA52 SiP module exhibit excellent antenna diversity and wireless coexistence in crowded 2.4-GHz environments ☐ APEC Wrap-Up SPECIAL 25 APEC’s growth reflects the health of the power industry low work-function surface in intimate contact with the donor electrode facing the dielectric It was explained to us as kind of a nanotech “Maxwell’s Demon.” This will be a significant breakthrough — a revolutionary one — if it can scale well BY ALIX PAULTRE Contributing Editor T his year’s Applied Power Electronics Conference (APEC) in San Antonio, Texas (Anaheim, California, next year), was larger than the last and represents the new energy in the power industry (pun intended) Over 5,000 power electronics engineering professionals attended, and APEC broke records in two significant categories — the number of “full conference” attendees and the number of attendees who also signed up for the Sunday and Monday seminars occurring outside of the exhibition In addition, the Power Sources Manufacturers Association’s (PSMA’s) full-day workshops on Saturday covering Magnetics and Capacitors were exceptionally well-attended According to Greg Evans, one of the hard-working people behind the scenes, “It is abundantly clear that the continuing developments in power semiconductors (GaN, SiC and silicon) are a driving force behind this growing need for more knowledge and understanding of circuit topologies and component selection.” In addition to the conference sessions, the combination of the largest APEC exhibition ever plus the largest number of industry sessions provided attendees with exposure to the very latest new product developments The beauty of the exhibition is its comprehensive aspect for what is billed as a “power show” as manufacturers continue to expand their recognition of the importance of energy management in every facet of embedded electronics Texas Instruments A 1-MHz active clamp flyback chipset and industry-first 6-A three-level buck battery charger from Texas Instruments can cut power supply size and charge time in half Operating at up to MHz, TI’s new chipset combines the UCC28780 active clamp flyback controller and the UCC24612 synchronous rectifier controller For battery-powered electronics that need maximum charging efficiency in a small solution size, the bq25910 6-A three-level buck battery charger enables up to a 60% smaller-solution footprint Designed to work with both gallium nitride (GaN) and silicon (Si) FETs, the UCC28780’s advanced and adaptive features enable the active clamp flyback topology to meet modern Complete in-house production of transformers, SMPS, chokes and PCBAs Evercell The most interesting thing that we observed at APEC was some tech that was far from mature but one that held great promise The Evercell thermal harvester demonstration unit was seen in a live demonstration to produce a constant output of about 200 mV Production of Evercell thermal harvesters will be scaled up to deliver an output of 1.2 Vdc The basic design of the Evercell power cell is made up of four very thin layers in the tens to hundreds of nanometers Opposing electrodes sandwich a dielectric that is less than 200 nm thick The surface of the donor electrode is surface-treated to lower the work function of its surface, thereby imposing a Basic Evercell Power Cell 230 210 240 220 Power transformer Toroidal transformer LED power driver Established in 1990 Samples ready in just days 30-days lead times Get a quote for OEM projects in days Equipment from Japan, the US and the UK Choke coil A Keen Ocean Industrial Ltd 210 - low-work-function electrode (2.0 eV) A - direction of current flow Website: www.keenocean.com.hk Email: sales@keenocean.com.hk ELECTRONIC PRODUCTS • electronicproducts.com • APRIL 2018 EET201803_Keen Ocean-OK.indd 2018/2/9 上午10:37 26 SPECIAL efficiency standards With multimode control that changes the operation based on input and output conditions, pairing the UCC28780 with the UCC24612 can achieve and maintain high efficiency at full and light loads Littelfuse Littelfuse added two 1,200-V silicon carbide (SiC) n-channel, enhancement-mode MOSFETs, the latest products of a strategic partnership that Littelfuse formed with Monolith in 2015 to develop power semiconductors for industrial and automotive markets The LSIC1MO120E0120 and LSIC1MO120E0160 SiC MOSFETs offer ultra-low on-resistance (RDS(on)) levels of just 120 mΩ and 160 mΩ, respectively These SiC MOSFETs are designed for use as power semiconductor switches in a wide range of various power conversion systems, outperforming their silicon MOSFET counterparts substantially in terms of blocking voltage, specific-on resistance, and junction capacitances The new 1,200-V SiC MOSFETs offer a reduction in passive filter components at the system level and support increased power density, and its extremely low gate charge and output capacitance combined with ultra-low on-resistance allows for minimal power dissipation, higher efficiency, and a reduction in the size and sophistication of the cooling techniques required Navitas Presented as the first GaN power ICs, Navitas Semiconductor’s iDrive NV6131, NV6105, and NV6115 offer a high-efficiency 650-V, 160-mΩ power FET with increasing integration of digital and analog circuits, leading to groundbreaking speed, energy efficiency, power density, and reduced system cost GaN can enable up to 100x higher frequencies than silicon, but driving, controlling, and protecting such high-speed power devic- APEC Wrap-Up es has been an industry challenge that has limited adoption By integrating these critical digital and analog circuits monolithically with the GaN power device, these system-level problems have been eliminated Navitas GaN Power ICs with iDrive guarantee optimized and robust performance for any application A 10x to 100x increase in system operating frequency is combined with higher efficiencies to enable up to a 5x increase in power densities and 20% lower system costs Power Integrations Addressing the expanding need for digital functionality in power supplies, Power Integrations released its InnoSwitch3-Pro family of configurable offline CV/CC and CP flyback switcher ICs Capable of delivering up to 65 W and achieving up to 94% efficiency across line-andload conditions, the new devices permit precise, dynamically adjustable control of voltage (10-mV step) and current (50-mA step) via a simple two-wire I2C interface Devices may be paired with a microcontroller or take inputs from the system CPU to control and monitor the offline power supply InnoSwitch3-Pro power-conversion ICs include a microprocessor VCC supply, eliminating the need for an external LDO to power the microcontroller; also included is an n-channel FET driver, which may be used to enable or disable the main power output Together with integrated bus voltage, current- and fault-reporting telemetry, and dynamiInnoSwitch3-Pro APRIL 2018 • electronicproducts.com • ELECTRONIC PRODUCTS cally configurable protection functions such as OTP, line OV/UV, output OV/ UV, and short-circuit, the BOM count for a sophisticated offline power supply is significantly reduced and design complexity is dramatically simplified InnoSwitch3-Pro ICs employ Power Integrations’ high-speed digital communications technology, FluxLink, synchronous rectification, quasi-resonant switching and a precise secondary-side feedback sensing and feedback control circuit GaN Systems Underscoring the migration of wide-bandgap devices into more application spaces, GaN Systems claimed the industry’s highest-current and power-efficient 100-V GaN power transistor, the 100-V, 120-A, 5-mΩ GaN E-HEMT device It is 1.3x the current rating of GaN Systems’ own 90-A part and 2.4x to 4.6x the current rating of other high-current GaNs in the industry The GS-010-120-1-T is an enhancement-mode GaN-on-silicon power transistor that leverages all of the die design and packaging advantages delivered from GaN Systems This revolutionary transistor is ideal for the growing 48-V applications in the automotive, industrial, and renewable energy industries that require power systems with high power levels in smaller form factors The transistor is footprint-compatible with GaN Systems’ 100-V, 90-A GaN E-HEMT (GS61008T), thereby enabling customers to add further power by substituting the GS-010-120-1-T without changing their board Increasing the current capability in the same-sized package allows customers to effectively increase the power by 33% for the same system volume Read more about APEC at http://bit ly/2pemYpS Insight into current product developments PRODUCT TRENDS 27 Five trends to watch in enclosure designs BY MAJEED AHMAD Contributing Editor H ow you select the right enclosure for an embedded system? While size, weight, and power are still key elements in choosing a suitable enclosure, there are more factors in play in the design of instrumentation cases and enclosures For example, is there sufficient space for the I/O devices? How does a cabinet protect itself from the internal and external hazards? How does enclosure design simplify the assembly work? Below is a sneak peek into what’s driving the enclosure design and how it can serve the embedded system hardware more efficiently Shelf management options The new enclosure designs are now helping users to manage and monitor the shelf operation, including power, cooling, and interconnect conditions on the shelf It leads to greater flexibility, which, in turn, creates more design options Take, for instance, the Pigeon Point shelf management for AdvancedTCA enclosures offered by LCR Embedded Systems The design facilitates a drop-in replaceable arrangement both mechanically and electrically Moreover, it features dual-redundant and hot-swappable fan trays in push-and-pull configurations and hot-swappable power-entry modules capable of reporting voltage and current on each feed A shelf manager can raise the fan level inside the enclosure if the temperature is exceeding a preset value And if that’s not sufficient, the shelf manager can even start powering down the field replaceable units (FRUs) to reduce the heat load on the shelf LCR Embedded Systems offers both Pigeon Point and Vadatech shelf management formats And besides Fig 1: The rackmount chassis platform from Pixus offers various cooling options A shelf manager can raise the fan level inside the enclosure if the temperature is exceeding a preset value And if that’s not sufficient, the shelf manager can even start powering down the field replaceable units to reduce the heat load on the shelf AdvancedTCA chassis, the Norristown, Pennsylvania-based company also provides shelf management options for the VPX form factors Cooling arrangements Airflow is crucial in ensuring a stable enclosure operation The new enclosure and chassis platforms now offer various front-to-rear, side-to-side, and bottomto-top airflow configurations Take the case of 9U RiCool chassis platform from Pixus Technologies that features up to 32 OpenVPX backplane slots Here, reverse impeller blowers reside directly above the boards The cooling arrangement pulls air from below the card cage and blows the Fig 2: Cover lids on Pixus enclosures enhance the assembly and deployment options exhaust 90 degrees to the back Next, fans are individually hot-swappable, and it enhances reliability and minimizes downtime Enclosures like RiCool also provide various power supply options in fixed, pluggable, and redundant modes Then there are venting accessories offered by firms like Polycase that facilitate various levels of airflow management and thus help equalize temperature and pressure in the watertight enclosure These vents come along with cable glands that help maintain a watertight seal around the hole used for cables ELECTRONIC PRODUCTS • electronicproducts.com • APRIL 2018 28 PRODUCT TRENDS Insight into current product developments Fig 3: The SB Series NEMA enclosures from Polycase comply with the IP65 and IP 66 ratings Enclosure lids Enclosure designs require more than just a box because you need to put components, controls, and instruments inside the enclosure with wiring, cables, and conduits Therefore, many enclosures now come with snap-on lids for easy and cost-effective assembly These lids feature a side-edge fold with half shears that allow a solid or perforated enclosure cover to snap into place Companies like Pixus Technologies offer covers that have side notches for fitting into rails with 160- or 280-mm depths These snap-on lids also include the EMC gaskets Likewise, Polycase offers internal panels for its enclosures; these panels allow users to secure components on a flat surface inside the enclosure without having to puncture the box The Avon, Ohio-based manufacturer’s EX Series aluminum enclosures are a case in point The enclosures have been designed to allow a standard PCB to slide into place with removable end-caps, which can easily be modified for cables, connectors, and switches Here, gaskets sit between the end-caps and enclosure body to provide the IP66-level protection from dust and water The aluminum material also provides a degree of EMI and RFI protection Outdoor applications Besides meeting the National Electrical Manufacturers Association (NEMA) ratings, enclosures for outdoor use should be airtight, and for that, they need to Fig 4: OKW’s table-top and wall-mount enclosure can incorporate 7-in touch displays Some enclosure units offer sufficient space and hardware slots for operating hardware elements like displays That’s critical in applications such as Some outdoor enclosure manufacturers also use polycarbonate plastic with a UV-stabilizer in the resin It’s worth noting that ABS plastic, which typically has a lower heat tolerance than polycarbonate, is not suitable for outdoor enclosures unless the resin has specifically been enhanced with a UV-stabilizer measurement and control, medical Enclosure displays There are some enclosure units that offer and laboratory instrumentation, and environmental engineering have a gasket between the base and cover to create a watertight seal Second, the material used for outdoor enclosures is of vital consideration Aluminum, stainless steel, and painted steel are metal types commonly used for enclosures in outdoor environments Polycase has introduced the SB Series stainless-steel enclosures that are waterproof, weatherproof, and corrosion-resistant These enclosures include an internal panel, external mounting brackets, latch key, and grounding studs and wire The company is targeting these NEMA-rated enclosures at food and beverage, pharmaceutical, and oil and gas industries APRIL 2018 • electronicproducts.com • ELECTRONIC PRODUCTS sufficient space and hardware slots for operating hardware elements like displays That’s critical in applications such as measurement and control, medical and laboratory instrumentation, and environmental engineering Enclosures like OKW’s SMART-TERMINAL are designed to fit standard display and touch solutions ranging from 4.3-in to a maximum of 8-in sizes Additionally, the inside of the enclosure has several mounting options on two assembly levels so that displays and PCBs can be optionally mounted face up or face down The above trends show that the enclosure design is evolving along with the backplane and chassis platforms It also shows how accessories are increasingly complementing the overall enclosure designs ☐ Electromechanical Components LAN transformer targeted at EtherCAT, Profinet applications The new LAN transformer from Würth Elektronik has been manufactured in a fully automated process, and it offers a compact design and robust electrical properties The eiSos transformer extends the capabilities of the company’s WE-LAN AQ series for industrial Ethernet applications It replaces the wound toroid cores in the existing WE-LAN AQ series with SMD solderable transformers and common-mode choke elements As a result, the low return loss attenuation provides the device with a better signal yield The WE-LAN AQ series of transformers — compatible with conventional LAN products — are specified for the industrial temperature range of –40°C to 85°C Würth is targeting its new transformers at EtherCAT and Profinet systems mostly used in factory automation environments The eiSos LAN transformer offers pin- and pad-compatible components for conventional standard packages with a low height of mm for the 10/100 Base-T variant and 4.25 mm for the 1,000 Base-T variant And the availability of lateral half-vias means that their solder joints can be inspected in SMT production using automated optical inspection (AOI) Würth Elektronik: www.we-online.com Waveguide relay switches available in seven sizes Fairview Microwave has released 28 waveguide relay switches, which serve frequencies ranging from 5.85 GHz to 40 GHz, encompassing C, X, Ku, K, and Ka frequency bands They are targeted at applications such as VSAT, SATCOM, radar, microwave radio, electronic warfare, electronic countermeasures, space systems, and test and measurement instrumentation PRODUCT ROUNDUP 29 These broadband waveguide switches are configured for single-pole double-throw (SPDT) operation with latching actuators, self-cut-off, TTL logic, and position indicators with manual override And a shorting plate can be removed for optional double-pole double-throw (DPDT) operation All 28 electromechanical switches incorporate a patented motor drive with arc suppression and include an environmentally sealed, quick-connect DC control connector and mate Moreover, they boast a compact package design with integrated waveguide ports featuring grooved flanges and O-rings for pressurized operation According to Tim Galla, product manager at Fairview Microwave, “These waveguide relay switches are targeted for designs that route either low- or high-power signals for applications that may involve microwave communications, broadcasting, and radar.” The new electromechanical relay switches are available in a broad selection of waveguide sizes: WR137, WR112, WR90, WR75, WR62, WR42, and WR28 They operate in temperatures ranging from –40°C to 85°C, are rated for 250K lifecycles minimum, and packages are fully weatherized for exposure of up to 100% humidity These broadband waveguide switches offer high isolation levels of up to 105 dB and extremely low insertion loss down to 0.01 dB And they are specified with operating voltages of either +12 Vdc or +28 Vdc and power-handling capability of up to 12 kW CW and 320 kW peak Fairview Microwave Inc.: www.fairviewmicrowave.com PCB relay claims 30% reduction in size TE Connectivity has launched a power PCB relay for heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) and other industrial control applications The new relay operating at 30 A is part of the Potter & Brumfield T9G series; it boasts quick-connect terminations, and that makes the relay user-friendly and easy to install TE claims that its new PCB relay offers 30% smaller package size and 13% less PCB floor space than competing products That, in turn, allows manufacturers to add more components on PCBs without having to compromise on relay performance The PCB relay also complies with the IEC 61810-1 standard to reinforce insulation amid an increase in distance between coil and contacts Furthermore, it features a rating of kV between coil and contact to provide better galvanic isolation Next, to ensure that surge resistance can withstand voltage, the T9G series relays have an 8-kV rating and thus can provide a higher degree of circuit protection The relays also use a 900mW coil that facilitates a 10% power reduction as compared to the conventional 1-W power PCB relays TE Connectivity: www.te.com ELECTRONIC PRODUCTS • electronicproducts.com • APRIL 2018 30 PRODUCT ROUNDUP Electromechanical Components Microturbine employs Ethernet ring to eliminate points of failure Phoenix Contact has teamed up with Capstone Turbine to develop PowerSync controllers for microturbines The new design is aimed at making the Capstone microturbines easier to use for both end-user customers as well as Capstone’s distribution partners The new controllers, based on Phoenix Contact’s AXC 3050 programmable logic controller (PLC), boost the reliability and availability of the Capstone microturbines by utilizing a self-healing Ethernet ring to eliminate single points of failure in the control network The PowerSync controllers include algorithms to maximize overall system efficiency and adjust the operation of individual microturbines in order to align with their predictive schedule service dates And that makes microturbines intuitive and easy to use Additionally, these controllers provide seamless transfer capabilities, ensuring that end-users’ loads don’t lead to any interruption in operation in the event of a utility power outage Finally, the controllers can also be customized according to the requirements of site-specific equipment of 3.3 V, V, 12 V, and 24 V These transformers typically operate at the switching frequency of 250 kHz and are designed for a wide range of operating temperatures from –40°C to 125°C The electrical insulation of these RoHS-compatible transformers complies with UL 1446 class 130 (B) That allows them to withstand a high-voltage test between the primary and secondary sides at 1,500 Vac, 50 Hz for one second Next, the DC resistance values can be as low as 3.5 mΩ That leads to higher efficiency and makes transformers more suitable for active clamp forward converter topologies In these transformers, the SMDs have dimensions of 30 x 22 x 11.4 mm TDK: www.global.tdk.com PCB terminal block for Profinet comes in four variations Phoenix Contact has introduced a PCB terminal block for Profinet-compliant data transmission applications There are four variants of the PCB terminal block — MKDS 1, SPTAF 1, ZFKDS 1,5C and SPT 2,5 — and each one of them has been designed specifically for the connection of twisted-pair conductors with cross-sections of 0.14 mm² to mm² Phoenix Contact: www.phoenixcontact.com Transformer aims to serve the new PoE standard TDK has unveiled a new series of EPCOS transformers for the Power-over-Ethernet (PoE) applications These transformers are designed for an output of up to 60 W as per the requirements of the IEEE 802.3bt specification The existing systems — compliant with the IEEE 802.3af (PoE) and IEEE 802.3at (PoE+) standards — use two pairs of cables and are designed for outputs of 15 W and 30 W, respectively On the other hand, the new IEEE 802.3bt (PoE++) standard, designed for four pairs of cables, has been developed to facilitate devices with higher power demand TDK’s new EPCOS transformers are designed to serve the applications specifically built around the new IEEE 802.3bt technology These applications include POS systems, lighting controllers, fire alarm systems, and access control for smart buildings The B82806D0060A series of transformers comprises four types with different turns ratios for output voltages APRIL 2018 • electronicproducts.com • ELECTRONIC PRODUCTS The conductor connection is made either via spring-cage connection or ZFKDS 1,5C; screw connection or MKDS 1; or push-in spring connection — SPTAF and SPT 2,5 All variants satisfy the requirements of the Profinet directive, version 4.00, and thus are suitable for secure data transmission as per Cat5 cabling requirements The angled variant, ZFKDS 1,5C series, as well as horizontal and vertical PCB terminal blocks, the SPT 2,5 series, are also approved for use in explosion-proof areas according to the IEC 60079-7 specification These Profinet-compliant PCB terminal blocks extend the range of the existing field and device connectors like M12 and RJ45, so they can provide efficient connection solutions for devices in industrial environments Phoenix Contact: www.phoenixcontact.com Power Sources NEW PRODUCTS 31 LED driver adds dimming for commercial lighting With a wide input voltage range and integrated power MOSFET, the AL8862 buck LED driver is well-suited for LED lighting drive circuits with minimized board space and reduced BoM cost It offers analog and PWM dimming functions and a typical output current accuracy of 5% (at up to A) and 97% efficiency from an input from V and 60 V An external control pin accepts either an analog or PWM signal to add dimming capabilities, and the integrated MOSFET is rated at 60 V with an Rds(on) of just 0.4 Ω, which delivers high efficiency while minimizing the need for external components Comprehensive protection against possible fault conditions caused by short or open circuits is also included along with overtemperature protection The AL8862 is supplied in a thermally enhanced SO-8EP package and priced at $0.30 at volumes of 10K Diodes Incorporated: www.diodes.com FRED Pt rectifiers increase power density, efficiency, and reliability Vishay Intertechnology’s latest 200-V FRED Pt ultrafast recovery rectifiers come in the thermally efficient FlatPAK 5x6 package with a low profile of