Our next meeting will be August 9 and our guest speaker is Professor Kathleen Melde, who will be talking about Radio Frequency Theory.
Topic
RF theory, design, and practice with emphasis on seeing and using the RF parameters measured by a VNA, including the now readily available, inexpensive nanoVNA. Why and how we can see RF parameters that are critical to know in order to isolate issues, solve problems, and in general and specific terms to have a much better idea and understanding of what is going on when transmitting and receiving particular signals, modifying signals, improving signals, problem solving, trouble shooting, etc. Please come with your questions, example-problems, and your nanoVNA if you have one.
Speaker
Kathleen Melde is the Associate Dean of Faculty Affairs and Inclusion, College of Engineering, Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering. Her bio and CV can be found on her faculty page at URL; ece.engineering.arizona.edu. As noted there, she “…is known for her contributions to the design and development of antennas and transmit-receive, or T/R, modules for airborne phased and active arrays. She has more than 90 publications, 5 U.S. patents, and has been an expert witness and consultant in the area of RF circuits and antennas. Her current projects include tunable RF front ends for cognitive radio, high-speed electronics packaging, on-chip antennas, and antennas for wildlife tracking.” Id. She is most familiar with professional / lab grade VNAs but is now familiar with nanoVNAs. She will be joining us for meet and greet for dinner and is planning an approximately 25 minute presentation followed by Q & A exchanges of thoughts, ideas, questions, etc. She is hoping to make her materials, theory, smith charts, etc., feel totally accessible to everyone to understand, see, and imagine using to solve RF problems with a nanoVNA, or any VNA tool available.