ECE Seminar* Speaker: Dr. Edward Ackerman, Vice President, Research and Development for Photonic Systems, Inc.
When: Friday,
October 16, 2015
2:00 PM
-
4:00 PM
Where: Science & Engineering Building, Lester W. Cory Conference Room: Room 213A
Cost: Free
Description: Topic: PHOTONIC BEAMSTEERING
Location: Lester W. Cory Conference Room
Science & Engineering Building (Group II), Room 213A
Abstract:
The impressively low attenuation per unit length and low dispersion incurred by light propagating in optical waveguides has long made photonic beamsteering techniques attractive to the designers of electronically steered phased array antennas that need to operate across a broad range of microwave frequencies. Broadband steering of the beam transmitted or received by a phased array antenna requires control of the relative delays experienced by signals in the multiple paths between the individual antenna elements and the point where the one signal is split among those multiple paths (in the case of a transmitting array) or is combined from those multiple paths (in the case of a receiving array). Conveying the microwave signals on optical carriers in optical waveguides results in delays that are essentially constant across broad frequency bands (due to low dispersion) and performance that is essentially independent of the beam direction (due to nearly length-independent attenuation).
This talk will review many specific approaches to photonic beamsteering that have been pursued in the past 30 years. The approaches are organized into three categories: 1. approaches that employ time delay units (TDUs); 2. lenses and lens-like approaches, and; 3. approaches in which the delays in the various signal paths depend on the wavelength of the optical carrier. For each of these three categories of approaches, the talk will describe one or more implementation examples. The review of approaches will conclude with a comparison of their advantages and limitations.
Biography:
Edward Ackerman received his B.S. degree in electrical engineering from Lafayette College in 1987 and his Ph.D. in electrical engineering from Drexel University in 1994. From 1989 through 1994 he was employed as a microwave photonics engineer at the GE Electronics Laboratory in Syracuse, New York. From 1995 to July 1999 he was a member of the Technical Staff at MIT Lincoln Laboratory. Since 1999 he has been Vice President of Research and Development for Photonic Systems, Inc.
Dr. Ackerman has authored or co-authored more than 100 technical papers and book chapters on the subject of analog photonic subsystem performance modeling and optimization, and he holds eight US patents in this area. In 2007 he was elected a Fellow of the IEEE for these contributions to the field.
The Seminars is open to the public free of charge.
*For further information, please contact Dr. Honggang Wang at 508.999.8469, or via email at hwang1@umassd.edu.
Location: Lester W. Cory Conference Room
Science & Engineering Building (Group II), Room 213A
Abstract:
The impressively low attenuation per unit length and low dispersion incurred by light propagating in optical waveguides has long made photonic beamsteering techniques attractive to the designers of electronically steered phased array antennas that need to operate across a broad range of microwave frequencies. Broadband steering of the beam transmitted or received by a phased array antenna requires control of the relative delays experienced by signals in the multiple paths between the individual antenna elements and the point where the one signal is split among those multiple paths (in the case of a transmitting array) or is combined from those multiple paths (in the case of a receiving array). Conveying the microwave signals on optical carriers in optical waveguides results in delays that are essentially constant across broad frequency bands (due to low dispersion) and performance that is essentially independent of the beam direction (due to nearly length-independent attenuation).
This talk will review many specific approaches to photonic beamsteering that have been pursued in the past 30 years. The approaches are organized into three categories: 1. approaches that employ time delay units (TDUs); 2. lenses and lens-like approaches, and; 3. approaches in which the delays in the various signal paths depend on the wavelength of the optical carrier. For each of these three categories of approaches, the talk will describe one or more implementation examples. The review of approaches will conclude with a comparison of their advantages and limitations.
Biography:
Edward Ackerman received his B.S. degree in electrical engineering from Lafayette College in 1987 and his Ph.D. in electrical engineering from Drexel University in 1994. From 1989 through 1994 he was employed as a microwave photonics engineer at the GE Electronics Laboratory in Syracuse, New York. From 1995 to July 1999 he was a member of the Technical Staff at MIT Lincoln Laboratory. Since 1999 he has been Vice President of Research and Development for Photonic Systems, Inc.
Dr. Ackerman has authored or co-authored more than 100 technical papers and book chapters on the subject of analog photonic subsystem performance modeling and optimization, and he holds eight US patents in this area. In 2007 he was elected a Fellow of the IEEE for these contributions to the field.
The Seminars is open to the public free of charge.
*For further information, please contact Dr. Honggang Wang at 508.999.8469, or via email at hwang1@umassd.edu.
Contact:
ECE: Electrical & Computer Engineering Department 508.999.9164 http://www.umassd.edu/engineering/ece/
Topical Areas: General Public, University Community, Electrical and Computer Engineering