Ikerlan wins the prize for the best research paper at the world's largest conference on electromagnetic compatibility

The Basque technology centre IKERLAN has made history by beating multinationals such as Intel, Sandia, Cisco, Google, Amazon, Analog Devices and even NASA itself to win the best research paper on electromagnetic compatibility at the largest international conference on this subject, the IEEE International Symposium on Electromagnetic Compatibility (EMC), organised by the IEEE EMC Society, which took place recently in Michigan (United States).

The award-winning research paper presents a novel technique for modelling and characterising the properties of ferromagnetic materials used to manufacture EMC protection components. It is a research carried out by the EMC group of the Electronics, Information and Communication Technologies (EICT) team at IKERLAN, which will help industrial manufacturers to increase the safety, operability and availability of equipment and systems that have electrical, electronic and communications functionalities with their environment.

Electromagnetic compatibility is a field of engineering that studies how to control, reduce, eliminate and prevent negative effects of electromagnetic coupling between equipment. In certain industrial sectors, such as automotive, aeronautics, satellite communication or railways, electromagnetic compatibility is a particularly relevant factor because it can affect the integrity of people, cause production stoppages or generate economic and resource losses, among other consequences.

The first winning paper

The winning paper is the first that IKERLAN has submitted to this conference. "We wanted to contrast our knowledge in this field at a global level and also to give visibility to our capabilities and knowledge to experts in this field", says IKERLAN researcher Rafael Suárez. "The fact that they have chosen our article shows the relevance and interest that exists in this subject worldwide in both the industrial and academic spheres, and it will allow us to position ourselves as a world reference in the line of research that we are developing in the EMC area". 

Electronics and telecommunications are evolving rapidly: the frequency of their use in communications and the speed of processing are increasing. This implies new uses of the electromagnetic spectrum and therefore new challenges in the field of electromagnetic compatibility. Advancing the early detection of problems in equipment and systems, using reliable simulation models, is another key challenge in this field.

About Ikerlan

IKERLAN is a leading centre in technology transfer and in the contribution of competitive value to industry. It offers integral solutions combining different technological domains in two main areas: Electronics, Information and Communication Technologies (EICT), and Energy and Mechatronics. The technology centre's team is currently made up of 400 people. As a co-operative member of the MONDRAGON Corporation and the Basque Research and Technology Alliance (BRTA), IKERLAN maintains a sustainable, competitive business model in permanent transformation.