Leeds hosts RF and Microwave Packaging Conference

Engineering and scientific experts from the worlds of academia and industry came together last week to attend the RF and Microwave Packaging (RaMP 2015) one-day conference, hosted by the UoL.

The conference was run by the International Microelectronics Assembly & Packaging Society (IMAPS), the leading global community of microelectronics engineers, scientists, manufacturers, end-users and supply chain companies across the full spectrum of electronics applications.

The event was preceded by a one-day Workshop on RF Design and Test, which took place in the School of Electronic and Electrical Engineering. The workshop was delivered by Keysight Technologies and featured the very latest measurement techniques for microwave and millimetre-wave applications.

The Conference focused on emerging applications of Radio Frequency (RF) systems, including 5G communications, microwave domestic and industrial heating, aerospace and healthcare. Keynote speakers focussed on low-cost devices entering domestic markets and GaN devices for new compact high power sources. Klaus Werner, from the RF Energy Alliance, outlined the challenges that were being addressed in order to create an affordable domestic microwave oven with transistors instead of a magnetron.

RF components and systems present significant and unique challenges. Careful considerations over substrate, materials and processes are required in order to meet cost, power, thermal, signal integrity, operation and performance specifications. The speakers described a wide range of novel techniques at ever expanding frequency ranges, and RF packaging is becoming a hot topic as new wireless communications, heating and sensing applications reach the marketplace, putting increasing demands on design and packaging engineers.

Professor Ian Robertson, Head of the School of Electronic and Electrical Engineering, said: "This was a really exciting event bringing together the packaging and RF communities, networking together to develop new applications of RF and microwave systems. The sophistication of the technology on display in the exhibition was simply outstanding. Packaging technology is especially important to the RF community as we bring devices and components together from an unusually wide range of semiconductor and materials technologies."