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EMC
A Brief History of the IEEE EMC Society
by Daniel D. Hoolihan
Jul 1, 2007

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The Electromagnetic Compatibility (EMC) Society of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) will be celebrating its 50^th Anniversary as a Society in 2007. In preparation for that celebration, the EMC Society created a committee (the 50^th Anniversary Committee) in 2000 which has been planning the activities of the 50^th Anniversary festivities. The planning activities will culminate in a one-day extravaganza as part of the 2007 IEEE International Symposium on EMC in Hawaii the week of July 7 -13. The last day of that week, Friday, July 13, there will be a combination tour, lunch, and awards program for the 50^th anniversary.

This article reviews the origins of the EMC Society and some of its major accomplishments over the past half-century. It is not intended as a comprehensive archive of all of the EMC Society’s activities over the last 50 years.

The Beginning
The EMC Society originated in the mid-1950s when some electrical engineers specializing in radio frequency interference (RFI) began to discuss a more formal organization for their loose-knit technical activities. These discussions resulted as a corollary reaction to informal meetings at Conferences on Radio Interference Reduction. The first one of these formal Conferences was held at the Armour Research Foundation in December of 1954 under Tri-Service (United States Army, Navy, and Air Force) sponsorship. This conference highlighted the magnitude and diversity of interference experienced by commercial and military electronic equipment and stressed techniques for reducing its severity. The first “Armour Conference” was a success and lead to a series of “Armour Conferences.”

In early 1956, a group of RFI engineers in the Los Angeles area founded an informal organization of interference experts. A steering committee was formed to develop the aims and intent of the group. The steering committee consisted of Prentice Tinney (North American Aviation), Joe Tobin (AiResearch), A.T. Parker (Stoddart Aircraft Radio), Charles W. Ketteman, Jr. (California Electronic Services Company), and Fred Nichols (Sprague). They became known as the Radio Interference Technical Committee and operated for almost two years as that Committee.

At the same time that the Los Angeles group was getting organized, a separate group of engineers from the New York City area were organizing. At the third Armour Conference in Chicago in February of 1957, an announcement was made of an organizational meeting to be held in New York City in April of 1957. At this meeting, the decision was made to petition the Institute of Radio Engineers (IRE) for formation of a Professional Group on RFI. This petition was circulated around the country and a total of 326 individuals signed the petition, which was formally submitted to the IRE on July 3, 1957.

The petition read as follows:

The undersigned do hereby petition for the formation of an IRE Professional Group on Radio Frequency Interference in the field of interest of electronics. The scope of this group, if approved, would encompass the following:

Radio Frequency Interference, including:

(1)  Methods of measurement and control.
(2)  Systems considerations such as: Susceptibility, Vulnerability, Compatibility, Spectrum Utilization, Related Propagation Effects, and Subjective Effects.
(3)  Studies of the origins of interference, both man-made and natural, and their classification.
(4)  Cooperation with other Professional Groups, committees and other organizations through joint meetings and activities; and by other appropriate means.

The scope will also include scientific, technical, industrial, or other areas that contribute to the field of interest, or utilize the techniques or products of this field where necessary to advance the art and science in this field, subject, as the art develops, to additions, subtractions, or other modifications directed or approved by the IRE Committee on Professional Groups.

The proposed Group is a new Group.

The following differentiates the field of interest of the proposed group from those of prior groups about which misunderstanding might occur. The new Group will bring together all those concerned with Radio Frequency Interference problems; and provide means which do not now exist of disseminating related technical information.

The undersigned and other members of the IRE interested in forming this group arrived at their decision to petition for the formation of the group through the following discussions or meetings:

Meeting at Willkie Memorial Building, New York City, April 10, 1957
Meeting at IRE Headquarters, May 2, 1957

The undersigned have named the following as desirable members of the Administrative Committee and asked that they be named as those officers for the year indicated.

1-Year Term – R. Fairweather, L. Milton, B. Schenker, and H. Schwenk
2-Year Term – S. Burruano, J. McNaul, A. Kall, W. Pakala
3-Year Term – W. Crichlow, Z. Grobowski, M. Kant, R. Showers

On October 10, 1957, the IRE approved the formal petition and the new Professional Group on Radio Frequency Interference (PGRFI) was officially born.

Founders of the IRE Professional Group on RFI
In 1982, at the 25^th anniversary of the founding of the IRE Professional Group on RFI; forty of the original 326 petitioners were still active members of the organization and these individuals were known as the Founders of the EMC Society. These Founders were Stuart Bailey, Saul Bernstein, Samuel J. Burruano, Edward W. Chapin, John F. Chappell, James J. Crenca, Rexford Daniels, Alfred Eckersley, Herman Garlan, Simon Goldman, Frank M. Greene, Joseph S. Grevious, Zigmund Grobowski, Fred Haber, J. M. Harley, Albert R. Kall, Milton Kant, E. V. Kavanaugh, Edwin S. Kesney, Warren Kesselman, Robert A. Kulinyi, Merrill N. Lustgarten, Vincent J. Mancino, Leonard Milton, Joseph Naresky, Stuart Nellis, John J. O’Neil, William A. Pakala, John J. Renner, James S. Rice, Douglas W. Robertson, Joseph L. Ryerson, Harold R. Schwenk, Neal H. Shepherd, Bryce Showalter, Ralph M. Showers, Samuel Skolnick, Leonard W. Thomas, Sr., and Anthony Zimbalatti.

First Administrative Committee
The first meeting of the Administrative Committee of the PGRFI was held November 20, 1957 at the Berkeley-Carteret Hotel in Asbury Park in New Jersey. Harold Schwenk was elected as the first Chairman, Leonard Milton as the first Vice-Chairman, Albert R. Kall as the first Secretary, and Lieutenant J. P. McNaul as the first Treasurer. The first official term of office ran from July 1, 1958 to June 30, 1959. The second chairman of the PGRFI was J. P. McNaul, and the third was Ralph Showers.

In 1963, the IEEE was formed from the combination of the IRE and the American Institute of Electrical Engineers (AIEE) and the IRE Professional Group on RFI became the IEEE Professional Technical Group on RFI. In 1964, the name was changed to the IEEE EMC Group. Then, in 1978, the EMC Group became the Electromagnetic Compatibility (EMC) Society of the IEEE, a name we have maintained for 29 years.

In 1965, the terms of office were changed to run concurrently with the calendar year so A. H. Sullivan, Jr. served as Chairman from 1 July 1965 until 31 December 1967 (a total of two and one-half years). This is the longest term served by any chairman.

In 1972, the offices of Chairman and Vice-Chairman were renamed President and Vice-President in a title change that has remained constant ever since. The Vice-Chair, Secretary, and Treasurer had no specific terms, and were often held for long periods of time by the same persons. However, traditionally the President (Chairman, in the past) served a two-year term beginning in 1974 – 1975 with W. E. “Gene” Cory. The traditional two-year term of the President of the Society was formalized in 1997 with a motion at the Board level.

A complete list of all Past Chairmen and Presidents is shown in Table 1.

1959-1959    Harold R. Schwenk
1960-1960    James P. McNaul
1961-1961    Ralph M. Showers
1962-1962    Harold E. Dinger
1963-1963    Herman Garlan
1964-1964    Donald R.J. White
1964-1965    Zigmund V. Grobowski
1965-1967    A. H. Sullivan, Jr.
1968            Richard B. Schulz
1969            Fred J. Nichols
1970-1971    Heinz M. Schlicke
1972            John J. O’Neil
1973            Joseph F. Fischer, Jr.
1974-1975    William E. “Gene” Cory
1976-1977    James C. Toler
1978-1979    Jackie R. Janoski
1980-1981    Donald N. Heirman
1982-1983    William G. Duff
1984-1985    Eugene D. Knowles
1986-1987     B. Leonard “Len” Carlson
1988-1989    Donald E. Clark
1990-1991    Edwin L. Bronaugh
1992-1993     H. R. “Bob” Hofmann
1994-1995    Warren A. Kesselman
1996-1997    William Gjertson
1998-1999    Daniel D. Hoolihan
2000-2001    Joseph Butler
2002-2003    Todd R. Hubing
2004-2005    Kimball Williams
2006-2007    Andrew Drozd

Table 1: Presidents of the IEEE Electromagnetic Compatibility Society


Some officers have served in their positions for an extended period of time. For example, L.W. (Leonard) Thomas, Sr. served as Secretary from 1966-1983 (17 years) and Warren Kesselman has been Treasurer from 1972-1983 and again from 1998 until the present (for a total of 20 years). And, Janet O’Neil has been Secretary from April of 1988 until the present time (a total of 19 years.)

Symposiums
As mentioned earlier in this article, Conferences and Symposiums have been an important part of the EMC Society from its beginnings, and indeed even before the time of its organization. The first Conference on Radio Interference Reduction was held in December of 1954 at the Armour Research Foundation of the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago, Illinois. It was followed by the Second Conference at the Sheraton Hotel in Chicago on March 6-7, 1956. The Third Armour Conference was held in February of 1957 and was instrumental as the meeting place for the organizers of the EMC Society. A total of 10 Armour Conferences were held. The last one took place at the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, Illinois from November 17-19, 1964. It was jointly sponsored by the U.S. Army, U.S. Navy and the U.S. Air Force, and was organized by the Illinois Institute of Technology Research Institute in cooperation with the IEEE EMC Group.

The first PGRFI symposium was held in New York City on June 15-16, 1959 with 250 people attending. The second one was held in 1960 in Washington, DC and was attended by over 400 people. Due to that success, the third Symposium was held in Washington, DC again.

During the years of the first EMC symposiums, the proceedings were termed digests and contained abstracts and summaries of the papers presented. In 1965, with the dissolution of the Armour conferences, the EMC Symposia records began to include some full papers and within two years (1967) all the symposia records included full papers.

The symposium was first called a National Symposium until about 1970, when the IEEE became interested in assuring all countries in the world were represented by its membership, and renamed it the International Symposium. The first IEEE International Symposium on EMC held outside the United States was in 1984 in Tokyo, Japan. (That year another EMC symposium was held in San Antonio, Texas which was also sponsored by the EMC Society.) Since then, two additional IEEE International Symposiums on EMC have been held outside the U.S.; one was held in Montreal in 2001 and a second in Turkey (sponsored by the Israel chapter) in 2003.

Of course, the EMC Society has cooperated with other EMC symposiums around the world. These include the Zurich Symposiums (held in odd-numbered years) and the Wroclaw Symposiums (usually held in even-numbered years). It should be noted that the “Zurich” symposiums were actually held in Montreux (1975 and 1977) and Rotterdam (1979). Other EMC Symposiums from all over the world have asked for technical cooperation from the EMC Society over the years and, typically, the EMC Society has agreed.
 
Transactions
An important element of the EMC Society has always been its technical publications, especially the Transactions. The Transactions were initiated in 1959 and were first called the IRE Transactions on Radio Frequency Interference. In 1963, their name was changed to the IEEE Transactions on Radio Frequency Interference and, in 1964, their name was changed to IEEE Transactions on Electromagnetic Compatibility (the current name.)

The IEEE Transactions on EMC publishes high-quality scientific peer-reviewed papers. The papers have contributed significantly to the advance of EMC technology over the past 50 years.

Early editions were published under the guidance of a Publications Committee and a Technical Papers Committee. The acting editors in this early time-frame were Ralph Showers (1959), O.P. Schreiber (1960), A.R. Kall (1961-1962), and A.H. Sullivan, Jr. (1962-1964). In 1964, an official editor was selected for the first time and, as the publication grew, associate editors were added. The first formal editor was A. H. Sullivan, Jr. (1964-1968) and the second was R.B. “Dick” Schulz (1969-1987). This excellent beginning was followed by the appointment of Moto Kanda (1988-2000), Marcello D’Amore (2000-2003), Flavio G. Canavero (2004-2006) and the current Transactions Editor-in-Chief, Perry F. Wilson.

In addition to the editors; the authors, reviewers, and the IEEE editorial staff have contributed significantly to the success and the high-quality of the EMC Transactions. Normally, the EMC Transactions are published four times a year but, sometimes special issues are produced which results in a fifth publication in a given year.

Examples of articles in recent Issues include the following:

1. “Development and Use of the BLT Equation in the Time Domain as Applied to a Coaxial Cable” by Fred M.Tesche.
2. “Analysis of Radiated Emissions from a Printed Circuit Board Using Expert System Algorithms” by Y. Fu and Todd Hubing.
3. “Common-Mode Current Due to a Trace Near a PCB Edge and Its Suppression by a Guard Band” by Y. Kayano, M. Tanaka, J.L. Drewniak, and H. Inoue.
4. “Study of the Coupling Between Human Head and Cellular Phone Helical Antennas” by S. Koulouridis and K. S. Nikita.
5. “Optimization of Carbon Fiber Composite for Microwave Absorber”by C.P. Neo and V.K. Varadan.

Newsletter
Before the Professional Group on RFI had a newsletter, there was an informal newsletter “Quasies and Peaks” which was originated by Rexford Daniels in 1954 in order to coordinate happenings in the technical area of Interference. It should be noted, however, that the first newsletter published directly by the PGRFI was actually written and edited by Milton Kant, one of the founders of the EMC Society. It was published January 2, 1958.

But, the second and subsequent Newsletters of the Professional Group on RFI was edited by Rex Daniels, and he continued as the editor until 1968 (Issues #2 -#53.) In 1968, Robert Goldblum became the editor and remained in that position until 1997 (Issues #54 - #173.) Since then, Janet O’Neil has edited the Newsletter (Issues #174 - #212).

The newsletter’s name has changed a number of times. It was originally called “The Professional Group on Radio Frequency Interference Newsletter” (Issues #1 and #2.) Then, it became the “IRE Professional group on Radio Frequency Interference Newsletter” (Issues #3 - #24 – August 1958 – December 1962). Issues Number 25 and 26 were entitled “IEEE Professional Group on Radio Frequency Interference Newsletter.” Then, Issue # 27 in April of 1963 was entitled “IEEE Professional Technical Group on Radio Frequency Interference Newsletter” and this title changed immediately to “IEEE Professional Technical Group on Electromagnetic Compatibility Newsletter” for Issue # 28 in July of 1963. It continued this way until Issue #34 in August of 1964 when the title switched to “IEEE Electromagnetic Compatibility Group Newsletter.”

(It was obvious from the rapid switch in Newsletter titles that there was a lot of changes going on around 1963 with the formation of the IEEE!)

The title then remained constant until Issue #98, in the summer of 1978, when it changed to “IEEE Electromagnetic Compatibility Society Newsletter.” The final change, to its present title of “IEEE EMC Society Newsletter,” occurred at Issue # 147 (Fall of 1990).

The Newsletter has also changed in content and length over the years. It started in the early years with four pages. It grew to an average size of 24 pages under Bob Goldblum and more recently has grown again, under Janet O’Neil, to about 50 pages. The newsletter has associate editors who support the chief editor in her duties.

EMC Abstracts
One of the areas of the EMC Society Newsletter that has been popular over the years has been the EMC Abstracts. These are short summaries of magazine articles and other pertinent articles on EMC that have been reviewed by EMC technical experts. The Abstracts highlight the main gist of the articles and describe the location of the article for the reader who wants more information.
 

Examples of recent EMC Abstracts include the following:

1. “Analysis on Shielding Effectiveness of Metallic Enclosures with Slot,” Yingpeng Fan, Zhengwei Du, Ke Gong, and Guoding Li; from the Proceedings of the Asia-Pacific Conference on Environmental Electromagnetics CEEM 2003, Hangzhou, China, November 4-7, 2003, pp. 43- 46.
2. “Analysis of Resonance Characteristics of a Power Bus with Rectangle and Triangle elements in Multi-layer PCBs” – Zhi Liang Wang, Osami Wada, Yoshitaka Toyota and Ryuji Koga; , from the Proceedings of the Asia-Pacific Conference on Environmental Electromagnetics CEEM 2003, Hangzhou, China, November 4-7, 2003, pp. 73-76.

Technical Services
The EMCS has a Vice-President of Technical Services who supervises a number of technical activities in the Society. His area of responsibility includes the Technical Advisory Committee (which has been a part of the EMCS for over twenty-five years), whose subcommittees include TC-1 through TC-10.

Their areas of interest are:

1. TC-1 EMC Management
2. TC-2 EMC Measurement
3. TC-3 EM Environment
4. TC-4 EMI Control
5. TC-5 High Power EM
6. TC-6 Spectrum Management
7. TC-7 Nonsinusoidal Fields
8. TC-8 EM Product Safety
9. TC-9 Computational EMC
10. TC-10 Signal Integrity

EMC Standards
The EMCS also has a Vice-President of Standards and the EMC Society has developed a number of standards over the years. The EMCS has had an interest in developing standards in the area of EMC almost from its origin as a Society.

Current EMC Society standards include:

1. IEEE Standard 299-1997 – IEEE Standard Method for Measuring the Effectiveness of Electromagnetic Shielded Enclosures
2. IEEE Standard 1128-1998 – IEEE Recommended Practice for RF Absorber Performance Evaluation in the Range 30 MHz to 5 GHz

International Growth
During its first 25 years of growth, the EMC Society was oriented towards the United States. The symposia were called National Symposiums, and most members were from the United States. Of the 21 active EMCS chapters in 1982, 20 were located in the U.S., and the sole chapter outside the U.S. was located in Tokyo, Japan.

Contrast that to the 2007 list of EMCS Chapters. There are 61 EMCS Chapters and 30 of them are outside the United States. The chapters outside the U.S. include Australia (Victoria Section), Austria, Beijing (China), Benelux, Brazil (South Brazil), Croatia, France, Germany, Israel, Italy (Central and South Italy), Japan, Malaysia, Montreal (Canada), Nanjing (China), Ottawa (Canada), Poland, Romania, Russia (Northwest), Russia (Siberia), Sendai (Japan), Seoul (Korea), Singapore, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taipei/Taiwan, Toronto (Canada), Turkey, Ukraine, and United Kingdom/Republic of Ireland.

The membership of the EMC Society has also shown international growth. The current composition of its 4000 members is 60 % from the U.S., 40% international.

Future
As technology is constantly changing, so, also EMC technology is changing to address the new issues that arise. Faster clock-rates and smaller chips coupled with a continually declining cost of computer memory are driving products to be smaller and yet more portable and powerful. This includes computers, hand-held communications devices including cell phones and personal data assistants, mobile GPS systems for cars and other similar transportation devices, digital cameras, and medical devices, to name a few major categories.

Both emission and immunity issues will continue in the future with the development of these technologies; fiber optics and fiber optic computers may arrive in the future in a wave of innovation. However, there will be a fiber optic/electronic interface for many years to come which will have EMC aspects to it.

Spectrum allocation issues are multiplying as rapidly as wireless devices are proliferating. We want access to signals, yet we don’t want to be interfered with when we attempt to communicate with our portable electronic devices. Laptops have multiple radios in them for communications; the radio signals and circuitry sometimes interfere with the operating circuits of the host laptop, giving a whole-new perspective to the age-old term “radio frequency interference!”
 
Conclusion
The EMC Society has grown from a few hundred members in 1957 to its current size of over 4000 members. The number of chapters has grown to match the growth in membership. The Society now includes members and chapters from all over the world.

The EMC Society has a history of high-quality EMC Transactions, high-quality International EMC Symposiums, excellent EMC Standards, and outstanding Technical Committees.

Even as the Society prepares to celebrate its 50^th Anniversary, it is also preparing for another 50 years of progress in its electrical engineering technical niche of electromagnetic compatibility engineering. n

Daniel D. Hoolihan is an independent consultant, who served as president of the IEEE EMC Society from 1998-1999. He can be reached at d.hoolihan@ieee.org.

References

1. Thomas, Sr.; Leonard W. and Hill, James S.; “A Brief Review of the Origin and Growth Statistics of the IEEE EMC Society;” IEEE Transactions on Electromagnetic Compatibility, Vol EMC-25, No. 3. August – 1983; Pages 138-153.
2. Kesselman, Warren; private communications with the author, 2004.

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