> Backgrounder: Funds aimed at Antenna Pattern Measurement Facility at SFU
Backgrounder: Funds aimed at Antenna Pattern Measurement Facility at SFU
March 14, 2008
Western Economic Diversification Canada is providing $325,000 in
funding towards a new antenna pattern measurement facility to be
located in SFU’s school of engineering science.
MP Ed Fast (Abbotsford) made the announcement on behalf of Rona Ambrose, Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs and Minister of Western Economic Diversification, at SFU’s Burnaby campus on March 14.
The facility will help advance wireless technology in the West by providing key technological support for Western companies in the area of pattern measurement and antenna-plus-terminal design innovation in wireless technology.
It will also enable SFU to train students in new and relevant areas for wireless applications, such as communications, sensing, security and even medical imaging.
"SFU will be the only university in North America with on-site access to this equipment, helping to raise the profile of SFU in the global research community, attracting international scholars and visiting researchers,” says Dr. Mario Pinto, SFU’s V-P Research.
“This initiative informs future students, their parents and researchers that wireless technology forms part of a strong sector with industry supporting long-term growth and sustainability."
The facility’s principal researcher is SFU Engineering Science Professor Rodney Vaughan, who is also a principal investigator with the University of Waterloo’s $12 million CFI-funded Centre for Intelligent Antenna and Radio Systems.
SFU researchers from engineering science and physics as well as those from industry will use the facility.
An antenna pattern is a mathematical function that represents a shape in space, like the shape of a balloon, notes Vaughan. It can be smooth and round for very simple antennas, or a highly complex shape for complex terminals.
“The pattern is a very complicated measure in terms of the mathematics, the physics, the precision mechanics and its control, and the computations. Think of taking a radio wave measurement – a bit like looking at the signal strength bars on your cell-phone – but in a scientific way.
“For characterizing a pattern of a small wireless device, such as on a cell-phone or a laptop, tens of millions of complex, precision radio wave measurements are required,” Vaughan adds. “This facility will allow all this to happen within several minutes to several hours, depending on the pattern complexity.”
Antenna pattern measurement is typically expensive and technically challenging. Most Canadian wireless companies can’t afford pattern measurement and the West has no publicly available pattern measurement facility.
To date, the use of antennas in wireless systems has been relatively unsophisticated. But research is showing that the capacity efficiency – how well we use and share the spectrum, a finite and global resource – can be directly proportional to the number of antennas on the terminals.
Consequently, there is an international rush to develop multi-antenna systems that include sophisticated signal processing and the multiple antenna design.
Multiple antenna systems with adaptive capabilities are also considered key elements for future satellite technology. Vaughan notes that the B.C. industry will stand to gain enormously by having a pattern measurement facility available to complement its own research designs and externally-sourced designs to adapt and commercialize.
Vaughan says the facility, which will specialize in patterns from multi-antenna systems, has a bright future for use in B.C.
MP Ed Fast (Abbotsford) made the announcement on behalf of Rona Ambrose, Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs and Minister of Western Economic Diversification, at SFU’s Burnaby campus on March 14.
The facility will help advance wireless technology in the West by providing key technological support for Western companies in the area of pattern measurement and antenna-plus-terminal design innovation in wireless technology.
It will also enable SFU to train students in new and relevant areas for wireless applications, such as communications, sensing, security and even medical imaging.
"SFU will be the only university in North America with on-site access to this equipment, helping to raise the profile of SFU in the global research community, attracting international scholars and visiting researchers,” says Dr. Mario Pinto, SFU’s V-P Research.
“This initiative informs future students, their parents and researchers that wireless technology forms part of a strong sector with industry supporting long-term growth and sustainability."
The facility’s principal researcher is SFU Engineering Science Professor Rodney Vaughan, who is also a principal investigator with the University of Waterloo’s $12 million CFI-funded Centre for Intelligent Antenna and Radio Systems.
SFU researchers from engineering science and physics as well as those from industry will use the facility.
An antenna pattern is a mathematical function that represents a shape in space, like the shape of a balloon, notes Vaughan. It can be smooth and round for very simple antennas, or a highly complex shape for complex terminals.
“The pattern is a very complicated measure in terms of the mathematics, the physics, the precision mechanics and its control, and the computations. Think of taking a radio wave measurement – a bit like looking at the signal strength bars on your cell-phone – but in a scientific way.
“For characterizing a pattern of a small wireless device, such as on a cell-phone or a laptop, tens of millions of complex, precision radio wave measurements are required,” Vaughan adds. “This facility will allow all this to happen within several minutes to several hours, depending on the pattern complexity.”
Antenna pattern measurement is typically expensive and technically challenging. Most Canadian wireless companies can’t afford pattern measurement and the West has no publicly available pattern measurement facility.
To date, the use of antennas in wireless systems has been relatively unsophisticated. But research is showing that the capacity efficiency – how well we use and share the spectrum, a finite and global resource – can be directly proportional to the number of antennas on the terminals.
Consequently, there is an international rush to develop multi-antenna systems that include sophisticated signal processing and the multiple antenna design.
Multiple antenna systems with adaptive capabilities are also considered key elements for future satellite technology. Vaughan notes that the B.C. industry will stand to gain enormously by having a pattern measurement facility available to complement its own research designs and externally-sourced designs to adapt and commercialize.
Vaughan says the facility, which will specialize in patterns from multi-antenna systems, has a bright future for use in B.C.