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58 DESIGN007 MAGAZINE I AUGUST 2024 Interview by Andy Shaughnessy I-CONNECT007 At PCB East, I met with Dan Beeker, tech- nical director at NXP Semiconductor, and a speaker at the conference. Dan always gives a spirited interview, so I asked him to discuss his class and challenges in the industry today. Andy Shaughnessy: Dan, I understand your class was packed. Tell us a little about the class. Dan Beeker: is was my first time teaching a class on the free day at PCB East, and that was pretty exciting. Mine was the first class of the day, and that can sometimes be a little scary because people might not come, but I ended up with a pretty full class. e class was focused on the behavior of electromagnetic waves. We're talking about a very simple perspective on wave theory and electromagnetic field theory. I put together a series of slides that explained what fields are, how you contain them, and how they behave in those structures. My favorite analogy for electromagnetic field theory is the idea of plumbing. In water pipes, you have something stored in them, much like the energy stored in the space between a trace and a ground. at's the basic structure: Dis- creet conductors separated by a space. is is different from the ideas in the past that a blob of power vias does something and a blob of ground vias does something else to the fields. A blob of power vias or ground vias doesn't help you deliver energy. Each blob is made up of the same conductor. If you put power and ground vias together, then each of those dis- crete spaces follows the rules, and energy can be stored in those spaces. It takes time. When you turn on the faucet for your hose, the water doesn't come out instantly. e water takes time to travel, and the same thing is true with energy, which trav- els at 6 inches per nanosecond in a PC board. e energy has no idea what's at the other Dan Beeker: Outstanding in his 'Fields' Dan Beeker (right) with (2nd from left) Troy Hopkins and Rick Hartley (center) at PCB East 2024.