Signal and Power Integrity: Foundations and Practical Guidelines (online)



Overview

Signal integrity is the practice of ensuring sufficient fidelity of a digital signal transmitted between a transmitter and a receiver for proper functioning of the circuit. The integrity of a signal in real-world applications is compromised by artifacts of the layout of the circuits on a printed circuit board, the type of IC package being used, and is impacted by the circuit logic family, power delivery network, and other aspects of high-speed digital design. These non-ideal, real-world effects can lead to severely distorted signal waveforms, and result in faulty switching and logic errors. Power integrity is the design of the power distribution network necessary to deliver the DC and dynamic current to high-speed switching devices, while meeting voltage droop and ripple specifications that can impact signal integrity, and is also considered.

The course will be delivered as a set of self-contained modules covering the topics of:

  • overview and trends of signal integrity (SI) and power integrity (PI) engineering for electronic design, and relation to electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) engineering
  • transmission lines and signal propagation in the time and frequency domains, including basic principles, characteristics of complex discontinuities, as well as conductor and dielectric losses that impact high-speed propagation
  • signal spectra and basic spectral properties of data signals, NRZ and PAM4
  • network and S-parameters 
  • signal propagation on single-ended as well as differential lines including self and mutual inductance and capacitance concepts and crosstalk, 2D cross-sectional analysis tools
  • link path/channel analysis, and the impact of discontinuities and non-ideal effects
  • VNA measurements – S-parameters and TDR 
  • power distribution network analysis including charge delivery and noise voltage, target impedance, PDN impedance, and design methodologies

Dates, Times and Delivery 

The Signal and Power Integrity: Foundations and Practical Guidelines (online) course will be delivered in eight sessions, each comprising 2 hours of teaching and up to 30 minutes of Q&A.

The course will run from 29 April - 14 May 2025, with sessions delivered over Microsoft Teams at 15:00 - 17:30 (UK time) on:

  • Tuesday 29 April 2025
  • Wednesday 30 April 2025
  • Friday 2 May 2025
  • Tuesday 6 May 2025
  • Wednesday 7 May 2025
  • Friday 9 May 2025
  • Tuesday 13 May 2025
  • Wednesday 14 May 2025

A world clock, and time zone converter can be found here: https://bit.ly/3bSPu6D  

This is a ‘virtual classroom’ course.  

To replicate the experience of a classroom, the sessions are ‘live’ and are not recorded. 

No in-person attendance at Oxford is required and you do not need to purchase any software. 

Programme details

Signal Integrity

Overview

  • Overview of SI and PI trends
  • Relation to EMC

Signal propagation on transmission lines

  • Frequency domain (FD) txlines – Z0, waves, resonance
  • Conductor and dielectric loss
  • Time-domain (TD) txlines 
  • Propagation, Z0, TEM, p.u.l. parameters, waves in space & time
  • Reflection and transmission – time domain (TD)
  • Complex RLC types of loads and discontinuities
  • Circuits vs. txlines and time scales

S-parameters

  • Network parameter concepts
  • Single-ended S-parameters and transfer function concepts

Signals

  • Signal spectra - NRZ
  • Basic data patterns and spectra - NRZ
  • Pre-emphasis and de-emphasis - NRZ
  • PAM4

Inductance and capacitance concepts

  • Getting from E & H fields to C and L, from the physics
  • Self, mutual L and C
  • Tools – 2D

Discontinuities and Non-ideal Effects

  • TEM, not-TEM, discontinuities
  • Via transitions

Crosstalk

  • Crosstalk – Lm and Cm
  • Trends with geometry and Z0, analytical calculations, NEXT, FEXT

VNA measurements

  • Best measurement practices
  • calibration and de-embedding
  • S-parameters – RL, IL, phase
  • TDR (from S-parameters) and useful insights

Link Path/Channel  Analysis

  • Assembling the link path from blocks
  • Ideal block behavior – RL, IL, transmission-phase, phase delay
  • Loss, ISI, single-bit-response
  • Examples

Power Distribution

Power Distribution Network I - Physics

  • PDN TD/FD concepts for package & PCB – charge delivery in time and frequency, noise voltage on plane
  • Current path physics
  • Input impedance
  • Target impedance

Power Distribution Network II - Design

  • Planes – layer stack-up, materials
  • PCB decoupling –decoupling values, location, number, achieving a target impedance
  • Design approach

Attending Your Course 

Details about accessing the private MS Teams course site will be emailed to you during the week prior to the course commencing.   

Please get in touch if you have not received this information within three working days of the course start date. 

Certification

In order to be eligible for a certificate of attendance, you will need to attend the whole course. Participants who meet this criterion will be emailed after the end of the course with a link, and instructions on how to access their University of Oxford digital certificate. 

The certificate will show your name, the course title and the dates of the course you attended. You will be able to download your certificate, as well as share it on social media if you choose to do so.

Fees

Description Costs
Course fee £1095.00

Payment

All courses are VAT exempt.

Register immediately online 

Click the “book now” button on this webpage. Payment by credit or debit card is required.

Request an invoice

If you require an invoice for your company or organisation, please email us to request an online enrolment form.

Tutors

Dr James L Drewniak

Course Tutor

Missouri S&T EMC Laboratory
Missouri University of Science and Technology, USA

Jim Drewniak received B.S., M.S., and PhD degrees in electrical engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA. He was a Curator’s Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering with the Electromagnetic Compatibility Laboratory in the Electrical Engineering Department at the Missouri University of Science and Technology, and is currently a Curator’s Professor Emeritus. He is one of the founders of the Missouri S&T EMC Laboratory, an internationally recognised laboratory for EMC research and education. His research and teaching interests focus on electromagnetic compatibility in high-speed digital and mixed-signal designs, signal and power integrity, electronic packaging, and measurements for SI/PI and EMC/RFI. He is a Fellow of the IEEE, and recipient of the IEEE EMC Society’s highest award for technical contributions, the Richard R. Stoddart Award, in 2013. He has taught short courses widely for industry on signal and power integrity, and EMI.

Prof Dr Christian Schuster

Course Tutor

Head of the Institut für Theoretische Elektrotechnik 
Hamburg University of Technology, Germany

Christian Schuster received the Diploma degree in physics from the University of Konstanz, Germany, in 1996, and a PhD in electrical engineering from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH), Zurich, Switzerland, in 2000. Since 2006 he is full professor and head of the Institut für Theoretische Elektrotechnik at the Hamburg University of Technology (TUHH), Germany. Prior to that he was with the IBM T. J. Watson Research Center, Yorktown Heights, NY, where he was involved in high-speed optoelectronic package and backplane interconnect modelling and signal integrity design for new server generations. His interests include signal and power integrity of digital systems, multiport measurement and calibration techniques, and development of physics-based as well as data-based simulation methods for electromagnetic compatibility and interference problems.

Dr. Schuster received several IEEE Transactions and DesignCon Paper Awards for his contributions to modelling for signal and power integrity. While at IBM, he received several IBM Research Division Awards for his contributions to packaging of high-end server systems. He is a member of the German Physical Society (DPG) and a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). In the past, he was serving as Distinguished Lecturer for the IEEE EMC Society, as Chair of the German IEEE EMC Chapter, as a member of the Board of the EMC Society, as Associate Editor for the IEEE Transactions on EMC as well as an Adjunct Associate Professor at the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering of the Georgia Institute of Technology. Currently, he is serving as President of the NIT Northern Institute of Technology Management (NIT) at TUHH.

Course aims

The course objectives are to provide participants with signal propagation, channel analysis and power distribution network design principles proceeding from the physics and network concepts critical to current high-speed systems.

Application

If you would like to discuss your application or any part of the application process before applying, please click on the 'Ask a question' button at the top of this page.

Level and demands

This course is intended for SI and PI engineers looking for a foundation or refresher of principles for SI and PI, designers and system architects who require a knowledge of SI and PI principles, and EMC engineers who may also have SI/PI responsibilities.

IT requirements

This course is delivered online using Microsoft Teams. You will be required to follow and implement the instructions we send you to fully access Microsoft Teams on the University of Oxford's secure IT network. 

To participate you must be familiar with using a computer for purposes such as sending email and searching the Internet. You will also need regular access to the Internet and a computer meeting our recommended minimum computer specification. 

It is advised to use headphones with working speakers and microphone.

Terms & conditions for applicants and students

Information on financial support