Passive Intermodulation at Contacts of Rough Conductors



Dayan, A ORCID: 0000-0002-9106-7395, Huang, Y ORCID: 0000-0001-7774-1024 and Schuchinsky, A ORCID: 0000-0002-4250-6590
(2022) Passive Intermodulation at Contacts of Rough Conductors Electronic Materials, 3 (1). pp. 65-81. ISSN 2673-3978, 2673-3978

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Abstract

Passive intermodulation (PIM) is a niggling phenomenon that debilitates the performance of modern communications and navigation systems. PIM products interfere with information signals and cause their nonlinear distortion. The sources and basic mechanisms of PIM have been studied in the literature but PIM remains a serious problem of signal integrity. In this paper, the main sources and mechanisms of PIM generation by joints of good conductors are discussed. It is shown that the passive electrical, thermal and mechanical nonlinearities are intrinsically linked despite their distinctively different time scales. The roughness of the contact surfaces plays an important role in PIM generation by conductor joints. A review of the PIM phenomenology at the contacts of the good conductors suggests that novel multiphysics models are necessary for the analysis and reliable prediction of PIM products generated by several concurrent nonlinearities of a diverse physical nature.

Item Type: Article
Uncontrolled Keywords: physics.app-ph, physics.app-ph
Divisions: Faculty of Science & Engineering > School of Electrical Engineering, Electronics and Computer Science
Depositing User: Symplectic Admin
Date Deposited: 03 Feb 2022 08:39
Last Modified: 23 May 2026 06:33
DOI: 10.3390/electronicmat3010007
Related Websites:
URI: https://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/id/eprint/3148057
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