Arnold Sommerfeld

Arnold Johannes Wilhelm Sommerfeld, (ˈzɔmɐˌfɛlt; 5 December 1868 – 26 April 1951) was a German theoretical physicist who pioneered developments in atomic and quantum physics, and also educated and mentored many students for the new era of theoretical physics. He served as doctoral supervisor and postdoc supervisor to seven Nobel Prize winners and supervised at least 30 other famous physicists and chemists. Only J. J. Thomson's record of mentorship offers a comparable list of high-achieving students. He introduced the second quantum number, azimuthal quantum number, and the third quantum number, magnetic quantum number. He also introduced the fine-structure constant and pioneered X-ray wave theory. Early life and education Sommerfeld was born in 1868 to a family with deep ancestral roots in Prussia. His mother Cäcilie Matthias (1839–1902) was the daughter of a Potsdam builder. His father Franz Sommerfeld (1820–1906) was a physician from a leading family in Königsberg, where

Challenges in Computational Electromagnetics

Ruzica Golubovic

To meet strict requirements of the information society technologies, antennas and circuit elements are becoming increasingly complex. Frequently, their electromagnetic (EM) properties cannot be anymore expressed in closed-form analytical expressions mainly because of the multitude of irregular geometries found in actual devices. Therefore, accurate and efficient (in terms of computational time and memory) electromagnetic models coupled with the robust optimization techniques, are needed in order to be able to predict and optimize the behavior of the innovative antennas in complex environments. The contribution of this thesis consists in the development and improvement of accurate electromagnetic modeling and optimization algorithms for an ubiquitous class of antennas, the planar printed antennas. The approach most commonly used to model and analyze this type of structures is the Integral Equation (IE) technique numerically solved using the Method of Moments (MoM). From the computational point of view, the main challenge is to develop techniques for efficient numerical evaluation of spatial-domain Green's functions, which are commonly expressed in terms of the well-known Sommerfeld integrals (SIs), i.e., semi-infinite range integrals with Bessel function kernels. Generally, the analytical solution of the SIs is not available, and their numerical evaluation is notoriously difficult and time-consuming because the integrands are both oscillatory and slowly decaying, and might possess singularities on and/or near the integration path. Due to the key role that SIs play in many EM problems, the development of fast and accurate techniques for their evaluation is of paramount relevance. This problem is studied in detail and several efficient methods are developed. Finally, the applicability of one of these methods, namely the Weighted Averages (WA) technique, is extended to the challenging case appearing in many practical EM problems: the evaluation of semi-infinite integrals involving products of Bessel functions. However, the development of effective analysis codes is only one aspect. At least equally important is the availability of reliable optimization techniques for an adequate design of antennas. For that purpose, the Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) algorithm is introduced in the context of our analysis codes. Moreover, the innovative hybrid version of the PSO algorithm, called the Tournament Selection PSO, has been proposed with the aim of even further improving convergence performances of the classical PSO algorithm. Detailed theoretical description of this socially inspired evolutionary algorithm is given in the thesis. Finally, the characteristics of both algorithms are compared throughout several EM optimization problems.

EPFL2011

Efficient algorithms for computing Sommerfeld integral tails

Ruzica Golubovic, Juan Ramon Mosig

Sommerfeld-integrals (SIs) are ubiquitous in the analysis of problems involving antennas and scatterers embedded in planar multilayered media. It is well known that the oscillating and slowly decaying nature of their integrands makes the numerical evaluation of the SI real-axis tail segment a very time consuming and computationally expensive task. Therefore, SI tails have to be specially treated. In this paper we compare two recently developed techniques for their efficient numerical evaluation. First, a partition-extrapolation method, in which the integration-then-summation procedure is combined with a new version of the weighted averages (WA) extrapolation technique, is summarized. The previous variants of WA technique are also discussed. Then, a review of double-exponential (DE) quadrature formulas for direct integration of the SI tails is presented. The efficient way of implementing the algorithms, their pros and cons, as well as comparisons of their performance are discussed in detail.

Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers2012

Challenges in Computational Electromagnetics

Ruzica Golubovic

EPFL2011

Challenges in Computational Electromagnetics

Real axis integration of Sommerfeld integrals with error estimation.

Efficient algorithms for computing Sommerfeld integral tails

Real axis integration of Sommerfeld integrals with error estimation.

Challenges in Computational Electromagnetics

Efficient algorithms for computing Sommerfeld integral tails