47 posts published in 2024.
RF engineering, semiconductor fundamentals, circuit design, automotive radar, photonics, and emerging technologies.
2024 was the first full year of Vik’s Newsletter.
I began by writing about subjects close to my engineering background: RF circuits, semiconductor devices, amplifiers, antennas, and microwave systems. As the year progressed, I started exploring automotive sensing, semiconductor manufacturing, photonics, and power electronics.
This library organizes those articles into technical themes. Many of them are tutorials and foundational explanations that remain useful regardless of how the semiconductor industry evolves.
If you’re new to a subject, I recommend following the articles in the order listed within each series.
1. RF and Microwave Engineering Fundamentals
The fundamental concepts behind RF circuits, signal transmission, amplification, and receiver architectures.
Absolute Basics of Transmission Line Theory — Why transmission lines behave differently from ordinary circuit connections, and when transmission-line effects matter.
Understanding Two Port Amplifier Power Gains — Understanding the different definitions of amplifier gain and their practical use.
A Guide to Noise Sources in MOS Transistors — Thermal, flicker, shot, and induced noise mechanisms in semiconductor devices.
Noise in Cascaded RF Systems — Understanding noise figure and noise accumulation through an RF signal chain.
An (Almost) Equation-Free Introduction to Compression and Nonlinearity Metrics — Understanding why amplifiers become nonlinear and how engineers measure the resulting distortion.
The Dark History Behind Radio Communication — The invention of the superheterodyne receiver and the history of radio communications.
The Image Problem in Superheterodyne Receivers — How frequency conversion creates unwanted image frequencies and the trade-offs involved in suppressing them.
2. RF Power Amplifiers — A Four-Part Technical Series
An introduction to power amplifier operating classes, their efficiency limits, conduction angles, and linearity trade-offs.
Read these four articles in sequence.
ABCs of Power Amplifier Classes: Foundations — The fundamental concepts needed to understand power amplifier operating classes.
ABCs of Power Amplifier Classes: Class A — Class A operation, biasing, linearity, and efficiency.
ABCs of Power Amplifier Classes: Class B — How reducing conduction angle improves efficiency and introduces distortion challenges.
ABCs of Power Amplifier Classes: Class AB and C — Comparing operating classes and their practical applications.
3. RFIC Design, Simulation, Modeling, and Measurement
Practical resources for designing, simulating, measuring, and validating integrated circuits.
A Beginner’s Guide to the Process of RFIC Design — The complete workflow of RFIC development, from design through verification.
The Ultimate Guide to Accurate RFIC Simulations — Improving simulation accuracy and understanding the limitations of circuit simulation.
Understanding Compact Models for MOS and Bipolar Devices — How transistor behavior is represented mathematically for circuit simulation.
A Practical Guide to Making Vector Network Analyzer Measurements — Practical VNA measurement methods and the importance of calibration.
Python Resources for RF Engineers — Software libraries and tools for RF data analysis, simulation, and measurement automation.
Applications of AI/ML to Analog and Mixed Signal Circuit Design — How machine learning can assist analog and mixed-signal circuit development.
4. RF Filters, Switches, and Front-End Architectures
The semiconductor devices and circuit architectures used to manage the increasingly complex RF front ends of wireless systems.
A Brief History of RF Switch Technology — The evolution of switching technology from PIN diodes and compound semiconductors to RF-SOI.
Phase Change Materials: Is It the Future of RF Switch Technology? — An examination of phase-change materials as alternatives to conventional RF switches.
The State-of-the-Art in RF Filter Technology — The acoustic and electrical filtering technologies used in modern wireless devices.
How Tuning, Filtering and Switching Helps Your Smartphone Deal with 50+ Unique Frequencies — How the smartphone RF front end manages a complex collection of wireless bands and signal paths.
5. Antennas, Phased Arrays, and Electromagnetic Materials
The electromagnetic principles behind antenna arrays, beamforming, reconfigurable RF systems, and unusual material properties.
A Preliminary Guide to Antenna Arrays — The fundamentals of antenna arrays and how multiple radiating elements interact.
How Does a Phased Array Antenna Work? Types of Beamforming Architectures — Phased-array operation and the differences between beamforming architectures.
How Origami-Inspired Phased Arrays Are Reshaping the Future of Antennas — How physically reconfigurable antenna arrays can create new radiation patterns.
The Extraordinary Properties of Artificial Metamaterials — Negative-index materials and the electromagnetic phenomena enabled by artificial structures.
The Promise of Terahertz Technology — The opportunities and engineering challenges of operating in the terahertz frequency range.
6. Automotive Radar, LiDAR, and Autonomous Sensing
A technical introduction to automotive sensing, from electromagnetic waveforms to commercial radar implementations.
FMCW Automotive Radar — A Four-Part Series
How Automotive Radar Uses Chirp Signals for Sensing — The fundamentals of FMCW radar and how chirps enable distance measurement.
How Automotive Radar Measures the Velocity of Objects — Doppler measurement, chirp design, and velocity estimation.
How Automotive Radar Measures the Angle of Arrival of Objects — The use of antenna arrays and spatial signal processing for angular estimation.
Exploring State-of-the-Art Commercial Automotive Radar Solutions — Examining how these principles appear in commercial automotive radar systems.
Automotive LiDAR and Sensor Architectures
A Short Introduction to Automotive LiDAR Technology — A guide to operating principles, measurement techniques, and the technology behind automotive LiDAR.
Tesla’s Big Bet: Cameras over LiDAR for Self-Driving Cars — Comparing sensor approaches and the technical arguments behind camera-centric autonomy.
7. Wireless Communications, Satellites, and Precision Timekeeping
Exploring communications systems beyond traditional RFIC design.
What’s Cool About WiFi 7 — The technical developments enabling the next generation of Wi-Fi.
Star Wars: SpaceX vs AST SpaceMobile — The engineering and competitive challenges of direct-to-device satellite communications.
A Brief History of Timekeeping: Part 1 — The development of timekeeping and the underlying physical principles.
A Brief History of Timekeeping: Part 2 — Atomic clocks and the technologies enabling precision timekeeping.
8. Semiconductor Manufacturing, Photonics, and Power Electronics
The beginnings of the broader semiconductor coverage that became central to the newsletter in subsequent years.
How Foundries Calculate Die Yield — The mathematics of semiconductor yield and why defect density matters.
The Semiconductor Apocalypse No One Would See Coming — High-purity quartz, the Spruce Pine supply chain, and semiconductor manufacturing dependencies.
Why We Can’t Build Lasers on Silicon — Understanding the indirect bandgap of silicon and why efficient on-chip light generation remains difficult.
Understanding How Electric Vehicles Convert Battery Power Into Propulsion — Traction inverter operation, power semiconductor devices, and electrical motor control.
9. Graduate School and Engineering Careers
Practical lessons for engineers pursuing research careers and advanced technical education.
The Graduate School Dilemma — The decision to pursue graduate education and its professional trade-offs.
8 Strategies to Speed-Run Graduate School — Advice on conducting research efficiently and making progress toward a graduate degree.
10. Essays, Industry Notes, and Publication Updates
Other writing from the first year of the newsletter, including shorter industry observations and reflections on building the publication.
How I Write an Engineering Newsletter — My process for researching and writing technical articles.
Starlink D2C, Tower Si-Pho, LLMs for Chip Design, Ionosphere Maps with Cellphones, Symmetry in IC Design — A collection of observations across semiconductor and communications technology.
We’ve Hit 1,000 Subscribers! — An early publication milestone.
Holiday Reading Guide, Annual Survey — Interesting reading recommendations and the annual reader survey.
2024: The Year in Review — A reflection on the publication’s first year, its most successful articles, and the direction ahead.
Where the Newsletter Began
The inaugural article, Envelope Tracking for Efficient Power Amplifiers, was published on December 31, 2023, just before the first full year of the newsletter. It provides an introduction to improving RF power amplifier efficiency through dynamic supply-voltage control.
It is included here for historical context but is not counted among the 47 posts published during calendar year 2024.
Continuing the Research
The 2025 library expands into semiconductor physics, AI accelerators, HBM, optical interconnects, advanced packaging, and datacenter power delivery.
The 2026 library builds on those foundations with deeper architecture and industry analysis.
You can also browse the complete publication chronologically through the Vik’s Newsletter archive.
Thank you for supporting independent, engineering-first semiconductor research.
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