RCA Proceedings - Spring 2020

Proceedings

SPRING 2020

PLAN AHEAD!

RCA RETURNS TO PITTSBURGH FOR 2020 BANQUET & SYMPOSIUM

Dr. Thomas Marzetta

2019 Armstrong Medal Recipient Read his acceptance speech on p. 13.

INSIDE:

New IEEE Milestone Celebrates HEMT And Radio Applications

Undersea Expedition to Retrieve Titanic's Radio

RCA Helps West Point

ISS Receives Interoperable Radio System From ARISS

Relive the 2019 Technical Symposium and Awards Banquet with seven full pages of candid photos!

PRESIDENT

Carroll L. Hollingsworth*

EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT

John Facella, P.E.*

VICE PRESIDENT

Nathan "Chip" Cohen, Ph.D.*

VICE PRESIDENT/COUNSEL

Chester "Barney" Scholl, Jr.*

CO-COUNSEL

John Stratton*

TREASURER

Ronald J. Jakubowski*

SECRETARY

Margaret J. Lyons, PE, PMP*

DIRECTORS

Robert Balais

David P. Bart*

Ernie Blair

Dr. James Breakall

Charles Kirmuss

Stephanie McCall*

Bruce R. McIntyre

Ray Novak

Carole Perry

Paul Scutieri

Dr. Julio Urbina

Elaine Walsh*

William Waugamann

Larry Weber

PRESIDENTS EMERITI

Steven L. Aldinger

Gaetano “Tom” Amoscato

Sandra Black

John “Jack” Brennan

Phillip M. Casciano

Mercy S. Contreras

Timothy Duffy

Mal Gurian

Bruce R. McIntyre

Stan Reubenstein

Anthony “Tony” Sabino, Jr.

Raymond C. Trott, P.E.

STAFF

Amy Beckham, Executive Secretary

Sue Sack, Financial Reporting

Miki Tufto, Membership and Order Fulfillment

COMMITTEE CHAIRPERSONS

Awards & Fellows: Charles Kirmuss

Banquet: Margaret Lyons

Bequests & Legacy Giving: Elaine Walsh

Constitution & Bylaws: Barney Scholl

Education: Dr. Julio Urbina

Finance: Phil Casciano

Fundraising Coordination: Nathan “Chip” Cohen, Ph.D.

Historical/Museums & Archives: Ray Novak

Keeping RCA Vibrant: Margaret J. Lyons, PE, PMP

Marketing & Endowment Policy: Elaine Walsh

Membership: James “Ernie” Blair

Nominations & Elections: Nathan “Chip” Cohen, Ph.D.

Publications: David P. Bart

Regional Conferences: Paul Scutieri

Scholarship Fund/Grant In Aid: Alan Spindel

Sponsorships: Jane Winter

Technical Symposium: John A. Facella, PE, C.Eng. and Dr. James Breakall

Website: John A. Facella, PE, C.Eng.

Youth Activities: Carole J. Perry

*Executive Committee Member

The Radio Club of ameRiCa, inC.

Honoring the Past, Committed to the Future

HEADQUARTERS OFFICE:

13570 Grove Drive #302 Maple Grove MN 55311 | (612) 405-2012 amy@radioclubofamerica.org | www.radioclubofamerica.org

AEROGRAM EDITOR

Elaine Walsh

TECHNICAL EDITOR

John S. “Jack” Belrose, Ph.D., VE2CV 811-1081 Ambleside Dr. Ottawa, ON K2B 8C8, Canada (613) 721-7587; jsbelrose@gmail.com

EDITORIAL DIRECTOR

David P. Bart 8512 Kedvale Ave. Skokie, IL 60076 (847) 542-9873; jbart1964@gmail.com

PROCEEDINGS EDITOR

Glenn Bischoff

ADVERTISING CONTACT

Amy Beckham (612) 430-6995; Amy@radioclubofAmerica.org

PRODUCTION

Sapphyre Group

PROCEEDINGS SCIENTIFIC ADVISOR

Nathan “Chip” Cohen, Ph.D.

FROM YOUR PRESIDENT

I want to thank you, the valued members of the Radio Club of America, for the opportunity to have served many years as a director, officer and President of this great organization. RCA’s members are truly what makes the Radio Club of America the prestigious and most recognized wireless organization in the world.

Perhaps I am biased, but I believe that in 2020 you have the most dedicated and talented board of directors and officers in the history of the Radio Club of America. The directors and officers of RCA are an outstanding, diverse group of dedicated professionals who are very representative of our membership. They represent all groups of the vast wireless communications industries that RCA serves.

I am very appreciative of the hard work and dedication that the RCA committee chairs provide to our organization. The jobs that the committee chairs and their committee members undertake is a true labor of love. If you wish to be a member of any of the RCA committees, please contact the committee chair.

I am very appreciative to each of you for being a valued member of the Radio Club of America. I want to encourage you to invite your industry friends and associates to become a member of this incredible organization. I can personally attest to the value of being a member of RCA, both professionally, and personally. As a member for thirty years, and an elected member of the board for over 20 years, I have found that it has been an incredible, rewarding experience. If you wish to become a member of the RCA board, this year’s election will take place this fall. I encourage each of you to consider running for the RCA board of directors.

Again, I thank you for the opportunity to represent you and to serve the Radio Club of America. As I close out my final year as your President, I can report that your board of directors has continued to keep your organization in excellent standing.

Warm Regards.

CARROLL HOLLINGSWORTH, President

The Radio Club of America, Inc.

THE RADIO CLUB OF AMERICA WELCOMED NEW BOARD MEMBERS AND OFFICERS IN NOVEMBER 2019

The Radio Club of America (RCA) announced its newly elected board members and officers in November 2019 who will serve a two-year term that began on January 1, 2020.

The new officers are:

• Vice President/Counsel: Chester “Barney” Scholl, Jr., Esq., Jr, K3LA

• Treasurer: Ronald J. “Ron” Jakubowski, K2RJ

• Secretary: Margaret J. Lyons, P.E.

The new directors are:

• Robert Balais, KK4EHO

• Ernie Blair, WA4BPS

• Bruce McIntyre

• Ray Novak, N9JA

• Carole Perry, WB2MGP

• Paul Scutieri

• Dr. Julio Urbina

• Elaine Walsh

FROM THE PUBLICATIONS CHAIRMAN

The Spring 2020 issue of the Proceedings goes to our members at a difficult time. The COVID-19 pandemic has raced across the globe, bringing much fear and sadness, but also heroism, and, of course incredible dislocation and disruption. As we go to press, wireless and radio events were largely cancelled this spring and many are at risk in the summer, even as the first glimmers of a COVID-19 recovery are emerging and the world starts planning for a recovery. Each spring, the Proceedings traditionally celebrates our prior fall banquet and technical symposium activities. So with that in mind, we bring you this issue. We recognize the banquet award recipients and new Fellows, and the very successful Technical Symposium from fall 2019. We also include the most up-to-date information about early planning for the upcoming RCA Banquet and Awards Ceremony and the Technical Symposium, all of which will return to Pittsburgh in November 2020 as we celebrate the centennial of KDKA’s

historic November 1920 broadcasts. We encourage all of you to join your fellow RCA members at this much anticipated, outstanding event this fall.

We want to express our sincere thanks to Glenn Bischoff for his many years of service as the Proceedings Technical Editor.

Glenn’s other obligations have shifted, and he needs to give up his time spent with RCA. Glenn is a Technical Editor/ Writer at Mission Critical Partners, part of Penton Media, where he contributes to the Mission Critical magazine and other publications at Penton. Previously, Glenn spent a decade covering the 9-11 sector for Urgent Communications magazine. Glenn has been instrumental in our efforts to publish each issue of the Proceedings as a high quality, professional industry journal. I want to personally thank Glenn for his guidance and insights, and I have enjoyed working with him. We are currently seeking a new Technical Editor for the Proceedings, so please forward your

recommendations and watch for more news in upcoming issues.

We remind our readers that the Proceedings reflects the commitment of our members. We need your contributions. We invite the entire membership, and outsiders, to share in the Proceedings by submitting your own articles and reprints. We seek a range of news, current technical information, historical content, and biographical material to share with our membership. The Proceedings has never been better, but we do need your help, so please contribute material for a future issue so that RCA can continue to expand its premier publication.

Finally, congratulations to all of RCA’s members for their continuing successes. We welcome your comments, recommendations, and suggestions on ways to further improve the Proceedings

We look forward to seeing all of you in Pittsburgh this November.

DAVID BART, KB9YPD Editorial Director and Chairman RCA Publications Committee

Glenn Bischoff.

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT RCA’S 2020 BANQUET EVENTS TO FEATURE DR. NATHANIEL FRISSELL AND A TRIP TO KDKA

The Radio Club of America (RCA) is thrilled to announce that Dr. Nathaniel Frissell, W2NAF, will be featured at the 2020 banquet and awards ceremony to be held in Pittsburgh, PA. Dr. Frissell is a recipient of the prestigious 2017 Yasme Foundation Excellence Award and the 2019 Dayton Amateur Radio Association Amateur of the Year Award for his experimental work to study the August 21, 2017 Total Solar Eclipse and his work regarding weather stations. Dr. Frissell recently won a $1.3 million grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to study the ionosphere using the amateur radio service.

BACKGROUND

Dr. Frissell is a Space Physicist and Electrical Engineer who comes to Scranton, PA from the New Jersey Institute of Technology Center for Solar-Terrestrial Research (NJIT CSTR). Dr. Frissell has a passion for radio science and remote sensing of the ionosphere, the electrically charged layer of the upper atmosphere that extends from ~50 to 600 km above the Earth’s surface. The ionosphere is responsible for long distance radio propagation on the high frequency (HF, 3 - 30 MHz) bands, errors in Global Positioning System (GPS) and Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) measurements, and drag on low Earth orbiting satellites. Dr. Frissell completed his masters (2011) and Ph.D. (2016) at Virginia Tech in the Space@VT Super Dual Auroral Radar Network (SuperDARN) laboratory prior to being a Research Professor and Postdoctoral Associate at NJIT. SuperDARN is a global network of HF over-the-horizon radars originally designed to measure ionospheric plasma convection in the Auroral zone, and now extended poleward to the polar cap and equatorward to midlatitudes. Using the SuperDARN radar measurements, Dr. Frissell studied magnetospheric Ultra

Low Frequency (ULF) pulsations measured by the radars and their connection to Earthward-moving plasma flows in space, as well as Traveling Ionospheric Disturbances (TIDs) associated with Atmospheric Gravity Waves (AGWs) and their connection with Polar Vortex. While at Virginia Tech, Dr. Frissell studied auroral physics at The University Centre in Svalbard (http://unis.no), the world’s Northernmost university center. Dr. Frissell also participated on SuperDARN and Automated Geophysical Observatory (AGO) build and repair expeditions on Adak Island, Alaska, and McMurdo Station, Antarctica. Dr. Frissell was introduced to space physics and space weather in middle and high school through the hobby of amataur (ham) radio, where he was fascinated by longdistance radio propagation and the variability imposed on it by the geospace system. In addition to leading him to pursue a Ph.D. in this field, it enabled him to found and lead the Ham radio Science Citizen Investigation (HamSCI, hamsci.org), a citizen science collective that aims to bring together the professional research and the amateur radio communities. This has led to the Solar Eclipse QSO Party, a nationwide ham radio experiment to study the August 21, 2017 Total Solar Eclipse (hamsci.org/seqp), and an ongoing collaboration with the amateur radio electrical engineering organization TAPR (tapr.org) to develop a Personal Space Weather Station (hamsci.org/swstation). For his efforts, the amateur radio community has awarded him the prestigious 2017 Yasme Foundation Excellence Award and the 2019 Dayton Amateur Radio Association Amateur of the Year Award.

In addition, Dr. Frissell has a long-time passion for teaching and education. He earned his B.S. in Physics and Music Education from Montclair State University (2007). He voluntarily coordinated and taught amateur radio license classes and radio and astronomy Boy Scout merit badge classes. An Eagle Scout and Vigil Honor Member, Dr. Frissell taught science and technology for six summers at Forestburg Scout Reservation in New York, and taught amateur radio with the K2BSA group at multiple Boy Scout National Scout Jamborees.

At the University of Scranton, Dr. Frissell is excited to be able to teach again, starting with Digital Signal Processing, Fundamental Physics, and Electromagnetics. He also looks forward to working with students on undergraduate research projects, and sharing the passion he has for radio and space science.

Dr. Nathaniel Frissell

KDKA’S CENTENNIAL AND RCA’S 2020 TECHNICAL SYMPOSIUM

RCA will return to Pittsburgh on Friday, November 20, 2020 to help celebrate KDKA’s 100th anniversary. The broadcast industry has moved beyond the simple AM radio broadcasts of the 1920s. RCA’s 2020 Technical Symposium will feature many speakers on the current hot issues in broadcasting including DTV (digital TV), DTV channel repacking, experts from broadcast manufacturers, and some interesting facets of KDKA’s various AM broadcast towers.

Another tour of the KDKA facilities, which was so successful in 2017, is being planned, as well as several other historic activities for Saturday. RCA is working in conjunction with a number of other organizations to make this a “don’t miss” event.

RCA’S 2020 BANQUET

RCA’s 2020 banquet will take place in Pittsburgh, PA, Friday, November 20 at the historic Duquesne Club. We look forward to seeing everyone in November for this rare and very exciting opportunity.

Pittsburgh – Host City for the 2020 Radio Club of America Banquet and Technical Symposium.

2020 TECHNICAL SYMPOSIUM AND 111TH BANQUET & AWARDS PRESENTATION

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 20 | PITTSBURGH, PA

Featuring Keynote Speaker Dr. Nathaniel Frissell, Space Physicist and Electrical Engineer, New Jersey Institute of Technology Center for Solar-Terrestrial Research (NJIT CSTR)

REASONS TO ATTEND THE RCA BANQUET AND TECHNICAL SYMPOSIUM

Exclusive tour of KDKA

Attendees are invited to an exclusive tour of CBS affiliate KDKA radio broadcasting station on Saturday, November 18 in Pittsburgh. KDKA has been called “the nation’s first broadcast radio station” as a result of its broadcast of the presidential election results on November 2, 1920.

Cutting edge technical learning

Once again we have an exciting agenda lined up for the 2020 Technical Symposium, with a special focus on broadcasting. See p. 13 for details.

Strengthen your network

The Radio Club of America is the oldest, most prestigious group of wireless professionals in the world. Make the most of your membership by connecting with old friends and developing new contacts.

Support the next generation

Help develop the future workforce by supporting RCA's youth efforts, and learn from this year's RCA Young Achiever Award Winner.

Honor the distinguished and deserving

Join us to celebrate the people who invent, create, inspire and collaborate to create the products, services and companies that make this industry one of a kind. See p.26–28 for a list of 2019 award recipients and Fellows.

Can you feel the energy?

RCA continues to build on the momentum from last year, recruiting new members and developing strategic partnerships with other organizations. Be a part of the excitement and help us shape the organization as we continue our vibrancy long into the future.

Discover Pittsburgh

Recently named one of the "Best Places to Travel in 2016" by Travel + Leisure, rated the nation's "No. 1 Food City" by Zagat, and named among the "Top Destinations on the Rise" by TripAdvisor, join us in Pittsburgh to experience it for yourself.

RCA'S 2019 BANQUET KEYNOTE ADDRESS

York

Miller has also served as Deputy Director of the Intelligence Analysis Division at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI); Assistant Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) where he led the Office of Public Affairs and served as the FBI’s National Spokesman; and Commanding Officer for the Counter

Terrorism and Criminal Intelligence Bureau of the Los Angeles Police Department. He also served as the NYPD’s Deputy Commissioner, Public Information. Before turning to law enforcement and intelligence, Miller was a well-known journalist and author, winning eleven Emmy Awards, two Peabody Awards and two DuPont Awards. Miller is the co-author of the New York Times best-seller The Cell: Inside the 911 Plot

Miller entertained and informed the audience with his characteristic mix of stories and vignettes, and offered his observations and perspectives about the risks facing the U.S. and the world today. He talked about his lifetime fascination with the role of radio and communications, and expressed gratitude to his father for introducing him as a child to the world of police radio. In many ways, Miller attributes his passion and career interests in crime to his earliest days of reading the crime blotter, listening to police calls, and his early curiosity about exploring the pulse of the city and the crime beat.

Thank you to John Miller for attending and speaking, and congratulations for being named as an Honorary Member of the Radio Club of America. In more than a century of operations, RCA has elevated only 26 individuals to the status of Honorary Membership. Chief Harlin McEwen, RCA Board Member, Fellow, and Life Member presented the Honorary Membership to John Miller at the banquet.

The 2019 banquet keynote speaker was John Miller, Deputy Commissioner for Intelligence and Counterterrorism, responsible for overseeing both the New

Police Department’s (NYPD’s) Intelligence Bureau and the NYPD’s Counterterrorism Bureau operations.

John Miller presenting the RCA Banquet 2019 Keynote Address.

John Miller received Honorary Membership in the Radio Club of America. (L to R) Chief Harlin McEwen, John Miller, Dr. Nathan ‘Chip’ Cohen.

RCA'S 2019 ARMSTRONG MEDAL ADDRESS

EDITOR’S NOTE: Dr. Thomas L. Marzetta received RCA’s Edwin Howard Armstrong Medal at the 110th Radio Club of America banquet and awards ceremony. The Armstrong Medal is presented when an individual has demonstrated excellence and made lasting contributions to radio arts and sciences. The following text presents Dr. Marzetta’s acceptance speech.

I want to thank the Radio Club of America for this great honor: Edwin Howard Armstrong was one of the giants in the field of wireless communications: inventor of the regenerative receiver, the super-heterodyne receiver, and, above all, wide-band frequency modulation.

I thank my friends and colleagues for taking time from their busy lives to join me on this occasion.

The path by which I arrived at the Armstrong Medal is not nearly as direct as you might expect, so let me spend a few minutes to talk about that. I was fortunate to have parents who spared no expense in obtaining the best possible education for their five children. My father was an electrical engineer at National Bureau of Standards, and a licensed radio amateur as well. Early on, he taught me Morse code, elementary circuit theory, and how to solder. His fondest hope was that I become a physician, but medicine had little attraction for me. I started college wanting, instead, to become a chemist, later a physicist, and finally, in my junior year, I settled on electrical engineering.

I finished graduate school in 1978; and, for the next 17 years, I had careers in petroleum exploration and defense. While I had studied communication theory, I never worked in this field until 1995 when I joined

Bell Labs. This, itself, was a chance event: my wife, Dr. Ingrid Carlbom, a computer scientist, was recruited by Bell Labs to be a department head. I could not find a job in New Jersey, and was kindly offered a one-year term position at Bell Labs. On my very first day at work, Jerry Foschini, one of the pioneers of multiple-antenna communications (now called MIMO – multiple-input/ multiple-output) told me about his recent discoveries. I remember thinking first, that this was supremely important, and second, if only I could invent something like that! My work in Massive MIMO was motivated by the recognized limitations of the early forms of MIMO. It was my good fortune to have managers who supported risky, long-term research, and to have brilliant, enthusiastic collaborators at Bell Labs, and externally as well.

Let me digress a bit. If you start with an old-fashioned broadcast AM signal, how can you improve the audio quality of the received signal? A brute-force approach increases the transmitted power, which has obvious practical limitations. Edwin Howard Armstrong, in 1933, showed that if, instead, you expanded the bandwidth of the signal and replaced linear modulation with frequency modulation, you could improve signal quality without expending extra power. This was the first coded modulation scheme, 15 years in advance of Claude Shannon’s celebrated paper “A Mathematical Theory of Communications”. There is a third way: to exploit the spatial dimension through phased antenna arrays. Amazingly, the earliest suggestion along these lines came in 1919 from the Swedish-American engineer, Ernst Alexanderson, in response to – guess what – a perceived shortage of spectrum! At that time, it was believed that trans-oceanic wireless communications

Dr. Thomas Marzetta (r) receiving the Edwin Howard Armstrong Medal from Dr. Jim Breakall (l).

Dr. Marzetta delivering the Armstrong Medal acceptance speech.

could only be done at extremely long wavelengths – say 10 kilometers – or 30 kHz, almost audio frequency. So there was spectrum only for a few dozen worldclass wireless stations. Alexanderson pointed out that transmitting the same signal, with suitable phase delays, from an array of antennas, would create a directionally selective signal, thereby permitting more stations to operate in the same band of frequencies.

All forms of multiple-antenna communications are variations on this idea. Massive MIMO happens to be the most effective and practical form of the technology yet devised. A numerically large array of small, low-power, individually controlled antennas transmits beams of data selectively to a smaller number of user receivers. All the users are served at the same time, in the same spectrum. The angular selectivity of the array ensures that each user receives only his intended data stream, without interference from the other data streams. Thus, the effective use of the same spectrum is multiplied by the number of simultaneous users. The focusing of power to where it is needed makes for an inherently green technology. Massive MIMO is one of the key physical layer technologies for the fifth generation of wireless, and it is now a commercial reality.

Again, my sincere thanks to the Radio Club of America, and to the many people who made my accomplishments possible. In future years I look forward to seeing even

greater achievements recognized by this award. Let me finish by quoting from a speech by Thomas Edison at the 1929 celebration of Light’s Golden Jubilee: “If our work has widened the horizons of men’s understanding even a little, and given a measure of happiness in the world, then I am content.”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Dr. Thomas L. Marzetta is a distinguished industry professor in the ECE Department at the New York University’s (NYU) Tandon School of Engineering. He joined NYU in 2017 after spending 39 years in three industries: petroleum exploration, defense, and telecommunications. He is the originator of the Massive MIMO innovations now in use in LTE and mid-band 5G. He is a scientist heavily involved with optimizing spectral efficiency in wireless. He holds fundamental patents on MIMO and wireless power transmission and received 47 total US Patents. He is a Bell Labs and an IEEE Fellow. Recognitions for his achievements include the IEEE Communications Society Industrial Innovation Award, IEEE Stephen O. Rice Prize, IEEE W. R. G. Baker Award, Thomas Alva Edison Patent Award, and an honorary doctorate from Linköping University. Dr. Marzetta was elected to National Academy of Engineering in 2020.

2020 RCA TECHNICAL SYMPOSIUM

The Technical Symposium this year will return to Pittsburgh, on Friday, November 20th, followed by the Awards Banquet in the evening. On Saturday, we are planning another visit to station KDKA including the 50 KW Westinghouse transmitter.

Topics and speakers are being organized. We are looking for presenters in any of the areas of wireless technology including antennas, broadband, broadcast, cellular, land mobile radio, military, satellite, or other wireless related technologies. RCA especially likes to feature 'early work' and offers an opportunity for researchers and companies to gain feedback on the technologies that they are developing.

In 2020, we will be featuring a number of presentations or panels about broadcast related topics as we celebrate the 100th anniversary of station KDKA, and several are already lined up. There will also be a presentation on wireless applications in railroads.

Live streaming has been very well received, and we hope to offer a virtual attendance option in 2020, using the Facebook Live platform.

We are calling for abstracts from potential presenters. More information is available at https://www.radioclubofamerica. org/news/call-for-abstracts-for-2020-technical-symposium/. If you have particular suggestions or ideas, please email to info@radioclubofamerica.org.

Also, make your reservations early. The hotel block sells out quickly. Information is on the RCA Website: https://www. radioclubofamerica.org/

THANK YOU : 2019 BANQUET SPONSORS

The Radio Club of America Board of Directors and its members would like to thank the generous event sponsors. Their support and contributions ensure that the Awards Banquet is a success and enjoyable for everyone. Be sure to tell them that you saw their company mentioned in the Radio Club of America Banquet Program.

3-YEAR SUSTAINING CORPORATE SPONSORS

• James Breakall

• Alan Caldwell

• John Facella, Fellow

• Paul Gilbert

SILVER

• Ron Jakubowski

• Lauren Libby

• John Rea

• Larry Weber

RCA’S 2019 TECHNICAL SYMPOSIUM WAS A HUGE SUCCESS!

The Technical Symposium held in in New York City on Friday November 23, 2019 was a huge success.

RCA’s annual opportunity to hear about innovative wireless technology witnessed a packed room with over 70 attendees, tremendous programs, and a very large audience watching online. The all-day symposium has indeed become one of the wireless industry’s premier events.

We had three major panels and six single presenters, one of our largest programs ever. Presentations covered 5G Technology, the Explorer 1 satellite program, Apollo 11 television on the moon, RF in automated vehicles, virtual environments, AMSAT, and deep space eclipses. Our youth presentation explored new-space technologies, and we received an update on RCA’s Youth Activities.

The presentation slides and the video of the presentations are available under the Technical Symposium tab on the RCA website. This year we again live streamed the video using Facebook Live. We had 1,000 people watching according to Facebook. Those who attended the event and needed continuing education units (CEUs) for their professional engineering licenses were able to do so for a nominal fee.

As in previous years, the Technical Symposium audience voted for the best presenters based on numerous criteria.

THANK YOU TO OUR 2019 TECHNICAL SYMPOSIUM PRESENTERS

Padraig Lysandrou (l) received second place in the Technical Symposium for Best Presentation from John Facella (r) for his presentation Youth Presentation “Since Last Time: Exploration of the New Space Industry.”

This year, first place was awarded to Bassem Iskander for his presentation on “Wireless Network Virtualization and Evolution: Where Are We Now and Where Are We Headed.”

In case you missed it, the presentations are available on RCA’s website.

• RF for Connected and Highly Automated Vehicles –Barry Einsig (CAVita), Jason M. Conley (OmniAir Consortium)

• Massive MIMO and Beyond: Innovation in the Wireless Physical Layer – Prof. Thomas Marzetta Ph.D. (NYU Wireless)

• Wireless Network Virtualization and Evolution: Where Are We Now and Where Are We Headed –Bassem Iskander (JMA Wireless)

• Progress Report on RCA’s Youth Initiative –Carole Perry

• The Explorer 1 Satellite Program – Dr. Henry Richter (JPL, retired)

• Since Last Time: Exploration of the New Space Industry –Padraig Lysandrou, Ph.D. student (University of Colorado, Boulder; GNC Engineer at SpaceX)

• Television on the Moon – David Bart (RCA/AWA), Alex Magoun, Ph.D. (IEEE Outreach Historian)

• AMSAT’s CubeSat Satellite – Prof. Alan Johnson Ph.D. (Villanova Univ. & AMSAT)

• The Edge of Space Sciences DMR Eclipse Project –Mike Pappas (Orban Labs)

• Moderator – John Facella, P.E

Preparations are already underway for the 2020 Technical Symposium in Pittsburgh, when we will be celebrating the centennial of station KDKA. A call for abstracts for this year’s Symposium and an invitation to prospective presenters to submit their ideas can be found at https://www.radioclubofamerica.org/news/call-for-abstracts-for-2020-technical-symposium. We hope to see you all in 2020!

2019 TECHNICAL SYMPOSIUM

John Facella moderated the Technical Symposium. Padraig Lysandrou discussing the new space industry.

Dr. Alan Johnson explains AMSAT’s Cubesat program.

John Facella (c) introducing David Bart (l) and Dr. Alex Magoun (r) for their presentation about Apollo 11 television on the moon.

Dr. Thomas Marzetta explaining Massive MIMO and the wireless physical layer.

2019 TECHNICAL SYMPOSIUM

Barry Einsig (l) and Jason Conley (r) in their panel discussion about RF for connected and highly automated vehicles.

Carole Perry providing a progress report on RCA’s youth activities initiative.

Bassem Iskander presenting on wireless network virtualization and evolution.

Mike Pappas discussing the edge of space sciences DMR eclipse project.

Carole Perry (c) with cadets from the U.S. Army Military Academy at West Point Nolan Pierce (l) and Patrick McGurrin (r).

Dr. Henry Richter explaining the history of Explorer 1 and the deep space network.

SOME CANDIDS FROM THE 2019 TECHNICAL SYMPOSIUM

SOME CANDIDS FROM THE 2019 TECHNICAL SYMPOSIUM

SOME CANDIDS FROM THE 2019 TECHNICAL SYMPOSIUM

THE RCA PROCEEDINGS ARE AVAILABLE ONLINE

RCA’s bi-annual publication is now available to all Club members in the members-only section of the RCA website.

Don’t have a login or not sure if your membership is current? Contact us at amy@radioclubofamerica.org or (612) 405-2012.

SOME CANDIDS FROM THE 2019 BANQUET

SOME CANDIDS FROM THE 2019 BANQUET

SOME CANDIDS FROM THE 2019 BANQUET

SOME CANDIDS FROM THE 2019 BANQUET

RCA’S 2019 AWARD RECIPIENTS

Congratulations to all of RCA’s 2019 award recipients. Each of them deserves recognition for their many individual contributions to radio and wireless communications. Their work has helped lead the way to creating, and also preserving, the arts and sciences that bring forth new technological advances for the benefit of the industry and mankind. Some of the recipients are shown below. And, thank you to Dr. Nathan “Chip” Cohen for serving as the master of ceremonies.

David Bart (l) accepting the RCA Service Award from John Facella (r).

Dr. Thomas Marzetta (r) receiving the Armstrong Medal from Dr. James Breakall (l).

Dr. Nathan “Chip” Cohen serving as the master of ceremonies at the 2019 RCA banquet.

Martin Jue (l) accepting the Barry Goldwater Award from Ray Novak (r).

Mercy Contreras (l) presenting the Vivian Carr Award to Margaret Lyons (r).

Frederick Baumgartner (l) receiving the Lee de Forest Award from Jerry Agliata (r).

Robert Strickland (l) receiving the Frank Gunther Award from Charles Kirmuss (r).

Dr. Henry Richter (r) accepting the RCA Lifetime Achievement Award from David Bart (l).

Carroll Hollingsworth (r) presenting the President’s Award to Barney Scholl (l).

RCA’S 2019 AWARD RECIPIENTS

The RCA website is the go-to place for RCA news and events. TROUBLE LOGGING IN?

Please email Amy@radioclubofamerica.org if you need a new password or have difficulty logging in.

Bryan Casciano (l) accepting the RCA Special Recognition Award on behalf of PMC Wireless from Carroll Hollingsworth (r).

Chief Barry Luke (r) receiving the National Public Safety Telecommunications Council Richard DeMello Award from Chief Harlan McEwen (l).

George Stoll (l) accepting the Fred M. Link Award from Jerry Agliata (r).

Carole Perry (l) presenting the RCA Young Achiever to Padraig Lysandrou (r).

Terry Fuller (r) accepting the USN Captain George P. McGinnis Memorial Award on behalf of Michael Lee Heenan from RCA President Carroll Hollingsworth (l).

Inaugurating the RCA Jay Kitchen Award are: Francis “Spike” Fuson (l), Jay Kitchen’s spouse Dr. Kim Kitchen (c), and Dale Walsh (r).

Dr. Bob Heil received the RCA Alfred Grebe Award but could not attend the 2019 RCA Banquet.

RCA'S 2019 FELLOWS ADDRESS

EDITOR’S NOTE: Dana Hanford spoke on behalf of the 2019 Class of Fellows inducted at the Radio Club of America Banquet and Awards Ceremony. Each year RCA inducts those who have made outstanding achievements and contributions to the art and science of radio communications or broadcast or the Radio Club of America. The following text presents Mr. Hanford’s acceptance speech. Biographical information about Mr. Hanford is located at the end of his comments.

Iam honored to be selected as spokesman for the RCA Fellows Class of 2019, to represent this distinguished group, and to acknowledge our individual appreciations of the elevation to Fellow.

Now I would like to introduce you to the RCA Fellows Class of 2019:

• Louis T. Fiore

• Donald E. Root, Jr.

• Alan Spindel

• Lee Ward

• Holly Wayt, and

• I am, Dana Hanford, Jr.

To receive an RCA Fellowship, one must, in one’s own way, have made professional and personal contributions to the art, science and evolution of wireless, in the community in which they respectively serve, or have served.

In the spirit of this award that was established in 1972, where Louis Brown was recognized as the first member to receive a Fellowship, each of this year’s Fellows have made their personal mark, in industry, government, and business leadership, all contributing to the development of radio and wireless.

Here on behalf of the Class of 2019, we sincerely thank the Radio Club of America in recognizing us. The class of 2019 is proud to be part of the RCA Fellows, which now numbers 373. This is a small but distinguished

group. Imagine, in over a century of its existence, and in almost 50 years of Fellows recognitions, only 373 RCA members have been elevated to this status. We are truly honored.

I am personally honored to be recognized as one among this distinguished fellows of this class, and appreciate the opportunity to thank RCA and its members on our behalf.

To the members who nominated us, and the Radio Club of America Awards Committee, the Fellows Class of 2019 thank you!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Dana Hanford, Jr., CPMR (KC7SDD) is Vice President of The Sales Group, Inc. (TSG). He began his career as an electronics technician, worked as a broadcast and recording engineer in New York City and joined TSG when he moved to Seattle. A graduate of New York University, he holds an Extra Class Amateur Radio License and General Radiotelephone Operator License and is active in ham radio, volunteering with city and county emergency management agencies. Secretary for the Western Washington Regional Interference Committee, he is Commercial Representative for the ID and WA APCO-NENA Chapters.

RCA’s 2019 Fellows: (L to R) Louis Fiore, Dana Hanford, Donald Root, Alan Spindel, and Holly Wayt.

RCA'S 2019 LEE DE FOREST AWARD ACCEPTANCE ADDRESS

EDITOR’S NOTE: Fred Baumgartner, KØFMB, CPBE, received RCA’s Lee de Forest Award at the 110th Radio Club of America banquet and awards ceremony. The Lee de Forest Award is presented to an individual who has made significant contributions to the advancement of radio communications. The following text presents Mr. Baumgartner’s acceptance speech.

[Gerald Agliata presented the Lee de Forest Award to Fred Baumgartner.] Gerry, thank you. Thank you for your mentoring, deep involvement in this industry and friendship. I am humbled. Like anyone in this business, and especially for those of us in broadcast, we owe a lot to our spouses and partners. Not every career favors the odd hours and inconveniences that this one does. Our profession and pastime are so mingled that even our sources of relaxation are often defined by noisily searching for a DX contact in the middle of the night. Thank you, Jody, for making this way of life a life.

I am guessing that for many of you, when we were young, radio publications and old radios were involved. Alfred Morgan’s A Boy’s First Book of Radio and Electronics might have been your introduction to Lee de Forest and the miracle of radio. One sign of how far we have come is that our first thoughts about that title today might be “Why wasn’t there a Women’s First Book of Radio?”

Elaine Walsh, who many of you know, and Bob Chapin introduced me to Communications magazine and the publishing world that is so much a part of this industry. At my first convention, I met Fred Link. It is no small circumstance to be able to speak with people who worked with the first generation of radiomen. Link, who as I recall, worked for de Forest for a time, was kind enough to answer questions and tell stories until the hotel café finally closed to prepare for breakfast. In college, through some serendipity, I came across the Audion patent hearings before Congress, where Lee de Forest defended his most notable invention. It is an incredible read. What an amazing character in a business full of amazing characters. I later came upon Gleason Archer’s History of Radio to 1926 in a dusty corner stack. That is not a typo. The book discusses radio before 1926. It starts with: “Radio is the miracle of the ages. Aladdin’s Lamp, the Magic Carpet, the Seven League Boots of fable and every vision that mankind has ever entertained, since the world began, of laying hold upon the attributes of the Almighty, pale into insignificance beside the accomplished fact of radio. By its magic, the human voice may be projected around the

earth in less time than it takes to pronounce the word ‘radio.’”

My first job out of college was teaching electronics. Serendipity found me that rare high school with a radio station. With organizations like the Society of Broadcast Engineers, I have had the opportunity to teach and support education. Radio is nothing if not infinitely fascinating and a place for lifelong learning.

How curious we all are. You are leaders in this industry, contributing combinations of advanced education, businesses achievement, publications work, inventions and innovations that make a difference. Yet, many of you are Amateur radio operators who respectfully greet any other “ham,” regardless of age or status, as “old man” and “young lady.” Some of us even contemplated sending a secret Morse code message at tonight’s banquet table. How thought-provoking that whatever we have done -- no matter how complex, how insightful, how useful, how practical -- in this room, most of us are so proud of our “amateur” status. Our call letters appear on our cars, addresses and business cards.

For me, there never was a time before radio and electronics. My oldest memory is the zap from sticking something into an electrical outlet while playing behind my aunt’s rocking chair. Yes, there is a higher power.

As relatives upgraded radios, I got the old ones and that opened up a big world. After that, it was all luck and providence. I grew up in a small community that was happy to hire a kid on a bike with a first-class license to run the local radio station overnight so that the local Holiday Inn would have music in its lobby. Then came

Fred Baumgartner (l) receiving the Lee de Forest Award from Gerald Agliata (r).

opportunities to care for transmitters big and small from medium-wave to satellite and the studios and content origination systems behind them. At every point, as this student was ready, teachers appeared. Tom, Jim, Gerry, Kent… Even with all the ups and downs, changes in ownership, program/format changes, regulations, audiences and purpose, I have never had a job that was more work than pleasure.

I, like de Forest, “…discovered an Invisible Empire of the Air, intangible, yet solid as granite.” Broadcasting bit me. Broadcasting had the biggest transmitters, biggest signals, tallest towers, reached everyone, and saved lives and property, but most of all, broadcasting is show business. What is not to love about the theater of the mind? As radio goes, broadcasting made the world smaller, closer and safer. I believe too that broadcasting forms a critical underpinning of democracy. If anything, a free media is even more important today. It’s not perfect, but it is critical. A world without radio is somewhere between unimaginable and a darker place. Many of us thought that whatever technology and business we were working on, and whatever the jobs we had when we entered this adventure, this world would change only gradually and over the course of our lifetimes. Obviously, we were wrong. It’s funny that upon looking back, the part of our lives that remained unseen, and to most of us unseeable, the constant advancement of the art, proved to be the most fascinating component. I am grateful for the opportunity to do the things I wanted to do. And, even when I did not see it clearly until it was behind me, that front row seat at the cutting

edge of radio allowed us to invent things daily, both small and large, that made a difference -- sometimes to a just few, and sometimes to many. Lee de Forest said it best: "I came, I saw, I invented—it's that simple—no need to sit and think—it's all in your imagination.”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Fred Baumgartner, KØFMB, CPBE, is a Society of Broadcast Engineers Fellow, a past trustee of the Ennes Foundation and Fellow of the Radio Club of America. He is currently the Director of Next Generation Broadcast Implementation for Sinclair Broadcasting. Previously, he was Director of Broadcast Engineering for Qualcomm’s MediaFLO project and directed Leitch/Harris’ Broadcast Systems Engineering group. Prior to that, he served as Director of Engineering for the Comcast Media Center in Denver, Director of New Product Development and joined as Director of Broadcast Satellite Operations. He previously held engineering and operations management positions at numerous radio and television stations including WIBA, KWGN, KHOW, WTTV and KDVR after earning his FCC 1st Class license in 1972. He contributed to the development of EAS and authored articles and books on radio and TV engineering. He is a graduate of the University of Wisconsin – Stout and holds three patents. He is currently working on developing and launching Advanced Emergency Alerting and Informing for NextGen Television Broadcast.

NEW IEEE MILESTONE CELEBRATES HEMT AND RADIO APPLICATIONS

By David Bart

On December 18, 2019, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) dedicated an IEEE Milestone celebrating the first high-electron-mobility transistor (HEMT). The Milestone plaque is displayed in the exhibition room on the ground floor of Fujitsu Laboratories in Atsugi, Japan. It reads:

The HEMT was the first transistor to incorporate an interface between two semiconductor materials with different energy gaps. HEMTs proved superior to previous transistor technologies because of their highmobility channel carriers, resulting in highspeed and high-frequency performance. They have been widely used in radio telescopes, satellite broadcasting receivers, and cellular base stations, becoming a fundamental technology supporting the information and communication society.

INVENTION

IEEE Life Fellow Dr. Takashi Mimura began researching how to make the metal-oxide-semiconductor fieldeffect transistor quicker while working as an electronics engineer at Fujitsu Laboratories in Atsugi, Japan in 1977. At the time, the GaAs Metal-Semiconductor Field Effect Transistor (MESFET), which had been invented in 1966, was the fastest transistor available. Mimura and other engineers wanted to enhance electron mobility, the speed at which electrons could move through semiconducting material, thus making it an even faster device. At the time, the goals of high-speed device development included improved logic circuits for supercomputers, more powerful radio-wave emitters for microwave applications, and low-noise amplifiers to detect very weak radio signals.

Mimura began investigating an alternative semiconductor to the silicon used in the MESFET and read an article in the journal Applied Physics Letters about heterojunction superlattices. These structures comprised of two or more semiconductors of significantly different bandgaps were developed by Bell Labs in Holmdel, N.J. The superlattices used a modulation-doping technique to spatially separate conduction electrons and their parent donor impurity atoms. Their design inspired Mimura to create a new transistor.

Mimura conceived of HEMT and applied for a patent on it in 1979 (granted in Japan in 1987 and in the US in 1991. The HEMT used a heterojunction superlattice to enhance electron mobility, substantially improving on speed and performance. He published a paper in 1980

demonstrating the first operation of HEMT in which a structure with a single heterojunction of n-AlGaAs and GaAs was used to control a two-dimensional electron gas using the field effect.

DEVELOPMENT OF HEMT

The improved performance has had a major impact on communication applications, and it now powers cellphones, satellite television receivers, and radar equipment.

• The first commercial application of HEMT was a low-noise amplifier due to its outstanding low-noise performance, leading to its use in receiving very weak signals from space in the 45-meter radio telescope at Nobeyama Radio Observatory (NRO), Nagano, Japan.

• HEMT has been used in satellite broadcasting receivers, reducing parabolic antennas to less than half the original diameter and helping to popularize satellite broadcasts in Japan as well as in Europe.

• Since HEMT can operate at high frequencies, it can be used to build amplifiers for the millimeter wave band.

• The higher performance of HEMT allows its use in high-efficiency microwave high power amplifiers.

• HEMT’s high efficiency has also benefited power conversion devices, leading to the development of the world’s smallest and most efficient AC adapter.

Satoshi Hiyamizu (left) and IEEE Fellow Dr. Takashi Mimura of Fujitsu test the first high-electron-mobility transistor. On the right is the first commercial HEMT: a cryogenic low-noise amplifier for the radio telescope at Nobeyama Radio Observatory, in Nagano, Japan. (Courtesy Fujitsu/IEEE)

HEMT STRUCTURE

The HEMT is comprised of thin layers of semiconductors (n-type gallium arsenide and aluminum gallium arsenide) as well as a heterojunction superlattice; a self-aligned, ion-implanted structure; and a recess gate structure. The superlattice acts as a diode and forms between the layers of n-type gallium arsenide (a highly doped narrow bandgap) and aluminum gallium arsenide (a nondoped narrow bandgap). The use of different bandgap materials causes a quantum well to form in the superlattice. The well lets electrons move quickly without colliding with impurities.

The self-aligned, ion-implanted structure consists of a drain, a gate, and a source, which sit on top of a second layer of n-type gallium arsenide—the recess-gate structure. Electrons originate from the source and flow through the semiconductors and heterojunction superlattice into the drain. The gate controls the current flow between the drain and the source.

A 2006 paper in IEEE Transactions on Electron Devices explains that the recess-gate structure decreases the chance of a current collapse—a reduction of current after high voltage is applied. A current collapse would decrease the transistor’s response at high frequencies.

HEMT MILESTONE

On December 18, the HEMT was dedicated as an IEEE Milestone. The Milestone and related events were sponsored by the IEEE Tokyo Section. Administered by the IEEE History Center and supported by donors, the Milestone program recognizes outstanding technical developments around the world.

SOURCES

IEEE Milestone Proposal: High Electron Mobility Transistor, HEMT, 1979, IEEE Milestones Wiki at http:// ieeemilestones.ethw.org/Milestone-Proposal:High_Electron_ Mobility_Transistor,_HEMT,_1979

J. Goodrich, This 40-year-old transistor changed the communications industry, IEEE Spectrum, Dec. 26, 2019. T. Mimura, Revolutionizing the world of communications through transistors: success comes with its fair share of challenges, reprint of an article posted in the Osaka University NewsLetter, No. 78 (Feb. 2018), Osaka University website at https://www.osaka-u.ac.jp/en/news/ storyz/storyz_alumni/201802_storyz04

W. Saito, Y. Takada, M. Kuraguchi, K. Tsuda and I. Omura, Recessed-gate structure approach toward normally off high-Voltage AlGaN/GaN HEMT for power electronics applications, IEEE Transactions on Electron Devices, vol. 53, no. 2, pp. 356-362, Feb. 2006.

MESTFET versus HEMT structures (Courtesy Osaka University)

WIRELESS COMMUNICATION AND THE PANDEMIC: THE STORY SO FAR

Reprinted by permission of the authors and IEEE

Written By: Hamed Ahmadi,

University of York, UK, Konstantinos Katzis, European University, Cyprus, Muhammad Zeeshan Shakir, University of West of Scotland, UK, Mahnaz Arvaneh, University of Sheffield, UK, Alan Gatherer, Futurewei, USA

Published: IEEE ComSoc Technology News (IEEE CTN) 17 April 2020.

[A Note From the IEEE Editor: At this moment of global crisis, the role of telecommunications in keeping people connected and working has been phenomenal. Much of this is simply down to being the backbone that allows streaming media, social networking and video conferencing to ramp up to new levels of activity. In this article, we would like to focus specifically on 5G wireless cellular technology and ask the deeper questions of how this technology may contribute and what new requirements this pandemic may spur within the embryonic 6G effort. We are sure to have missed something so your comments are most welcome.

Muhammad Zeeshan Shakir, Editor Alan Gatherer, Editor-in-Chief]

The World Health Organization (WHO) recognized COVID-19 as a pandemic and almost all countries in the world have been affected by it one way or another. Many countries like Italy, Spain, Germany, France and the UK have declared full or partial lockdown and people are advised not to leave their homes unless necessary. In this difficult time, the UK announced a list of professions as key workers who will remain active and serve the society during the lockdown. This list includes doctors, pharmacists, National Health System workers, police and security forces, and telecommunication networks engineers/workers. Universities are retooling research projects to design low cost ventilators and data analytic engines to track outbreaks. Everyone is asking what they can do to help. Motivated by this, in this article we will have a look at the role of wireless telecommunications so far during the COVID-19 pandemic. Given that many of these nascent efforts may not come to fruition in time to help with the current outbreak, we also ask what the potential of networks beyond current 5G will be in reacting to similar situations.

While the healthcare system, nurses and doctors are at the frontline of fighting the pandemic and protecting patients, others have to stay at home and maintain social distancing. This means that many people need to work from home using internet-based technologies. At this point, it can be argued that the load is mainly on the fixed networks which connect homes. However, this does not reduce the importance of cellular networks, but emphasizes on key

design challenges of 5G and its different verticals. Figure 1 shows use of 5G technologies for considered verticals such as healthcare, education and retail during a Pandemic situation. In this lockdown situation, reliability, availability, and resilience of the cellular network are very important. To better justify the point, let us review the position of these three crucial industries/verticals during the COVID-19 lockdown first and then relevant mobile communications technologies.

5G VERTICALS AND PANDEMICS

In this section, we present the importance of mobile connectivity to healthcare, education, and retail sectors in supporting society and economy and doing social-economic good during pandemics like COVID-19.

Connectivity for Healthcare

5G mobile technologies can reliably connect hospitals, ambulances and homes to make the healthcare service more resource efficient and more effective to manage Pandemic together with normal operations. Connected ambulances can have high quality video calls with doctors and specialists in the hospital to attend the patient remotely and more suitably, especially under ongoing social distancing measures. Services such as artificial intelligence enabled remote patient monitoring and diagnoses can be supported by 5G networks to allow anyone with a medical condition to report back to their local or central healthcare system without having to physically be present [1]. This is especially important for people living in more remote areas. Due to travel restrictions caused by the COVID-19 outbreak, it may be difficult or impossible for many patients and surgeons to attend more equipped hospitals typically located in larger cities. However, surgeries and treatments are still essential. 5G-enabled remote surgery, or in a larger scale internet of skills [2], enables the patients to attend a nearby hospital and receive treatment/ surgery from a doctor hundreds of miles away. Of course this requires ultra-reliable low-latency communication (URLLC) and very high data-rate [3]. Robots have been already used to perform duties/activities in environments that humans cannot go or it is life threatening to go. COVID-19 infected areas are among these environments. Companies like UVD-Robots and Ubibot used robots for COVID-19 disinfecting hospital rooms using UV light. Similar robots have been used for passenger temperature checking (day) and UV light disinfection (night) in the airport. Positioning and maintaining the connection for controlling the robot requires reliable and fast connection links of 5G technologies.

Another use of such wireless communication systems is the effective tracing of potential COVID-19 contacts

whereabouts by employing cellular network type of localisation techniques and offer disease management via integrated personalise mobile Apps. Similar form of localisation techniques can be used to implement social distance measures. In many countries, the government, with the help of the military, has set up temporary hospitals, e.g. National Health System Nightingale hospitals in the UK, due to the sudden increase in the number of patients requiring intensive care. These hospitals are sometimes placed in areas that are not perfectly covered with the required cellular capacity demand and need new approaches of providing coverage and capacity with wireless backhauling techniques such as using low altitude platforms, e.g. Helikites [4,5]. Electric Vehicles (EVs) which are parked at the residential spots during Pandemic can be used to mobilise the stored energy and fulfill the energy demands to run the cellular network at these temporary sites or to meet the other energy demands at the hospitals. To make it happen, EVs will be required to use Vehicle to Grid (V2G) and Vehicle to Infrastructure (V2I) communication through 5G technologies and route the distributed EVs to the desired energy demand [6].

Connectivity for Education

When many countries announced partial lockdown, the education sector was among the first massively impacted as schools and universities discontinued in-person classes

and worked to quickly transition to online classes so that students could continue their education. Nevertheless, this approach has surfaced a number of techno- socio-economic issues. More specifically, students and instructors living in rural areas experience limited coverage/Quality of Service (QoS) as their fixed broadband connection or cellular service is much slower than in urban areas. In addition to this, current broadband wired and cellular networks have experienced increased network traffic and may not support good quality video streaming. According to NOKIA’s network traffic insights in the time of COVID-19 [7] a cumulative increase between 30%-50% over ‘normal’ weekend peak traffic has been observed. The increase observed on weekdays was mainly due to the increased videoconferencing activities during business hours (symmetrical highbandwidth traffic) whereas during weekends it was mostly due to streaming video such as Netflix and YouTube. In the US, conferencing applications such as Zoom experienced over 700% of growth from the 1st of February. All these technical issues directly impact the smooth operation of online classes, thus disrupting the online learning experiences.

Apart from the technical limitations of the current infrastructure, some socio-economic issues appeared when low-income families could not financially support wired-broadband connectivity at home, thus leaving some pupils outside the online classes. 5G mobile technology

Figure 1: Graphical illustration to show the role of wireless communications and their distinguished 5G traits for verticals such as healthcare, education and retail during a Pandemic situation.

is a promising solution that can address most of the aforementioned shortfalls of the current wired and cellular networks offering true online education experience in cases like this. 5G can be employed to support multimedia streaming or to deliver educational material through Virtual Reality (VR), Augmented Reality (AR), and Mixed Reality (MR) for enhanced learning experiences. It can also address traffic generated by online meeting platforms and optimise the resources in real time through self organising networks (SON). In addition to these platforms, Universities will also require 5G technology in order to support immersive experiences for class and laboratory experience through applications such as Remote Laboratories (RL), Robotics and Internet of Things (IoT) embedded applications for Science Technology Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) education.

Connectivity for Retail and Supply Chain

Panic buying and supply chain disruption due to shortage of staff and delay in deliveries caused potential shortage of food and supplies in some areas. An efficient order placement and warehouse management system specifically in this situation requires accurate information about the location and delivery time of products [8]. While delivery trucks can be tracked by global positioning system (GPS), and radio-frequency identification (RFID) technology can be used for small boxes, larger packages can be tracked accurately using ambient backscatter communication technology. Moreover, delivery trucks that carry fresh or frozen products need even better route planning and tracking to avoid food spoilage. For that purpose, they can also regularly update the central system with their products temperature and condition through IoT and artificial intelligence (AI) enabled solutions. This is more crucial when delivering medicine and goods to vulnerable and selfisolated people. In such a system, computation at the edge can reduce the load on the cloud, e.g., computations for remote condition monitoring at the roadside unit jointly with the wireless communication can fix many problems.

Connected self-driving cars is another automation technology which can significantly help the society by automating delivery services and reducing the required number of delivery staff. Realisation of these technologies heavily depends on 5G-based vehicle to infrastructure/vehicle communications (V2I/V2V) and edge computing. This can move even another step forward with robot-based and dronebased delivery using beyond 5G networks. In this system, smaller and more essential packages like medicine and blood can be delivered to houses and transferred between hospitals using self-driving cars, robots and/or drones without having human-in-the-loop [9]. Connectivity on the fly for these drones to work effectively will require availability of wireless backhaul, trajectory optimisation and advanced positioning and localisation techniques. Next, we will have a look at the technologies in cellular networks that enable aforementioned services and applications.

5G KEY TECHNOLOGIES AND REQUIREMENTS

To further investigate the potentials that mobile connectivity and 5G networks provide to different sectors during the pandemics let us review a number of key 5G technologies.

Pervasive Connectivity

Most houses in many developed countries have fixed fast/ fiber broadband connection while in many rural areas of these countries and in developing countries, the only available connection is through cellular networks. Another type of users that fall into this category are the passengers travelling on cruise ships, where they may get stranded near a port and not be allowed to disembark [10]. In such a pandemic, providing a reliable connection to rural or remote areas or cruise ships stranded near port, enables the residents/passengers to use healthcare, government and retail services without disruption.

In order to address the ever increasing peak traffic and the aforementioned vertical applications, 5G and beyond networks can enhance existing terrestrial broadband networks by rerouting traffic through its cellular networks through advanced resource allocation and scheduling techniques. Hybrid type of wired/cellular modems (supporting Optical Fibers, Cable, xDSL, 4G, 5G) might prove a viable solution delivering broadband services for watching TV, working remotely through a VPN service, attending distance learning classes, etc. The current terrestrial network may prove inadequate in parts of cities or rural areas in handling the traffic in emergency cases such as this one. Furthermore, it can be used to provide additional capacity when needed in medical related instances.

Self-Organised and Green Networking

The number of mobile network operators (MNO) active staff/ technicians during the pandemic needs to be kept as low as possible which leads to importance of network selforganisation. Self-healing helps the network to maintain the service in the covered area by the faulty base stations until MNO engineers fix the problem which may take longer than usual. Additionally, the network should independently facilitate the functions of small cell base stations (e.g., turning them off) in dense areas of business or commercial centres to reduce total energy consumption while maintaining the service in the area by macro base stations. A beyond 5G automated network will be even able to predict potential faulties and/or service degradation, and prevent them in a proactive manner.

Ultra Reliable Low Latency Communications (URLLC)

Ultra-reliable and low-latency communication (URLLC) aims at addressing the stringent requirements of extreme and rare events in terms of their reliability and latency [11] and [12]. To satisfy these requirements, 3GPP has been using a plethora of techniques such as short packet transmission, grant-free mechanisms, leveraging spatial, frequency, and temporal diversity techniques in order to meet the 5-nine reliability and 1ms latency targets [13]. Although this might sound astonishing, applications such as high-precision robot control and autonomous vehicles cannot operate under these conditions. For example, factory automation requires a 7-nine reliability and <1ms latency [14]. Furthermore, future applications such as intelligent systems implementing realtime human-machine interactions, require 9-nine reliability

Table 1 presents a summary of these key communication technologies for different considered verticals.

Vertical Applications

Healthcare Education

Retail

Smart hospital, patient monitoring at home, remote surgery, remote diagnosis

Online classes and laboratories, AR, VR, MR, educational robotics

Food & supplies tracking, spoilage reduction

with 0.1ms latency [15]. The next generation (6G) of wireless systems suggests that these stringent requirements will be addressed. Several applications that can benefit from URLLC have been described in the previous section. For example, in the Healthcare sector, haptic feedback in robot-assisted surgeries can operate using URLLC. This is extremely important as this will improve the dexterity of a surgeon while it will minimize the trauma to the patient. Similarly, in Education, URLLC can support technologies such as Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, Mixed Reality, and 3D holography to enhance the remote educational experience of the students who happened to have to have their classes at home due to a general lockdown of the country as a result of a pandemic.

Massive Machine Type Communication (mMTC)

5G enables collecting data from millions of deployed sensors using mMTC technology. Through mMTC-based technologies many verticals including supply chain, smart agriculture, smart cities, industry 4.0 can support the societies and economies during the pandemic. Deployed sensors/actuators in cities or farms send/receive data from the centre using LTE-m/Narrow Band-IoT or LoRa and are helping further automation of essential activities [16].

Cloud/Edge/Caching

Significance of the centralised cloud services for wireless communications, internet of things and web based applications and services has now become more than ever before. With the support of edge/cloud computing and exploitation of big data analytics, such technology can yield significant gains towards the modelling of human activities and behaviour during a pandemic. Furthermore, vast amounts of data may be evaluated for content popularity estimation and strategic contents can be cached at the base stations to achieve higher users’ satisfaction and backhaul offloading [17]. This can have a profound impact for the network when employed for video content distribution.

Security, Privacy, and Trust

Operation of public and private organisations has been severely impaired not just because of the lockdowns but because their staff are not allowed to handle sensitive data remotely. 5G networks are important to provide a true and secure working-from-home experience while managing the traffic, providing high speed and low latency connectivity. 5G networks, however, present an opportunity for cyber

5G Technologies / Requirements

eMMB, NBIoT, URLLC, cloud/edge computing, V2I

Cloud computing, multi-access edge computing, IoT

Enhanced coverage, positioning, URLLC, Edge/cloud computing, Industrial IoT, V2I

espionage and action must be taken at a very early stage to secure vital communications against snooping. It is estimated that 5G networks will experience many more attack vectors compared to previous 4G networks [18]. This issue can become devastating where a huge number of mMTC devices will be connected to the network. To add to this, things are expected to become even less secure as current public key cryptography is vulnerable to quantum computing. Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) is a technology based on Quantum Physics used to secure the distribution of symmetric encryption keys by allowing the exchange of a cryptographic key between two remote entities with absolute security. This key can then be used securely with conventional cryptographic algorithms. Furthermore, using Quantum Communications it is possible to synchronise highdensity core 5G nodes in metropolitan networks [19]. During pandemic large databases of citizens’ information are created which includes their health and financial information. Additionally, IoT-based sensors, cameras and smart meters are used more often than usual which create further threats to citizens’ privacy. We must highlight that the potential unintended use of this technology should be considered and companies/governments should not excessively/unnecessarily use the available technology for citizens tracking and localization. Following General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) requirements the collected data during a pandemic must be kept safe and destroyed in time. Very recently Google and Apple announced a partnership to use Bluetooth connectivity to enable “privacy preserving contact tracing” [20]. This technology would allow each mobile device to make lists of the other devices it comes into contact with through the sharing of encrypted keys. If the user of that device is diagnosed with COVID19 the device will then upload this list to the cloud and theoretically it can be used to track the contacts of this users and provide appropriate advice on isolation strategies. This technology will not be immediately available but could be used as a tool late this year as we bring economies back online and need to monitor new outbreaks closely.

Lessons Learned: Future Potential Verticals and Requirements for Beyond 5G

One of the main lessons learned from COVID-19 pandemic is that communications networks in general and wireless/ cellular communications in particular are key technological elements of resilient societies. They helped us survive, remain connected, and reduced the economic damage. Aforementioned verticals and their applications can

Table 1: Key communication technologies for different verticals

significantly benefit from improvements in the network. As beyond 5G networks will be more intelligent using artificial intelligence and machine learning algorithms, they will satisfy requirements of many other innovative and important verticals and applications. This includes further automation (industry 4.0) and distributed autonomous decisions that allow vital production lines, consumer services and applications to continue with minimum disturbance, and smart connectivity. Agriculture sector can benefit from artificial intelligence and machine learning enabled remote condition monitoring and robotics. Tourism is one of the most affected industries by COVID-19 and beyond 5G networks can enable virtual tourism using drones and VR. In conclusion, we believe 5G networks play a significant role in keeping the societies and communities resilient and the continuation of 5G deployment should not be delayed as a result of economic difficulties caused by COVID-19. Similarly, we believe the research and development of beyond 5G networks should be continued to support our agriculture, manufacturing and more importantly our societies.

REFERENCES

[1] M. Z. Shakir, and N. Ramzan, AI for Emerging Verticals: Robotic-Human computing, Sensing and Networking, The IET, UK, April 2020.

[2] Dohler, Mischa, et al. "Internet of skills, where robotics meets AI, 5G and the Tactile Internet." 2017 European Conference on Networks and Communications (EuCNC) IEEE, 2017.

[3] H. Ren, et al. "Resource Allocation for URLLC in 5G Mission-Critical IoT Networks." ICC 2019-2019 IEEE International Conference on Communications (ICC). IEEE, 2019.

[4] H. Ahmadi, K. Katzis and M. Z. Shakir, "A Novel Airborne Self-Organising Architecture for 5G+ Networks," 2017 IEEE 86th Vehicular Technology Conference (VTCFall), Toronto, ON, 2017, pp. 1-5.

[5] M. Alzenad, M. Z. Shakir, H. Yanikomeroglu, and M.-S. Alouini, “FSO-based vertical fronthaul/backhaul framework for 5G+ systems,” in IEEE Communications Magazine, vol. 56, no. 1, pp. 218-224, Jan. 2018.

[6] I. A. Umoren, S. S. A. Jaffary, M. Z. Shakir, K. Katzis, H. Ahmadi, Blockchain-based energy trading in electric vehicles enabled microgrids, in IEEE Consumer Electronics Magazine, April 2020.

[7] https://www.nokia.com/blog/network-traffic-insightstime-covid-19-march-23-29-update/ (Accessed 9 April 2020)

[8] M. Koivisto, A. Hakkarainen, M. Costa, P. Kela, K. Leppanen and M. Valkama, "High-Efficiency Device Positioning and Location-Aware Communications in Dense

5G Networks," in IEEE Communications Magazine, vol. 55, no. 8, pp. 188-195, Aug. 2017.

[9] Y. Zeng, J. Lyu and R. Zhang, "Cellular-Connected UAV: Potential, Challenges, and Promising Technologies," in IEEE Wireless Communications, vol. 26, no. 1, pp. 120-127, February 2019

[10] G. Fontanesi, H. Ahmadi and A. Zhu, "Over the Sea UAV Based Communication," 2019 European Conference on Networks and Communications (EuCNC), Valencia, Spain, 2019, pp. 374-378.

[11] M. Bennis, Rethinking URLLC: An Application-Driven and Machine-Learning-Enabled Approach to Redefining the Impossible Requirement, IEEE CTN, 10 March 2020

[12] J. Park, S. Samarakoon, H. Shiri, M. K. AbdelAziz, T. Nishio, A. Elgabli, M. Bennis Extreme URLLC: Vision, Challenges, and Key Enablers, https://arxiv.org/ abs/2001.09683

[13] 3GPP TR 38.824, “Study on physical layer enhancements for NR ultra-reliable and low latency case (URLLC),” Tech. Rep. 38.824 Rel-16, Mar. 2019.

[14] G. Berardinelli, N. H. Mahmood, I. Rodriguez, and P. Mogensen, “Beyond 5G wireless IRT for industry 4.0: Design principles and spectrum aspects,” in Proc. IEEE GLOBECOM Workshops, Abu Dhabi, UAE, 2018.

[15] W. Saad, M. Bennis and M. Chen, "A Vision of 6G Wireless Systems: Applications, Trends, Technologies, and Open Research Problems," in IEEE Network.

[16] Katzis, Konstantinos, and Hamed Ahmadi. "Challenges implementing Internet of Things (IoT) using cognitive radio capabilities in 5G mobile networks." Internet of Things (IoT) in 5G Mobile Technologies. Springer, Cham, 2016. 55-76.

[17] E. Zeydan et al., "Big data caching for networking: moving from cloud to edge," in IEEE Communications Magazine, vol. 54, no. 9, pp. 36-42, September 2016.

[18] https://business.financialpost.com/telecom/attacksurface-has-multiplied-5g-networks-more-vulnerable-tohackers-conference-told (Accessed 9 April 2020)

[19] A.M. Lewis, M. Travagnin, “A Secure Quantum Communications Infrastructure for Europe”, JRC Technical Reports, European Commision https://etendering. ted.europa.eu/document/document-file-download. html?docFileId=68917

[20] https://www.apple.com/covid19/contacttracing/ Statements and opinions given in a work published by the IEEE or the IEEE Communications Society are the expressions of the author(s). Responsibility for the content of published articles rests upon the authors(s), not IEEE nor the IEEE Communications Society.

RADIO CLUB OF AMERICA ANNOUNCES

NEW PARTNERSHIP WITH

WIRELESS TECHNOLOGY AND COMMUNICATIONS ASSOCIATION

On April 22, 2020, the Radio Club of America (RCA) and the Government Wireless Technology and Communications Association (GWTCA) announced a new industry collaboration designed to help members of both organizations advance their careers through expanded wireless industry training and publication opportunities.

COLLABORATION AND GOALS

Both organizations have a focus on education and training to assist those in the wireless industry advance their careers. GWTCA and RCA will work together on education and training initiatives. They will also offer joint discounts on membership and do mutual on-line promotion.

GWTCA President Andrew Maxymillian said “The vision and the goals of both of our organizations are completely aligned: to improve the visibility of wireless as a career for youth and women, and to create more educational opportunities for those already in the wireless industry. GWTCA is uniquely positioned to help the interests of wireless as used by government, transportation, utilities, public safety, and business entities.”

RCA President Carroll Hollingsworth remarked that “Like RCA, GWTCA is a broadly based wireless organization, and both organizations have the ability to help fix the increasing void of new entrants into the wireless industry. RCA has been doing this with our thirty plus years of working with youth to get them interested in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) subjects, and with our long-term focus on encouraging more women into wireless. With our new partnership with GWTCA we can both do even more for the wireless industry.”

•

•

ORDER

GTWCA

GWTCA focuses on public transit and other public service wireless technology and communications users, to be their voice and focus on solutions for their unique needs.

GWTCA advocates for policies of importance to our members and to promote the advancement of wireless technology and communications as an effective means for public transit, other public service and public safety agencies to complete their missions.

GTWCA’s board of directors is as diverse as its membership, including representatives of municipalities, manufacturers, consultants, and educators. Their interests are broad as well, from traditional land mobile radio to cyber security, from smart cities to IP.

Visit https://gwtca.org for more information.

RCA

Founded in 1909, RCA is the oldest, most prestigious group of wireless communications professionals in the world. Members are dedicated to the wireless art and science for the betterment of society. The Radio Club of America is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization. For more information, visit www.radioclubofamerica.org.

RADIO CLUB OF AMERICA ANNOUNCES NEW PARTNERSHIP WITH IEEE COMMUNICATIONS SOCIETY

On February 13, 2020, the Radio Club of America (RCA) and the IEEE Communications Society (ComSoc) announced a new partnership designed to help members of both organizations advance their careers through expanded wireless industry training and publication opportunities.

PARTNERSHIP AGREEMENT

The agreement encourages members of each organization to submit papers and presentations to each other’s meetings and publications, expanding the potential for reach to a broader audience. It also provides special incentives to members of each organization to join the other organization. The agreement allows RCA members to register for ComSoc-sponsored meetings at IEEE member rates.

ComSoc will provide an option to RCA members for Affiliate Membership, thereby providing the same privileges as ComSoc members for ComSoc publications subscriptions, access capabilities to ComSoc on-line publications, and technical activities. In return, RCA will provide an option for ComSoc members to become members of RCA. ComSoc members who join will have the same privileges as other RCA members to receive RCA publications, attend RCA events, to vote inRCA elections, and to be elevated to other levels of membership when they meet RCA’s qualifications.

To advance their respective interests in industry education and help ensure a pipeline of future members, each organization will assist the other in promoting wireless careers to students from the middle-school through the university level.

IEEE Communications Society President Vincent W.S. Chan said, “This is a great partnership of two major wireless institutions working together to enhance careers and job opportunities in the wireless industry. ComSoc resources, such as our training programs and our publications, provide engineers with an on-going ability to stay current in a rapidly changing industry.”

RCA President Carroll Hollingsworth said “This partnership provides both RCA and ComSoc members with access to both our organizations’ resources for training. This will materially enhance RCA’s thirty plus years of working with youth to get them interested in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) subjects, and our additional focus on attracting more women into wireless.”

MEMBERSHIPS

RCA members can learn more about joining ComSoc as an Affiliate Member by visiting ComSoc’s Membership page. ComSoc members can obtain a Radio Club of America membership application on the RCA website at a discounted rate.

COMSOC

Comsoc promotes technological innovation and fosters creation and sharing of information among the global technical community. The Society provides services to members for their technical and professional advancement and forums for technical exchanges among professionals in academia, industry, and public institutions. Founded in 1952, Comsoc represents a global network of practitioners, engineers, and academics. At 27,000 strong, Comsoc members span the globe in 140 countries, contributing their talents to the continual innovation of technology in communications. Comsoc’s members are engineering professionals with a singular purpose: to better humanity through advancements in communications and networking technology. Visit https://www.comsoc.org for more information.

IEEE

IEEE is the world's largest technical professional organization dedicated to advancing technology for the benefit of humanity. Through its highly cited publications, conferences, technology standards, and professional and educational activities, IEEE is the trusted voice on a wide variety of areas ranging from aerospace systems, computers, and telecommunications to biomedical engineering, electric power, and consumer electronics. Learn more at http://www.ieee.org.

RCA

Founded in 1909, RCA is the oldest, most prestigious group of wireless communications professionals in the world. Members are dedicated to the wireless art and science for the betterment of society. The Radio Club of America is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization. For more information, visit www.radioclubofamerica.org.

AMSAT CELEBRATES 50 YEARS OF SATELLITE OPERATIONS

By David Bart

In October 2019, AMSAT celebrated its 50th anniversary. A unique organization, and a descendant of Project OSCAR, it partners amateurs and professionals interested in promoting and operating amateur radio satellite communications.

AMSAT is a name that has become generic for amateur radio satellite organizations worldwide, but the name actually refers to the Radio Amateur Satellite Corporation (AMSAT-NA), which is headquartered near Washington, D.C. AMSAT organizations design, build, arrange launches, and operate satellites that carry amateur radio payloads.

Today, international teams of AMSAT volunteers help build each other’s space hardware, or help launch and control each other’s satellites. AMSAT has launched

satellites from 21 countries, many of which have their own AMSAT affiliates. To date, AMSAT has been directly involved in 21 amateur radio satellite projects: 15 were successfully placed into orbit, 4 are waiting for scheduled launches, and 1 is in development.

PROJECT OSCAR

On December 12, 1961, NASA launched the first satellite built by amateurs, named OSCAR 1. The OSCAR acronym stands for Orbiting Satellite Carrying Amateur Radio. Due to the historical role of Project Oscar, amateur radio satellites are generally called OSCARs.

OSCAR 1’s launch occurred just four years after the Soviet Union launched the world’s first satellite, Sputnik I. OSCAR 1 possessed a very unique and specific shape and weight, so that it could replace one of the ballast weights that balanced the payload in the rocket stage. This set the model that amateur satellites have since followed, generally occupying excess, otherwise empty, or ballast replacement spaces onboard spacecraft.

OSCAR 1 was the first satellite to be ejected as a secondary payload (the primary payload was Discoverer 36), which subsequently entered a separate secondary

Lance Ginner holding OSCAR 1 (Courtesy: AMSAT).

Early AMSAT directors and officers in June 1969 with Australis-OSCAR A. (L-R): Jim Puglise, George Kinal, Cap Petry, Chuck Dorian, Bill Tynan, Jan King and Perry Klein. (Courtesy AMSAT)

orbit from the main payload. Thus, it was the first piggyback satellite. It was also the world’s first private non-government spacecraft.

The small, 4.5 kg satellite carried no on-board propulsion, and its orbit decayed quickly. Despite orbiting for only 22 days, OSCAR 1 was an immediate success. Over 570 amateur radio operators in 28 countries forwarded observations to Project OSCAR after receiving OSCAR 1’s simple transmitted CW message of “HI”.

Reports on OSCAR 1 permitted analysis of signal propagation, the orbit, and the thermal condition of the satellite. Three subsequent launches occurred through 1965; all launched by NASA, designated as OSCAR II through IV.

ORIGINS OF AMSAT

OSCAR 1 originated with six West Coast amateur radio operators and grew to include the American Radio Relay League (ARRL), representatives of the U.S. Air Force and the Lockheed Missiles and Space Company in Sunnyvale, California. Following the success of Project OSCAR, AMSAT-NA was founded in 1969 in Washington, D.C. to continue its work.

AMSAT’s first project coordinated the launch of OSCAR 5, constructed by students at the University of Melbourne in Australia. In view of the key role of Project OSCAR, all AMSAT satellites are formally named OSCAR. This policy began with the Australian spacecraft, which was known as Australis OSCAR-A prior to launch and Australis OSCAR-5, or AO-5, once in orbit. AMSAT’s members provided additional design modifications, and the satellite was successfully launched on January 30, 1970 aboard a NASA Thor Delta launch vehicle.

AMSAT-OSCAR 6 (AO-6) was launched on October 15, 1972. AO-6, built with participants from Australia and West Germany, was AMSAT’s first long-life satellite. Command stations were located in Australia, Canada, Great Britain, Hungary, Morocco, New Zealand, the

United States and West Germany. The U.S. and West Germany controlled the satellite, and it remained in service for 4½ years. Subsequent AMSAT satellites continued to emphasize international cooperation.

AMSAT-OSCAR 7 (AO-7) included a new transponder developed and built by Karl Meinzer and AMSAT Germany (AMSAT-DL). AMSAT Japan (JAMSAT) contributed their own transponder to AMSAT-OSCAR 8 (AO-8).

SATELLITE NAMES

As noted above, AMSAT satellites carry the OSCAR name. Most amateur satellites do not receive their sequential OSCAR designation until after they are successfully placed into orbit, and then only at the request of the launching organization. The organization responsible for constructing the satellite names it, and that name is frequently incorporates the OSCAR designation, such as the CubeSat-OSCAR 57. Orbiting satellite names are typically abbreviated as CO-57 or similar.

One unique amateur satellite was SuitSat, an obsolete Russian space suit that had a transmitter placed into it, which was launched in 2006 from the International Space Station. In a twist of fate, “Oscar” was the name

Lance Ginner holding OSCAR 1 (Courtesy: AMSAT).

Launch of OSCAR 3. (Courtesy AMSAT)

given to an obsolete space suit by its young owner in the book Have Space Suit, Will Travel, by Robert A Heinlein, that was originally published just after the Soviet Union’s launch of Sputnik in 1957.

LAUNCH OPPORTUNITIES

In order to launch its satellites, AMSAT works with space agencies and commercial launch contractors. AMSAT takes advantage of unused areas of launch vehicles for its payloads. In return, AMSAT sometimes succeeds in negotiating a reduction or waiver of launch costs. One of the most significant was the Ariane Structure for Auxiliary Payloads (ASAP), developed and manufactured in partnership with the European Space Agency in 1990 for use on its Ariane 4 launch vehicle. AMSAT was able to utilize unused space in the launch vehicle for AMSATOSCAR 40 (AO-40).

AMSAT’S FIRST SATELLITES AO-5 AND AO-6

The first amateur satellites carried simple telemetry beacons. Since 1965, most OSCARs carry a linear transponder for two-way communications in real time. Some satellites have a bulletin board for store-andforward digital communications, or a digipeater for direct packet radio connections.

AO-5 launched into orbit in January, 1970. It carried beacons on 2 meters and 10 meters. In addition to getting amateur radio back into space, this satellite

had two principal objectives. The 10 meter beacon was intended to prove the utility of that band for space use, and the command function would furnish the first demonstration of ground command of an amateur radio satellite. The ability to command amateur satellites would prove increasingly important in later years as AMSAT, and similar organizations, endeavored to convince their governments and other launch authorities that amateurs could control their spacecraft. Permission for launches often hinged on being able to furnish such assurance. Once the AO-5 mission was complete, design and construction began on AMSAT’s first from-the-ground-up project. In orbit, it would be named AMSAT OSCAR-6, or AO-6. This satellite contained a 2 meter up/10 meter down transponder, a 21-channel command decoder, a 435.l MHz beacon and a Morse code telemetry system.

AMSAT OSCAR-6 was launched in October, 1972, and a problem became apparent almost immediately. Although European stations heard the satellite soon after launch, Australia reported no signals. Transmitting the ON command brought the spacecraft to life, but even though it contained no on-board computer, only logic control circuitry, its transponder turned on and off for no apparent reason. To maintain operation in the desired mode, commands had to be resent by the various command stations around the world at every opportunity.

AMSAT OSCAR-7, AO-7, followed. This spacecraft carried two transponders: one was a 2 meter to 10 meter unit like the one on AO-6 dubbed Mode A, and the other transponder was an in-band 2 meter transponder originally built but not installed for Project OSCAR.

EARLY SUCCESSES AND GROWTH

The overlapping lifetimes of AO-6 and AO-7 provided amateurs an opportunity to accomplish something never before achieved with any other satellite, government or commercial: relaying signals from one satellite to another. This satellite-to-satellite mode of communication has since found application in non-amateur spacecraft,

OSCAR 6. (Courtesy AMSAT)

OSCAR 5. (Courtesy, AMSAT)

OSCAR 7 on display in OSCAR Park. (Courtesy AMSAT).

including NASA’s Tracking and Data Relay Satellites (TDRS).

The experiment conducted using both AO-6 and AO-7 involved sending a signal through each satellite, then computing the location of the station sending that signal by the Doppler shift. Confirmation of the utility of this technique to locate ground-based transmitters eventually led to initiation of the international SARSAT (Search And Rescue SATellite) Project to locate downed aircraft and lost mariners.

By the end of 1973, AMSAT’s early successes were becoming recognized and its membership passed 1,000. Ten years later, AMSAT launched OSCAR 10, AO-10, a star-shaped German AMSAT micro-satellite, launched alongside the European Test Satellite (ECS-1 on an Ariane 1-06 launcher into a GTO orbit ). Today, AMSAT has approximately 3,000 members and has affiliated AMSAT organizations in 22 countries.

CONTINUING INNOVATIONS AND COMPETITION

OSCAR-1 was built, quite literally, in the basements and garages of the Project OSCAR team. Today, the innovations of amateurs continue, both at home and in partnership with professional organizations and laboratories. OSCAR 1 demonstrated that spacecraft design and shapes could accommodate the available space in the launch vehicle. AMSAT’s ability to orbit small yet robust satellites arguably opened the door to affordable access to space.

As worldwide interest grew, the modern space industry expanded to encompass amateurs, businesses and governments, all of whom take advantage of the lower cost of smaller satellites and launch opportunities. As the number of interested “riders” and the variety of launch vehicles and companies have multiplied, it became clear that creating satellites designed simply to fit into various launch vehicle spaces was very inefficient.

The newer CubeSat standardization concept brought the same type of satellite designs to multiple deployers that could be fit into a variety of launch vehicles. Cubesats also offered the ability to choose or move between launch vehicles if necessary, with relative ease. AMSAT now

focusses on building CubeSats because CubeSats are much easier to get scheduled for launch. However, free launch opportunities are dwindling because of the limited supply and increasing demand for space onboard launch vehicles as many of the launch candidates seek lower altitudes and work to reduce costs. In addition, restrictions have increased in order to limit “space junk”. The constraints that require AMSAT to de-orbit spacecraft within 25 years after the end of the mission will make it more difficult to maneuver through the regulatory agencies responsible for granting launch approvals.

Going forward, AMSAT will need to prove that its missions last more than the one year that all CubeSats are lumped into these days, because most do not have a mission of more than a few months.

RUSSIAN AND INTERNATIONAL CONTACTS

Less than 20 years after AMSAT was incorporated in 1969, who would have imagined that AMSAT’s efforts to expand amateur radio in space would encompass collaboration with the Soviet Union and the first U.S. amateur station two-way communication with a Russian crewed spacecraft (MIR)? Collaboration began at the 1988 AMSAT Space Symposium in Atlanta, Georgia during the Cold War. Later, following the establishment of the Russian Federation, came the creation of ARISS International in 1996, the launch of Echo (AO-51) in 2004 by a former Russian ICBM launch vehicle repurposed for commercial launches, the deployment of SuitSat in 2006, and later ARISSat-1 from the ISS by Russian Cosmonauts in August 2011.

CURRENT PROJECTS AND ACCOMPLISHMENTS

Since its inception in 1969, AMSAT has orbited 13 amateur radio satellites ranging from early telemetry/ science beacons to store and forward packet mail systems to hemispheric coverage with an apogee that changed position each orbit, giving the entire world an opportunity for that type of coverage. Some were collaborations with AMSAT branches in other countries such as Australia, Germany, and the United Kingdom. One more awaits launch in AMSAT’s 50th year. Putting a successful satellite into orbit on an average of approximately one every 4 years is a remarkable feat.

Amateur radio satellites have helped advance the science of satellite communications. Contributions include the launch of the first satellite voice transponder (OSCAR 3) and the development of highly advanced digital “storeand-forward” messaging transponder techniques.

To date, AMSAT and Project OSCAR have launched more than 100 amateur satellites into successful orbit and operations. Today, there are more than 18 fully operational amateur radio satellites in orbit; acting as repeaters, linear transponders, and as store and forward digital relays.

OSCAR 10. (Courtesy AMSAT)

AMSAT-NA is currently building a series of small, low orbit, CubeSats. These satellites carry university experiments, including a camera, and mode U/V FM repeaters. The first two of these satellites, Fox-1A, and Fox-1B, were launched in October 2015 and November 2017, respectively. They are currently operational and available for use. Fox-1D was launched in January 2018 from India. Fox-1Cliff was launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base aboard the SpaceX Falcon-9 SSO-A rocket in December 2018. These four Fox satellites contain FM transponders with uplink on the 70cm band and downlink on the 2 m band. RadFXSat-2/Fox-1E, a variation of the

Fox-1 series, carrying a mode V/U linear transponder has been accepted for a launch by the NASA CubeSat Launch Initiative. AMSAT is also working on a Phase 4 mission to geosynchronous orbit and actively pursuing High Earth Orbit (HEO) opportunities.

AMSAT-NA currently operates the AO-7, AO-85, AO-91, and AO-92 satellites, which are open for general amateur use. The U.S. Air Force FalconSAT-3 was turned over to AMSAT in late September 2017. AO-95 was launched aboard Spacex’s Falcon-9 SSO-A mission in December 2018. Unfortunately, it was later determined to have poor or no RF reception capabilities, thus preventing its formal commissioning and putting its FM transponder mission into indefinite suspension.

CHALLENGES FOR AMSAT TODAY

Right now, costs are increasing for AMSAT, including launch costs, regulatory compliance, and space hardware certifications. AMSAT is experiencing the reality of being a product of its own success. Launch costs and competition for those launches are increasing because of the realization that smaller, less expensive CubeSats do work and work well. Due to the growth of a marketplace for space operations, competition has increased. In the past, AMSAT rode as ballast on missions, but now extreme competition exists for that physical space. Access to space increasingly requires expenditure of real dollars and funding that may exceed the resources of the amateur radio community or of any one nation. International cooperation will be increasingly necessary. This cooperation will also require compliance with U.S. federal laws. New AMSAT compliance and monitoring policies will need to be developed and implemented. Once completed, agreements with individual foreign organizations will need to be further pursued. Only then will AMSAT be able to sustain its international reputation and operations.

FOX 1 CubeSat. (Courtesy AMSAT)

FOX 1A Launch. (Courtesy AMSAT)

ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATIONS

AMSAT celebrated its 50th anniversary with a Space Symposium and General Meeting in October 2019.

Earlier, in May 2019, AMSAT provided a display, “Oscar Park,” at the Dayton Hamvention, which included an original OSCAR 1 on loan from ARRL, and other notable spacecraft. Only three original OSCAR 1 satellites were made. One was launched into orbit, one prototype was given to the Smithsonian Institution, and ARRL holds the third prototype.

The Radio Club of America recognized the anniversary of AMSAT and its CubeSat innovations during RCA’s Technical Symposium in November 2019 with a presentation by Professor Alan Johnson of Villanova University who is AMSAT’s vice president of educational activities. He presented “Designing the AMSAT CubeSat Simulator: A Functional Satellite Model for the Classroom.”

Additional information about AMSAT can be obtained at its website https://www.amsat.org/.

SOURCES

Brennan Price and Keith Baker at AMSAT.

J. Spier, Apogee view –the president’s letter, The AMSAT Journal, Vol. 42 No. 2, March/April, 2019, p. 3.

J. Buxton, Engineering update, The AMSAT Journal, Vol. 42 No. 2, March/April, 2019, p. 5.

B. Tynan, Past presidents’ retrospectives, The AMSAT Journal, Vol. 42 No. 2, March/April, 2019, p. 9.

B. Baines, Past presidents’ retrospectives, The AMSAT Journal, Vol. 42 No. 2, March/April, 2019, p. 13.

K. Baker and D. Jansson, A brief history of AMSAT, AMSAT website at https://www.amsat.org/amsat-history AMSAT, Wikipedia website at https://en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/AMSAT

Amateur Radio Satellite, Wikipedia website at https:// en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amateur_radio_satellite.

A. Bilsing, OSCAR-1 launched 50 years ago, translated from Funkamateur at http://www.arrl.org/files/file/ Technology/Bilsing.pdf

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

David P. Bart, KB9YPD, is Chairman of the Radio Club of America Publications Committee and Editorial Director of the Proceedings of the Radio Club of America. He is a Life Member and Director of the Antique Wireless Association, and a Life Member, Director, and Fellow of RCA. He is also treasurer of the IEEE History Committee and vice president of the Museum of Broadcast Communications in Chicago. He is a member of AMSAT.

AMSAT’s OSCAR Park display. (Courtesy: AMSAT, Keith Baker).

OSCAR 1 at the Smithsonian Institution Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center. (Courtesy: Wikicommons).

RCA HELPS WEST POINT

By RCA Fellow John Facella, who served in the U.S. Army Signal Corps

It is no secret that military units depend on communications in order to function.

While we have moved well past the wig-wag flags of the civil war, the military has recognized that having good communicators is vital to the mission of protecting our nation.

For example, as long ago as April of 1921 (3 years after the end of World War I), the Army’s Chief Signal Officer had conceived the idea of forming a Signal Reserve Corps of officers and enlisted men with communications experience because they were radio amateurs.

Fast forward to recent times, and all three of the major military academies have amateur radio clubs (West Point W2KGY, the U.S. Naval Academy W3ADO, and the U.S. Air Force Academy K0MIC). Two recent articles in QST have highlighted some of the activities of the West Point amateur radio club.

Members of the Radio Club of America have been providing assistance to the West Point club over the past several years, as West Point modernized its antenna systems and equipment.

As many already know, RCA Director and Fellow Carole Perry, WB2MGP, has been working tirelessly for over 30 years with middle and high school youth, getting them interested in STEM (science, technology, engineering, math) subjects using amateur radio as the attraction.

Last year she was contacted by West Point to enquire if they could attend RCA’s annual Technical Symposium. As a result, Carole arranged for two cadets,Nolan Pierce and Patrick McGurrin, to attend both the Technical Symposium and the Annual Awards Banquet in New York City.

But before this connection took place, RCA Fellow Don Backys, K9UQN, had already become involved with West Point. Don is a retired Motorola engineer who now lives in Tennessee and enjoys using his amateur radio station to make long distance (DX) contacts.

As Don explained it to us: “The West Point project started when one of our East Tennessee DX Association (ETDXA) members, Hugh Morgan, became a silent key. Hugh was a graduate of West Point, was a helicopter pilot, and was retired in Knoxville. He and I would talk on the air

Carole Perry (c) with cadets from the U.S. Army Military Academy at West Point Nolan Pierce (l) and Patrick McGurrin (r).

World War I U.S. Army Signal Corps signal flags.

about ham radio and flying. In Hugh's will he donated his technical library to West Point, and the library is named after him. Another classmate of Hugh's was also a member of ETDXA. Together John Ulmer, WB4AVX and I put our heads together, and contacted the West Point Amateur Radio Club’s license trustee and asked ‘how can we help’?"

“Well, the cadet radio club was in the process of being relocated to the 3rd floor of the engineering building. The reason for this move by the way is kind of interesting: As cadets would walk by the station’s room they could hear ‘strange sounds’ emanating from the room, CW (Morse code), RTTY (radio teletype), FT8 (a digital mode) and SSB (single sideband voice). Pretty soon the club members began hearing, ‘Hey, what's going on in here?’ Well, before they knew it they had 40 cadets taking their ham radio license course. I believe first pass they got 37 Techs, two Generals and one Extra.”

“The Academy would pay for new furniture, lighting, flooring, etc., but not for the radios. We asked the trustee, ‘What kind of radio do you have in mind?’ His answer was that the radios had to be digital and first class. Then we asked, ‘How much money do we need to raise?’ We beat the bushes, giving talks to local radio clubs, even attending a yearly West Point Alumni dinner and ‘passing the hat’. Our goal was $7,500. We managed to raise most of it through contributions, and I wrote a personal check for the remainder so that the cadets could reach their goal."

Don explained further: “The long-term goal of the club is not only to have cadets obtain their amateur radio licenses, but to get them fired about all phases of radio communications. Hopefully some will go on to become Army officers in the Signal Corps.” This is the same desire that was voiced back in 1921 by the Army Chief Signal Officer!

Don went on to explain that he has also created an endowment scholarship fund at the Milwaukee School of Engineering, and that his second student was graduating this year with a BSEE degree. Don has also been assisting

another RCA Fellow, Joe Fairclough, WB2JKJ, who has been working for 40 years with junior high school students in New York City.

Continuing our saga of RCA members assisting West Point is RCA Fellow and former Director Robert Walsh, WA8MOA, who was a U.S. Army officer. He is currently an attorney specializing in veterans’ affairs. Upon meeting the two West Point cadets last year at the Annual Technical Symposium, Bob decided to donate an ICOM HF radio to the West Point amateur radio club. The original intention was to donate the radio at an event to be held at West Point, but Bob decided with the pandemic it was better to send the radio to the club directly. It is hoped that in future when the pandemic subsides that some RCA members can formally donate the radio to West Point.

It is gratifying to see the many ways that RCA members are giving back to the community, and especially in this case to the U.S. Military Academy. Those of us who are active in the wireless industry are well aware of the need to increase the numbers of engineers, technicians, and others who have an education and experience in wireless technology. Other RCA members who have stories of providing assistance to their communities or the industry, please submit that information to Amy Beckham, our executive secretary, for possible future articles.

SOURCES

Organization of Amateur Radio Operators, Army and Navy Journal, April 30, 1921, Vol. 58, Part 2, p. 949. M. Sherburne, Rebuilding the West Point Cadet Amateur Radio Club - W2KGY, QST, Feb. 2017, also reprinted in April 2020, p. 57.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

John Facella, BSEE, P.E., is Executive Vice President of the Radio Club of America, director of RCA’s Technical Symposium and RCA’s webmaster. He is a Principal at Panther Pines Consulting, LLC, specializing in public safety communications consulting, and general management consulting. He spent over 30 years in the wireless industry, including 28 years working for both Motorola and Harris, and over 2 years as a senior vice president with a national consulting company. He has held positions including product management, systems engineering management, and Director of Public Safety Markets. He has also held general management positions in a number of high tech startup companies.

RCA Fellow Don Backys K9UQN

Bob Walsh

NEWS ITEM

Dayton Hamvention Cancelled and IWCE

is Going Virtual

Many Radio Club of America (RCA) members participate in numerous annual radio and wireless related events. RCA members play significant roles in many of these organizations; in leadership positions, operating booths and activities, and as participants and attendees.

The Coronavirus pandemic has left hundreds of industry and other activities planned for the first half of 2020 either cancelled or rescheduled. As we prepare for release of this issue of the RCA Proceedings, some parts of the world and portions of the U.S. are beginning to reopen after months of shutdowns. Yet, considerable uncertainty remains regarding which events may or may not take place, and the future outlook for the rest of 2020 remains uncertain.

We wish all of these wireless, radio, and indeed all other organizations, governments, and citizens, the very best as they struggle through the current period. We highlight two major annual events in this article that are well known to RCA members. Please check schedules for all activities and continue to support these and other organizations as they deal with the pandemic and its impacts.

DAYTON HAMVENTION CANCELLED

For the first time in its 68-year history, Dayton Hamvention® cancelled its activities due to concerns about the coronavirus outbreak. The glum news was not entirely unexpected, given widespread cancellations of public gatherings and a national state of emergency.

In March, the Hamvention Executive Committee announced it was “monitoring the COVID19 pandemic. We have worked very closely with our local and state health departments. It is with a very heavy heart the Hamvention Executive Committee has decided to cancel Hamvention for this year,” Hamvention General Chair Jack Gerbs, WB8SCT, said in announcing the cancellation on March 15. “This decision is extremely difficult for us, but with around 2 months until the Great Gathering we felt this action necessary. More specific details regarding the closure will soon be posted. Thank you for your understanding in this time of international crisis.”

The Dayton Hamvention cancellation comes less than a week after the International DX Convention in Visalia, California, called off this year’s show. The Dayton Amateur Radio Association (DARA) sponsors Hamvention.

Since 1952, Hamvention® has been sponsored by Dayton Amateur Radio Association (DARA). For many years it has been the world’s largest amateur radio gathering, attracting hams from throughout the globe. The international gathering attracted more than 32,000 visitors in 2019. Hamvention’ s announcement has caused the cancellation of other associated events. These include Contest University, the Contest Dinner, and the Top Band Dinner. The Dayton Hamvention will return in 2021 on May 21, 22 and 23 at the Greene County Fairgrounds and Expo Center in Xenia, Ohio. Updates, questions about refunds, and future plans can be monitored at https://hamvention.org/

IWCE IS GOING VIRTUAL

For over 40 years the International Wireless Communications Expo (IWCE) has been North America’s premier critical communications event. It is the one place where critical communication technology professionals gather to evaluate, learn and network with industry leaders.

On June 4, IWCE announced that IWCE 2020 was going Virtual, no travel required. Earlier this spring they had made the decision to reschedule to late August, in the hope that it would be safer for all to travel and convene large gatherings. However, out of an abundance of caution, the decision was made to go Virtual.

IWCE Virtual will take place the week of August 24, 2020, and will allow the entire global community to participate. All registered attendees of the previous in-person event wll automatically have their pass transferred to the March 2225, 2021 IWCE. They will also receive a comparable level of access to sessions, booths, trainings, etc. for the IWCE Virtual event this August.

IWCE Virtual will deliver robust, high-quality content including world-renowned keynotes, conference tracks, trainings, workshops, roundtables, and working groups that we were all looking forward to at this year's in person event. The Virtual event will also provide for new networking opportunities through data driven networking engagements across various new virtual formats.

Additional information about IWCE Virtual can be found at https://www.iwceexpo.com/iwce20/public/enter.aspx

SOURCES

Dayton Hamvention website at https://hamvention.org

Dayton Hamvention announces cancelation of 2020 show, ARRL Letter, Mar. 15, 2020.

IWCE is officially rescheduled, IWCE website at https:// www.iwceexpo.com/iwce20/Public/Enter.aspx.

NEWS ITEM

ISS Receives Interoperable Radio System From ARISS

Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) is celebrated the successful March 7 launch and docking of the SpaceX-20 commercial resupply mission to the International Space Station (ISS). One payload on the flight is the ARISS Interoperable Radio System (IORS), which ARISS calls “the foundational element of the ARISS next-generation radio system” on the space station.

ARRL AND AMSAT SUPPORT

Amateur radio has been an integral component of ISS missions since 2000. The Dragon cargo capsule docked successfully with the space station on March 9. ARISS-US Delegate for ARRL Rosalie White, K1STO, said hundreds of ARRL members contributed to make the IORS project happen, and ARISS is celebrating the 4-year-long project.

“ARISS is truly grateful to ARRL and AMSAT for their co-sponsorship and support of ARISS since day one,” White said. “ARISS greatly appreciates the hundreds of ham radio operators who have stood by ARISS, sending financial support and encouragement. A robust ham station is on its way to replace the broken radio on the ISS, and tens of thousands of hams will enjoy strong ARISS packet and ARISS SSTV signals as a result. In addition, thousands of students will discover and use ham radio to talk with a ham-astronaut. We hope to see the trend continue where more ARISS teachers and local clubs set up school ham clubs.” The new system includes a higherpower radio, an enhanced voice repeater, updated digital packet radio (APRS), and slow-scan television (SSTV) capabilities for both the US and Russian space station segments.

White called the March 7 launch, “beautiful, flawless.” ARRL President Rick Roderick, K5UR, told ARISS that he had his fingers crossed for a successful launch.

ARISS

Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) receives funding from and uses resources of the International Space Station U.S. National Laboratory. ARISS is a member of the Space Station Explorers consortium. ARISS is a cooperative venture of international amateur radio societies and the space agencies that support the International Space Station (ISS). In the United States, sponsors are the Radio Amateur Satellite Corporation (AMSAT), the American Radio Relay League (ARRL), the International Space Station U.S. National Laboratory and National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). The primary goal of ARISS is to promote exploration of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) topics by organizing scheduled contacts via amateur radio between crew members aboard the ISS and students in classrooms or public forms. Before and during these radio contacts, students, educators, parents, and communities learn about space, space technologies, and amateur radio. For more information, see www.ariss.org.

THE INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION (ISS) U.S. NATIONAL LABORATORY

In 2005, Congress designated the U.S. portion of the ISS as the nation’s newest national laboratory to optimize its use for improving quality of life on Earth, promoting collaboration among diverse users, and advancing science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education. The ISS U.S. National Laboratory manages a portfolio of both basic and applied research projects to support the transition of low Earth orbit to a robust space economy. A fundamental component of the ISS National Lab mission is to make the unique properties of the low Earth orbit environment available for use to non-NASA U.S. government agencies, academic institutions, and the private sector. Through management of a comprehensive and diverse research portfolio, the ISS National Lab is driving innovative science that can benefit life on Earth and demonstrate the value of space-based research to the American public.

Space Station Explorers is a consortium of organizations that use the power and appeal of the International Space Station to engage students. Consortium members develop and deliver high-quality educational programs that feature

March 7

Launch of SpaceX-20 commercial resupply mission.

science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) concepts and skills. This includes the opportunity for students to design, build, launch and/or operate their own experiments on the ISS. The consortium works with educators, learners and explorers of all ages.

UNLOADING AND INSTALLATION OF IORS

According to NASA Mission Control, it will take the three ISS crew members up to a month to unload and stow the 4,300 pounds of cargo on board the Dragon capsule, and the IORS is not a priority. The actual ham equipment will be installed in the ISS Columbus module. Another IORS unit is in line to be launched and installed in the Russian segment of the ISS later this year.

The IORS consists of a custom-modified JVCKenwood TM-D710GA transceiver, a multi-voltage power supply, and interconnecting cables. The ARISS hardware team will assemble four flight units -- and 10 IORS units in all -- to support onboard flight operations, training, operations planning, and hardware testing. Future upgrades and

enhancements to the next-generation system are in various stages of design and development. These include a repaired Ham Video system -- currently planned for launch in mid-to-late 2020, an L-band (uplink) repeater, a microwave “Ham Communicator,” and Lunar Gateway prototype experiment.

HAM RADIO ANTENNAS

There are six Ham radio antennas on ISS. Four Ham radio antennas are located on the exterior of the Russian Zvezda Service Module and two are located on the European Space Agency Columbus module.

A set of four antenna systems are deployed on the ISS Service Module supporting the current installation of the Kenwood D700 and D710 radios. Each of the four antennas can support amateur radio operations on multiple frequencies and allow for simultaneous automatic and crew-tended operations. Having four antennas also ensures that ham radio operations can continue aboard the station should one or more of the antennas fail.

Three of the four antennas are identical and each can support both transmit and receive operations on 2 meter, 70 cm, L band and S band. They also support reception for the station’s Russian Glisser TV system, which is used during spacewalks. The fourth antenna has a 2.5-meter (8 foot) long vertical whip that can be used to support High Frequency (HF) operations, particularly on 10 meters. Currently, one of the 3 VHF/UHF antennas is disconnected and the HF antenna has no radio hardware available for use.

Two antennas are installed in the Columbus module, currently serving the Ericcson radios deployed there. Frequencies available for transmission to and from Columbus are 2 meters, 70 centimeters, L-band and S-band.

Additional information about ISS ham radio equipment (including antennas) can be found at Contact the ISS.

SOURCES

ARISS Celebrates Successful Launch Carrying Interoperable Radio System to ISS, ARRL Letter, Mar. 12, 2020.

F. Bauer, First element of ARISS next generation radio system readied for launch on SpaceX-20, ARISS website at https://www.ariss.org/index.html

B. Brown, Where is HAM radio antenna on ISS? Can I get some images of HAM radio antenna on ISS? Quora website at https://www.quora.com/Where-is-HAM-radio-antenna-onISS-Can-I-get-some-images-of-HAM-radio-antenna-on-ISS

ARISS Antennas on ISS - Russian Zvezda Service Module.

ARISS Antennas on ISS - European Space Agency Columbus Module.

NEWS ITEM

Radar Could Detect Cosmic Neutrinos in Antarctic Ice

SLAC laboratory physicists in the US can detect radar echoes by bouncing radio waves off a cascade of high-energy particles. Their achievement could lead to a new and inexpensive type of neutrino telescope. The new telescope could be capable of detecting neutrinos with energies currently outside the range of both optical observatories and radio antennas.

For the past decade, an unusual telescope in Antarctica, the “IceCube,” has been searching the sky for neutrinos. Dozens of kilometre-long strings of photomultiplier tubes are buried in the ice. The observatory detects Cherenkov radiation emitted by charged particles that are created when neutrinos travelling up through the Earth interact with the ice. Since 2013, some of those faint flashes of light have been identified as coming from high-energy “cosmic” neutrinos, which originate from deep space rather than from the Sun or Earth’s atmosphere.

IceCube has detected neutrinos with energies up to 10 PeV (1016 eV), but is unlikely to reach much higher energies. Cherenkov radiation at optical wavelengths is heavily attenuated in ice, travelling at most for about 200 m, which limits the detector volume. Since neutrinos are rarer at higher energies, a limit volume imposes an upper limit on the energy.

RADIO EMISSIONS

Charged-particle showers generated by neutrino interactions also emit radio waves, which travel far greater distances through ice than does light. A balloon-based detector, ANITA, searches for neutrinos by detecting radio emissions from a vast swathe of Antarctic ice. However, ANITA has the opposite problem as IceCube: it struggles to detect neutrinos with energies less that about 100 PeV because the strength of radio emission scales with the energy of the incoming particle.

Steven Prohira of Ohio State University and colleagues exploit “active” means of radio detection by using radar echoes. This method recognizes that a particle cascade moving through a material at near the speed of light will kick out electrons from atoms within the material. In the brief period before those electrons are re-absorbed, they can be made to oscillate by externally applied radio waves. Antennas can then be used to detect the radio waves that are emitted by the oscillating electrons, detecting the “echo”. This technique is generally independent of the incoming particle’s energy.

Prohira was part of a group that tried to demonstrate this technique in the field, using a donated television transmitter and a set of radio antennas positioned close

IceCube Laboratory at the Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station in Antarctica. (Courtesy Sven Lidstrom, IceCube/NSF)

to a cosmic-ray telescope in Utah. They tried to detect radar echoes from air molecules ionized by passing cosmic-ray showers in order to confirm that they could observe a signal at the same time as the telescope. But after three years of data collection, a limited detection efficiency, caused in part by the very short lifetime of free electrons in air, meant that no radar signal was forthcoming.

TEST FOR ECHO

Seeking definitive proof of the effect, Prohira and colleagues have now completed a laboratory experiment at End Station A of the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory in California. There they set up a 4 m-long plastic target serving as a proxy for Antarctic ice and blasted it with a beam containing about a billion electrons, each having an energy of around 1010 eV. The idea was to represent the effect of a neutrino with 1019 eV (somewhat higher than the ideal energy, but a value fixed by other users in the lab).

After directing radio waves at the target and using a second antenna to monitor any echoes, the researchers

observed a signal lasting less than 10 ns. Such a signal is predicted by simulations so after accounting for several background sources, the team concluded that it was indeed a radar echo produced by ionization inside the target.

Francis Halzen at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and principal investigator of IceCube, said that while testing echo detection in the field has been “challenging,” researchers have been able to make progress in radio techniques using the SLAC beam, noting “This is one more example of the power of these beam experiments.”

Prohira and colleagues are now planning a new experiment in Antarctica, at a high enough altitude to detect radar echoes from cosmicray showers that reach the ice. If funding is forthcoming, they hope to have the detector up and running within the next couple of years. They aim then to complete a neutrino observatory before the end of the decade. Prohira indicated, “We first want to show that the technique is viable with a known source before building a full-sized array.”

The virtue of such an observatory would be its simplicity. Relatively few detector holes in the ice and fairly straightforward radar equipment should, estimates Prohira, mean a price tag of just a few million dollars, compared to IceCube’s $275 thousand. He argues that such economy will not compromise the science and that a radar-echo facility could yield important results in identifying sources of high-energy neutrinos as well as in flavor physics. “We would want to be complementary to IceCube,” he says.

A paper reporting the research has been accepted for publication in Physical Review Letters and a preprint is available on arXiv.

SOURCES

E. Cartlidge, Radar could detect cosmic neutrinos in Antarctic ice, Astroparticle Physics Research Update, Physicsworld, Jan. 28, 2020.

E. Cartlidge, IceCube finds cosmic neutrinos at the South Pole, Telescopes and Space Missions Research Update, Physicsworld, Nov. 21, 2013.

NEWS ITEM

TUndersea Expedition to Retrieve Titanic's Radio

he company with sole rights to salvage artifacts from the RMS Titanic has gone to court to gain permission to carry out a "surgical removal and retrieval" of the Marconi radio equipment on the ship, a Washington Post article reports.

1912

The Titanic sank in 1912 on its maiden voyage after striking an iceberg in the North Atlantic. The state-of-theart wireless telegraph transmitter, installed by Marconi Wireless and Telegraph Company, was the Titanic’s sole connection to the rest of the world. As the radio room filled with water, radio operator Jack Phillips transmitted, "Come at once. We have struck a berg. It's a CQD, old man," and other frantic messages for help, using the spark transmitter on board. CQD was ultimately replaced with SOS -- which Phillips also used -- as the universal distress call. The passenger liner RMS Carpathia responded and rescued 705 of the passengers.

CURRENT CONDITION

After resting at the bottom of the ocean for more than a century, the rust-covered wireless equipment that relayed those messages could be recovered. As might be expected, the deteriorating Marconi equipment is in poor shape after more than a century under water.

RMS Titanic Inc., the Atlanta-based company with the sole rights to salvage artifacts from the shipwreck, is seeking a court’s permission for the “surgical removal and retrieval” of the Marconi set.

The undersea retrieval would mark the first time an artifact was collected from within the Titanic, which many believe should remain undisturbed as the final resting place of some 1,500 victims of the maritime disaster, including Phillips. The wreck sits on the ocean floor some 2 1/2 miles beneath the surface, and remained undiscovered until 1985.

THE TREATY

A just-signed treaty between the U.K. and the U.S. grants both countries authority to allow or deny access to the wreck and to remove items found outside the vessel. "This momentous agreement with the United States to preserve the wreck means it will be treated with the sensitivity and respect owed to the final resting place of more than 1,500 lives," British Transport and Maritime Minister Nusrat Ghani said in a statement.

THE DEBATE

RMS Titanic Inc. argues that the wireless transmitter must be recovered soon, and ideally within the year, as expeditions to the site more than two miles below the

The Marconi wireless transmitter as it appears in the wreck.

A rendering of the Marconi transmitter as it would have appeared in 1912.

ocean’s surface have noted deterioration over the years. The “Silent Cabin,” the soundproof room where it is housed, withstood years of damage and protected the transmitting switchboards and regulators, the company wrote in court documents. The deckhouse above the Marconi transmitter has been falling apart since 2005, and holes have been forming over the Silent Cabin. The overhead will probably collapse within the next few years, Titanic expert Parks Stephenson wrote in court documents, “potentially burying forever the remains of the world’s most famous radio.”

Millvena Dean, Titanic’s last living survivor said in a 2000 interview, “I think the ship should be left in peace.” She was 9 weeks old at the time of the disaster and died in 2009. “Any bits and pieces that have come out from the ship on the seabed — that is all right. But to go on the ship — no, that is all wrong.” RMS Titanic Inc. President Bretton Hunchak, however, has said the radio recovery mission would be limited in scope and undertaken in an effort to protect the important artifact before it is too late, “This is a careful, surgical operation to rescue a historically significant item so it can teach future generations about the story of Titanic.”

The request to enter the rapidly disintegrating wreck was filed in U.S. District Court in Eastern Virginia by RMS Titanic, Inc. of Atlanta, Georgia, which said that it hopes to restore the Titanic radio transmitter to operating condition, if it is allowed to go forward.

THE PLAN

The company plans to use a manned submarine to reach the wreck and then deploy a remotely controlled sub that would perforate the hull and retrieve the radio equipment. If carried to the surface, it could perhaps be restored to working order, RMS Titanic Inc. said, meaning “Titanic’s radio — Titanic’s voice — could once again be heard."

SOURCES

Undersea expedition planned to retrieve Titanic's radio gear, ARRL Letter, Feb. 6, 2020.

B. Shammas, Relic hunters plan to retrieve Titanic radio that relayed the ship’s final pleas for help, Washington Post, Jan. 22, 2020.

Due to the efforts of Carole Perry, the Youth Activities Program has been very successful. During the year, Carole travels all over the country to meet with people and to speak on behalf of the program. Almost all of the travel is at Carole’s personal expense. You can help by donating your frequent flyer miles to the Radio Club. If you would like to participate, please contact Carole Perry at wb2mgp@gmail.com and she will assist you.

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 2020

PITTSBURGH, PA

SILENT KEYS

MICHAEL CLARSON

It is our sad news to inform our readers about the passing of Michael Clarson of Bloomfield, NJ on Sunday, January 12, 2020. Michael was laid to rest in January and further information is available from the Walter Johnson Funeral Home, in Bloomfield.

Mike was born in Manhattan and grew up in New Jersey. He received his BS in Electrical Engineering from NJIT and was a member of the NJIT NYC Metro Alumni since 2016.

Mike was a Communication Engineer at Parson’s Transportation in Newark and New York City for 6 years. He was an amateur Ham radio operator since he was 10 years old, WV2ZOW. He was a member of the Radio Club

of America since 1981, and he was elevated to a Fellow and served as a Board Member. Mike was a member of the Quarter Century Wireless Association. He also was a member of the Girl Scout Heart of New Jersey and received their Honor Pin. Mike obtained his amateur radio incense at the age of 10 in 1961, launching a passionate interest and lifelong commitment to the science and art of radio communications. His career included both commercial and public safety land mobile communications, first as a technician with Motorola C&E, then DirectorTechnical Operations with Airsignal International (radio paging/mobile phones). After spending several years with cellular startups, Mike joined RCC Consultants, Inc. where, for over 22 years, he designed and implemented commercial, and public safety communications systems.

Since 2013, Mike has served as the Principal Project Engineer for PARSONS Corporation. Mike was the

CLIFFORD E. BADE

TSILENT KEY

Silent key is a term of respect for a deceased amateur radio operator. The key in the term refers to a telegraph key, the instrument that all early amateur radio operators, as well as many contemporary amateur radio operators, used to send Morse code. The term SK is used in telegraphy to indicate an end of transmission. Today, the term is commonly used within the radio community as a sign of respect and condolence, regardless of whether the deceased was an amateur radio operator.

Clifford Bade

he Radio Club of America is sorry to report the passing of Clifford E. Bade age 84. He passed away in Boynton Beach Florida on January 14, 2020 after an extended series of hospital stays. Cliff was a long-time resident of northeastern Ohio and moved to Florida in 2011. Over his life, he was an avid Ham Radio enthusiast and active in many Masonic Organizations including Olmsted Falls Masonic Lodge (Master in 1983) and Al Koran Shrine and Jesters. He founded Cleveland Communications in Parma, Ohio and was a long-time leader in

RF Design lead for various public safety and rail transit projects, such as the World Trade Center Transportation Hub and campus in New York City, the East Side Access, which brings Long Island Railroad trains into Grand Central Terminal and Hudson Yards where the Long Island Rail yard by Penn Station, NYC is being overbuilt with high rise buildings.

Mike was an avid contributor to the Radio Club of America, and had a strong interest in history. He authored a number of articles and supported RCA’s publishing team and made many contributions as a board member. His enthusiasm and friendship will be missed.

Mike is survived by his wife of 42 years, Jean (Murzenski) Clarson, and other family members. In lieu of flowers, please make a donation in his memory to Auricle Communications (www.wfmu.org/donate) or Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (www. giving.mskcc.org).

the municipal and commercial 2-way radio communications industry until he retired in 1997. He was a long time member of the Radio Club of America

Cliff is survived by his second wife Michele (Micki) and his three sons Ken, Doug, Phil and their wives as well as four grandchildren and seven great grandchildren. A lifelong salesman and entrepreneur, Cliff is remembered by his friends and acquaintances for his friendliness, integrity, generosity and willingness to help anyone in need. He will be greatly missed. In lieu of flowers, memorials may be made to the Shrine Children’s Hospitals via Al Koran Shrine https://alkoranshriners. com. Online condolences at www. bakerfuneralberea.com

Michael Clarson

VOICES OF TOMORROW CITIZEN SCIENCE IN DATA COLLECTION AND EXPERIMENTATION

By Frances Bonte, KE8HPA

EDITOR’S NOTE: This issue of the Proceedings of the Radio Club of America brings another installment from the next generation of inventors and developers in wireless communications. The Voices of Tomorrow column provides a place for younger people to share their work in a professional setting. RCA is interested in finding students (primarily college- or high-school level) who are interested in writing about their explorations, ideas and contributions to wireless communications. We congratulate Tucker Dunham on his first professional publication, and we encourage submissions by others for future columns. Please contact David Bart, Proceedings editor at jbart1964@gmail.com for further information or to submit draft articles for publication.

Citizen science has been in the news more often in recent months because of the need to collect large data sets related to the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet, citizen science has been around for a long time in many disciplines and fields of study. For instance, the Citizen Science Association (CSA), which is a member-driven organization to connect people to advance knowledge through research by, for, and with members of the public, was founded in the United States in 2013. Typically, citizen science involves the general public working with scientists and engineers on projects to obtain data, monitor systems, and help make discoveries. Citizen science allows for collaboration across all levels – from people who study something for their full-time job, to those who do it in their spare time. Nonetheless, the scientific advancements that result from the collaboration between citizens and scientists can make big waves of change. To improve the world around us, all levels of society should be a part of the solution, and bridging the connections among scientists, engineers, and citizens is a way to do this.

PROJECT ORIGINS

I am currently working on a project that taps into the citizen science method for data collection and experimentation. This project, which began in November 2019, was planned as my presentation topic for the 2020 Hamvention Carole Perry Youth Forum. Please refer to the RCA Youth Activities website for more information about the Youth Forum. It is a great resource for young people who are just beginning their radio journeys. I was really inspired to begin my own citizen science work after attending one of the Hamvention Carole Perry Youth Forums.

Since 2019, my brother Seamus Bonte, KE8GTT, and I have been involved in HamSCI, a citizen science organization with amateur radio operators. That year, HamSCI held a workshop at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, as shown in Figure 1. Scientists and Hams attended from all over the world.

I presented at the workshop with KE8GTT on Hams: the First Makers.

Our presentation outlined and demonstrated the long history of amateur radio and electronics builders. It also described the current Maker Movement, based on our experiences in a maker space laboratory that had open resources. The support included “Elmers” (amateur radio mentors) to guide learning and construction. Makerspaces provide important aid and support for citizens to conduct experiments, make designs, and construct prototypes. The Makerspace provides access to expensive equipment and instruction to the users, making scientific exploration financially feasible and available to the general public. One can learn to connect scientific and engineering concepts with their own creativity and imagination to design and construct projects!

Figure 1: The author with her HamSCI lab coat and mug.

While doing the background research for my presentation, I was fascinated to learn how early Hams, who did not have access to catalogs let alone the Internet, raided kitchens and garages to find the parts to make their radios function better, or to build them from scratch.

The workshop inspired me to participate more fully, and I sought out more experiences.

PERSONAL SPACE WEATHER STATIONGROUND MAGNETOMETER PROJECT

I volunteered to participate in the development of the Personal Space Weather Station - Ground Magnetometer (PSWS-GM) Project with people I met in Cleveland. Dr. Nathanial Frissell, from the University of Scranton, suggested that I help develop basic documentation to guide others in the installation and operation of the station. I hoped that my brother and I might help generate enthusiasm for the PSWSs among young hams, makers, and citizen scientists.

Participating under the umbrella of a larger national project with support from the National Science Foundation, I had the opportunity to work on the magnetometer for this project. A magnetometer is a device used to measure the strength of Earth’s magnetic field in the x, y, and z planes. As an amateur radio operator, I realized this offered the chance for me to provide some insight into the project.

The overall goal of the project is to create PSWSs. Each one includes a collection of instruments that study space weather and its effect on radio propagation from a fixed ground position. Many teams are working on different instruments, such as the software-defined radio (SDR) that will sample noise levels, Doppler shift, and other phenomena. A GPS disciplined oscillator will help establish precise frequency and time. Finally, the ground magnetometer for the stations, my part of the project, measures the earth’s magnetic field in many locations. Observers can use the data obtained from the ground magnetometer to uncover the direct links between space weather and radio propagation. More information about some of the pieces of the project can be found on the HamSCI website.

Because scientists need considerable data to find relevant patterns, which requires many data collection points across the world, PSWSs placed in many locations can encourage wide-spread citizen science participation. The purpose of the PSWS-GM Demonstration Project is to develop a mock-up instrument of the ground magnetometer using off-the-shelf components to record geomagnetic observations in the form of sample data sets for later use by the project development team.

PSWS PROTOTYPE

Mr. David Witten, KD0EAG, is developing the prototype of the unit and has furnished both an evaluation and a communication board for my use. Dr. Hyomin Kim, Ph.D., from the New Jersey Institute of Technology, is responsible for the project data and has provided great information and advice. While the prototype for the module is still being developed, it was possible to create a working mock-up, capable of producing sample geomagnetic measurements for use by the project development team.

My first step involved assembly of the mock-up instrument from modular components and a program controller utilizing sample code and sketches. Next, I needed to test the mock-up instrument to ensure its basic operation before installation. Then, I could install the instrument at a sample site to test the enclosure for the magnetometer and support board. A sample data set could be made from the board for review by the project team.

DATA COLLECTION AND OBSERVATIONS

My goal was to gain a basic understanding of the earth’s magnetic field, and the impact that changes in the magnetic field can have on one’s daily life, with special attention given to the effects on radio propagation. I hoped to develop a working model capable of producing data measurement and data storage from the PSWS-GM support board. This required me to become familiar with the hardware, software, and communication protocols for data collection. The key component used for data collection is the PNI RM3100, a geomagnetic sensor with a high resolution for its cost. See Figure 2 for the device layout and connections.

Figure 2: Demonstration project layout.

I also sought to develop a list of key recommendations for siting and installation. I wanted to provide sample data that can aid in future project development.

I attempted to match the data collected by very precise scientific instruments as shown in Figure 3, using my low-cost setup. The SuperMag data shows the strength of Earth’s magnetic field in three axes, where N E and Z are the x y and z axes, as observed over time in UTC. See the SuperMag website for specific data.

Like the SuperMag site, my device used a real time clock module to generate a time stamp in ISO format. Measurements were received to the microcontroller in 30 second intervals and were recorded on a micro SD card and via serial port. Initially, we set up the device with little attention to the orientation. See Figure 4 for my first sample data test. It was immediately clear that the orientation of the magnetometer greatly affected the measurements. In its final position, the magnetometer should be level and plumb with the x-axis facing magnetic north to get the most accurate x, y, and z values in microteslas. This position creates much more consistent values with that of the scientists at SuperMag, showing that this device can mimic that data collection, and provide similar results. This hypothesis will be tested with Dr. Hyomin Kim who plans to install a

similar set-up near the University of Scranton instrument at the Jenny Jump State Forest Park in New Jersey.

One other data point collected was the temperature of the magnetometer. In the future, I will look at the effect of temperature on the readings, and consider if temperature compensation should be applied.

I was able to present my preliminary findings at the HamSCI 2020 workshop. This was an online meet-up that took place in March 2020. All the presentations can be found on the HamSCI YouTube website.

Figure 3: Magnetometer data from SuperMag.

Figure 4: The Magentometer and Redboard.

OUTCOMES

Through this experiment, I have been able to complete some of my goals, while others are still underway. Currently, during this time of COVID-19 quarantine, I have been able to work on the system. I focused on the form of data uploading and learned how to accomplish remote data upload without a cord connection or having to interrupt the stream of data collection. Although it has proven challenging, I have learned more about the specific topics of this project. I have also learned about the process of research and experimentation before leaving high school. I have been fortunate enough to be a tester for the WWV Doppler shift implementations as well!

The experiences that I have had as an amateur radio operator throughout high school have taught me the importance of involving young people in the field. When people explore technologies like this in their youth, they build confidence and a sense of curiosity to learn more; and, they may continue to expand their knowledge. I am a mentor for young girls in STEAM fields (science, and technology, interpreted through engineering, and the (liberal) arts, and based in mathematics). The ideas these younger students have shared with me make me feel that they will one day solve big problems. They, and many others, could be involved in citizen science!

Organizations like RCA, with its focus on Young Achiever awards, are doing incredible work to spur technological curiosity – just a note, my younger brother is also a RCA Young Achiever! Other events, like the Carole Perry Youth Forum at Hamvention, show the dedication of young hams not only to radio but to the scientific method.

Whether these young participants choose to go into scientific fields of study or not, becoming involved now in radio technologies will help grow the citizen scientist ranks and lead to scientific advancements that result from the collaboration between citizens and scientists –operating together to improve the world around us.

SOURCES

Website links that provide articles, videos, and other resources for more information include:

Citizen Science: https://www.citizenscience.org/about-3/ HamSCI: https://www.hamsci.org/

SuperMAG: http://supermag.jhuapl.edu/ Radio Club of America, Youth Activities: https://www.radioclubofamerica.org/youth-activities/

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Frances “Frankie” Bonte, KE8HPA, is a senior and valedictorian at St. Francis DeSales High School, Class of 2020, located in Columbus, Ohio. She is a member of the National Honor Society and is the Student Council Treasurer. She earned her Ham Radio license in 2017. She is also a member of the ARRL, DELARA, and the Central Ohio Radio Club. She has been involved with emergency communications and participates in HamSCI. When she is not studying or working on projects with her dad, she mentors middle school girls in STEAM fields. She once sent a photo to DX Engineering telling them that she knows the difference between a balun and a ballerina. Frankie dances classical ballet at BalletMet, the professional company in Columbus, Ohio. She will attend Case Western Reserve University in fall 2020 to study engineering and dance.

The Radio Club of ameRiCa, inC.

BOOK REVIEW

Energy Choices for the Radio Amateur, Your Power Sources in the 21st Century by Bob Bruninga, WB4APR

Reviewed by John Facella, RCA Fellow, Director, Life Member

EDITOR’S NOTE: The following book has been suggested as interesting reading or as a useful resource. The following review does not constitute an endorsement or recommendation by RCA. We welcome suggestions and recommendations from RCA’s members regarding books to share with RCA’s membership. The scope can include technical, regulatory, or other subjects. We encourage you to send your suggestions to David Bart at jbart1964@gmail.com for publication in a future issue of the Proceedings.

Despite its title, this book is not just for radio amateurs, but rather for anyone interested in solar power and how to bring it into your life style. The book is very broad in scope, providing 16 chapters on topics ranging from “The New World Everyday Power (DC)”, “Choosing Your Home Solar System”, “Solar DIY at Home and in the Field”, “New Energy Sources of Radio Frequency Interference (RFI)”, “Electric Vehicle DIY Projects”, “Life’s Major Energy Milestones”, “How Our Energy Use Shapes Our World Today”, and others.

The author is a Georgia Tech engineer and a professor at the Naval Academy. An inveterate experimenter, the author has tried making all kinds of solar projects over the years, including various solar projects to power his home, a solar powered boat, solar pier, and solar cars based on the THINK City car and Toyota Priuses that he modified.

The book covers emergency power for the home and feeding back into the grid. In chapter 2, it explains why 300 VDC is becoming the new standard for in-home power systems. In Chapter 3 it takes you through all the details of solar energy production including the price history on photovoltaic cells (PV), shading calculations, why now is the time to start considering solar, and the reality that the angle of the panels to the sun is not as important as others have made out. Chapter 4 discusses a home solar system, and details like micro-inverters versus large string inverters. Chapters 1, 5 and 10 explain why disconnecting a DC circuit is completely different from an AC circuit (and dangerous if not done correctly). And, chapter 13 provides specific examples of making the switch to solar.

If you know very little about solar power, but have been thinking about it without knowing where to start, this is the ideal book with its ‘A to Z’ coverage. It will provide you with many ideas, both simple and more complex.

P.S., for those that don’t know, Bob Bruninga, besides being a lifelong aficionado of solar power, was the inventor of the APRS (the Automatic Packet Reporting System) in the early 1990s. Today, APRS is used by tens of thousands of amateurs worldwide. Energy Choices for the Radio Amateur. Bob Bruninga WB4APR. ISBN-13: 978-1-62595-103-8. ARRL, Inc., 2019. 320 pages; 9”x7”. Softcover.

ABOUT THE REVIEWER

John Facella, BSEE, P.E., is Executive Vice President of the Radio Club of America, director of RCA’s Technical Symposium and RCA’s webmaster. He is a Principal at Panther Pines Consulting, LLC, specializing in public safety communications consulting, and general management consulting. He spent over 30 years in the wireless industry, including 28 years working for both Motorola and Harris, and over 2 years as a senior vice president with a national consulting company. He has held positions including product management, systems engineering management, and Director of Public Safety Markets. He has also held general management positions in a number of high tech startup companies.

BOOK REVIEW

Code Girls, The Untold Story of the American Women Code Breakers of World War II by Liza Mundy

Reviewed by John Facella, RCA Fellow, Director, Life Member

EDITOR’S NOTE: The following book has been suggested as interesting reading or as a useful resource. The following review does not constitute an endorsement or recommendation by RCA. We welcome suggestions and recommendations from RCA’s members regarding books to share with RCA’s membership. The scope can include technical, regulatory, or other subjects. We encourage you to send your suggestions to David Bart at jbart1964@gmail.com for publication in a future issue of the Proceedings.

Code Girls is a very interesting and important book that illuminates the vital and underappreciated contributions that women made during the Second World War in breaking the codes and ciphers used by both of our enemies at the time, the Japanese and the Axis powers, and even those of neutral nations or friendly nations.

The book takes you through the basics of the arcane arts of cryptography and cryptanalysis; arts to which mathematicians, linguists, and those with both good memories and the ability to see patterns all contribute. The history of these techniques is also nicely documented, starting before World War I.

While not concerned directly with wireless, wireless played a major role, because intercept stations around the world operated on HF and lower frequencies, listening to the various enemy stations that usually transmitted in CW (Morse code), but which sometimes used teletype machines. Those messages were often sent in 5 letter groups, and the true message was also encrypted, sometimes multiple times, to thwart breaking.

We learn that in both the Atlantic and Pacific theaters of war, at the height of the war 10,000 women (and a lesser number of men) were at work in key locations across the U.S., trying to break the multitude of codes that were used by our enemies. The work involved long hours, intense concentration, endless disappointments and frustration, and usually encompassed 7 days before a 1 day break was taken. Most of the women had boyfriends, husbands, brothers, cousins, or uncles who were fighting in strange overseas locations, and dying. Every day and every hour that an enemy message lay unbroken meant more allied men would die.

In the early stages of the war, German submarine U-boats were sinking allied merchant shipping faster than we could build new liberty ships for transporting people and goods overseas. Our allies in Great Britain

and the Soviet Union were dependent on the supplies the U.S. could deliver to them. After a period, we cracked the German Naval codes and the U-boat menace was effectively stopped.

Despite early Japanese successes in the Pacific, we soon mastered their codes and ciphers and were able to eavesdrop effectively on most their operations.

As a result, MacArthur and the U.S. Pacific fleet command generally knew where the enemy ships were located, where the enemy troops were concentrated, and what their supply situation was like. Soon, we were sinking nearly every Japanese supply ship. It was later estimated that the majority of Japanese casualties were caused by starvation. Understanding this, one begins to realize that we either would not have won the war, or it would have taken more years and more casualties to win, had the Code Girls not performed so effectively.

The book also addresses the controversy over the U.S. use of atomic bombs on Japan. By reading Japanese de-coded messages, we knew that the Japanese government commanded every citizen to resist our planned invasion. Thus the entire nation would refuse to surrender and would continue to fight. Our estimates anticipated that another million allied casualties would result, plus many times that in Japanese military and civilian casualties.

This 361 page book is very well researched. There are 30 pages of notes at the end citing sources, and another 7 pages of bibliography for those who want to read more. The author went through thousands of pages or archives and was personally interviewed 27 people who were still alive.

She follows the lives of a number of the women including Dot Braden, Ann Caracristi, Wilma Berryman, and many others. These women were recruited for both the U.S. Navy and U.S. Army operations. The Navy recruited mainly from Ivy League women’s colleges; the Army preferred mid-

Western and Southern colleges. In 1942, only 4 percent of women went to college, so there were not many women even available to recruit. In many cases, the women were math or science majors, or linguists, and some had a liberal arts education. Many were school teachers, a common occupation for educated women of the time. Most had never ventured far from their home state. The war changed all of that.

The author documents the many impediments for women of the time in getting higher education, and in getting employment outside of the traditional occupations of teaching, nursing, and home making. Again, the war changed all of that. Ultimately, most of the women were found to be more skillful than the men at this work. Some stayed on after the war to work at what became NSA-the National Security Agency. At the end of the book, some of their lives after the war are detailed.

The book provides the reader with a birds-eye view and a perspective on what it was like to work ‘back home’ on the U.S. continent supporting the war effort: the shortages, the red tape, the stresses, the sorrows of Gold Star families.

At times, I felt the book was a bit too detailed and provided too much information about the lives of the women. Overall though, this is an excellent history that needs to be told. It will serve as an inspiration to other women. Note, there are a few portions of the book that deal with more adult themes of violent combat deaths, sex, and sexual preference, so parents are cautioned.

Code Girls: The Untold Story of the American Women Code Breakers of World War II. Liza Mundy. ISBN-13: 978-0316352536. Hachette Books, 2017. 432 pages; 6”x9”. Softcover, audio, and Kindle versions available.

ABOUT THE REVIEWER

John Facella, BSEE, P.E., is Executive Vice President of the Radio Club of America, director of RCA’s Technical Symposium and RCA’s webmaster. He is a Principal at Panther Pines Consulting, LLC, specializing in public safety communications consulting, and general management consulting. He spent over 30 years in the wireless industry, including 28 years working for both Motorola and Harris, and over 2 years as a senior vice president with a national consulting company. He has held positions including product management, systems engineering management, and Director of Public Safety Markets. He has also held general management positions in a number of high tech startup companies.

The RCA website is the go-to place for RCA news and events.

VISIT THE SITE FOR:

• Member only content including the 2018 Technical Symposium slides and videos

• Updated membership list, including email address and call sign (login required)

• Calendar of upcoming RCA and industry events

• Updated Wireless Women tab to assist women and youth

• Updated committees page

• Updated publications archive

• New products in the RCA store

• Training Tab lists available wireless training opportunities

• Current articles about youth outreach

TROUBLE LOGGING IN?

Please email Amy@radioclubofamerica.org if you need a new password or have difficulty logging in.

BOOK REVIEW

The TVs of Tomorrow: How RCA’s Flat-Screen Dreams

Led to the First LCDs by Benjamin Gross

Reviewed by David Bart, RCA Fellow, Director, Life Member

EDITOR’S NOTE: The following book has been suggested as interesting reading or as a useful resource. The following review does not constitute an endorsement or recommendation by RCA. We welcome suggestions and recommendations from RCA’s members regarding books to share with RCA’s membership. The scope can include technical, regulatory, or other subjects. We encourage you to send your suggestions to David Bart at jbart1964@gmail.com for publication in a future issue of the Proceedings.

Fifty years after the Radio Corporation of America announced its creation of flat screen television, The TVs of Tomorrow have become a reality. In 1968, RCA announced its invention of a new electronic display that incorporated liquid crystals. TVs and other visual equipment of the era utilized bulky cathode ray tubes (CRTs) to reproduce an electronic image. RCA’s revolutionary liquid crystal display (LCD) could electronically control the passage of light with flat, less bulky and more reliable display screens. RCA’s efforts that led to LCDs occurred alongside other attempts at reducing the sizes of bulky CRTs. RCA predicted that LCDs would eventually be used in clocks, calculators, and even a TV that could hang on a wall. This is the story of RCA’s efforts to bring those dreams to life.

Today, RCA’s dreams have become a reality, and LCDs have become a multibillion-dollar global industry. In The TVs of Tomorrow, Benjamin Gross explains why RCA could not capitalize on its ideas. He examines the history of flat-panel display research at RCA from the perspective of the chemists, physicists, electrical engineers, and technicians at the company’s central laboratory in Princeton, New Jersey.

He draws upon laboratory notebooks, internal reports, and interviews with key participants to reconstruct the development of the LCD and explains other efforts to create a thin, lightweight replacement for the TV picture tube. He shows how RCA researchers mobilized their technical expertise to secure support for their projects. He also highlights the challenges associated with the commercialization of liquid crystals at RCA and at Optel, an RCA spin-off that ultimately manufactured the first LCD wristwatch. The TVs of Tomorrow provides a detailed portrait of American innovation during the Cold War, and confirms that success in the electronics industry hinges upon input from both the laboratory and the boardroom. Other reviewers have commented that “This text could easily be compared to Tracy Kidder’s Pulitzer

Prize–winning The Soul of a New Machine (1981); it chronicles the drama, intrigue, and intense work of countless researchers over decades in the development of the liquid crystal television display. David Sarnoff, radio and TV pioneer and longtime head of RCA, predicted in 1956 that wall-mounted, flat-screen TVs would populate our homes in just a few years. Though this prediction would take several decades and countless fits and starts to come to fruition, the world Sarnoff envisioned is fully a reality. Gross documents RCA's own failure to significantly profit from its years of research that laid the groundwork for the introduction of flat-screen LCD displays, which resulted in a major shift in how video is entwined in modern society. Gross, former curator of the Sarnoff collection at the College of New Jersey, provides a very readable, exceptionally well-researched analysis of the scientists whose years of research eventually led to a quantum leap in how video technology impacts our lives today. An informative, engaging resource for anyone interested in the history of early electronic research. Recommended.” (Choice)

RCA engineer George Heilmeier holds an early liquid-crystal display, 1968. (Courtesy David Sarnoff Library Collection, Hagley Museum and Library)

Others note that the book provides “As much a cautionary tale for corporate technology creators as it is a story of personal triumph and pioneering scientific exploration. Importantly, the work examines the highs and lows from the perspective of RCA's scientists, technicians, and engineers… Superbly researched, The TVs of Tomorrow includes extensive archival information and interviews with many of the story’s real-life players… Sit with the book and you, too, will find that the story is a worthy one.” (Information Display)

The book is carefully researched and illustrated. It identifies the many people and factors and the corporate intrigue that affect the course of innovation. David Brock, Director of the Center for Software History at the Computer History Museum, noted that it addresses “corporate impulses and intrigues, the materiality of substances, the consumptive logics of electronics, laboratory and manufacturing cultures, serendipity and systemization, and the individuality of chemists, physicists, and engineers—in which LCD technology emerged at RCA from the 1950s into the 1970s. This story of industrial science and technology is an important contribution to our understanding of the black mirrors with which we have added a new layer of electronic reality to the old, and within which so much of contemporary life is lived.”

Benjamin Gross has the background and skills to dig deeply into his topic. He is the vice president for research and scholarship at the Linda Hall Library. The Linda Hall Library is the world’s foremost independent research library devoted to science, engineering, and technology. Before moving to Kansas City, Mr. Gross was a research fellow at the Chemical Heritage Foundation and consulting curator of the Sarnoff Collection at the College of New Jersey. He spent over ten years researching and writing the book, and the efforts have succeeded in bringing this well-written and well-researched story to life.

The book is organized chronologically into chapters that roughly cover 5-10 year increments of the primary historical period from 1951 through 1976. A comprehensive introduction and conclusion place this history into context and reassert the main themes. A detailed bibliography and extensive notes are provided, spanning approximately 75 pages of the 307 total page count.

Today, LCDs are widely used in TVs, computer monitors, tablets, and smartphones, but this was not inevitable. Sarnoff’s presence looms large, and his early request to pursue some type of flat screen display came at the time of his 60th birthday celebration events at RCA. Sarnoff’s request became a strategic goal of RCA. RCA’s reputation for innovation was certainly well deserved, spanning multiple communication fields over many decades dating back to the 1920s. The effort to create a flat screen TV eventually involved chemists, physicists, electrical engineers, and many others. And, historical

research actually dated to 1951, when researchers first began to understand that materials can behave with the mechanical properties of liquids but possess the regular molecular structure of a crystalline solids.

Gross weaves an interesting and very readable tale of business history, industrial research, and changing fortunes as the work progressed in spurts as priorities shifted. Laboratory successes and failures rendered achievement of the goal elusive, as costs mounted and production opportunities drifted away. Questionable business decisions combined with crippling internal politics and clashes among strong personalities eventually dooming the project. RCA ultimately abandoned its efforts and failed to capitalize on LCDs.

RCA’s problems encompassed other parts of the organization as well. RCA soon entered a period of decline in the 1970s and was effectively out of business by the mid-1980s. But, RCA left us with something that has become a staple of our modern technological world. In the decades that followed, LCDs became integral to our high-tech world.

Thus, the book is a cautionary tale about the paths of science and innovation, risks from changing circumstances and internal politics, and the importance of timing in bringing the awareness of inventions and their potential applications into the world. But the book also provides a perspective that missed opportunities can still leave an incredible legacy and fertile ground for others to plow.

I highly recommend this book both for the technical reader and the corporate historian as well as the general public who will find the tale to be intriguing and thought provoking. The writing is open and engaging, providing new material for the novice reader, and more in-depth commentary for those with more background in the subject. The writing is clear and accessible, and the logic and supporting discussion are linked successfully.

The TVs of Tomorrow How RCA’s Flat-Screen Dreams Led to the First LCDs. Benjamin Gross. ISBN-13: 978-0-22651997-5. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2018. 307 pages; 6”x9”. Hardcover/Softcover/Kindle.

ABOUT THE REVIEWER

David P. Bart, KB9YPD, is Chairman of the Radio Club of America Publications Committee and Editorial Director of the Proceedings of the Radio Club of America. He is a Life Member and Director of the Antique Wireless Association, and a Life Member, Director, and Fellow of RCA. He is also treasurer of the IEEE History Committee and vice president of the Museum of Broadcast Communications in Chicago.

CALL FOR PAPERS & EDITORIAL COMMENTS

The Proceedings of the Radio Club of America is known for bringing you a wide mix of papers, ranging from sophisticated technical material to historical surveys of subjects related to electronic communications. RCA also is known for fostering discussion and sharing the viewpoints of its members. RCA is therefore issuing a call for papers and editorial comments for publication in upcoming issues of the Proceedings.

The Proceedings is published semi-annually, and has been issued since 1914. The Proceedings is considered to be the first publication geared to promoting and sharing the intellectual development of all aspects of radio and wireless communications. Coverage has expanded to include relevant articles encompassing science, technology development, marketing and regulatory topics. We seek articles from knowledgeable engineers, professionals, academics and amateurs who are participating in building future applications, as well as those who want to document the history of relevant technologies.

As a fellow reader of the Proceedings, we would like you to author an article or editorial for publication. We welcome “early work,” even if it is still in the process of being drafted. RCA offers a unique opportunity for you to get an early reaction to important work now underway in wireless communications. It is also a unique opportunity to air your views, inviting commentary and response from the membership.

Please submit an abstract (1-3 paragraphs) including the title, author(s) and contact information, a synopsis of the material to be published, and a note as to why you think the subject is interesting or important to the wireless industry. Authors of papers selected for publication in the Proceedings may be given an opportunity to present at one of the RCA’s upcoming events, such as the annual Technical Symposium. (Note: participants are responsible for their own travel expenses to RCA events.)

We seek interesting or important technical articles, editorials and discussion pieces in any of the following areas:

• Antennas and supporting structures (i.e., towers)

• Broadband communications

• Broadcast

• Cellular telephony

• FirstNet

• Ham (amateur) radio

• Land mobile radio

• Long-Term Evolution (LTE)

• Military communications

• Regulatory topics

• Robotics

• Satellites

• 4G/5G Cellular

• Semiconductors, LED or other devices supporting wireless communications

• Any other wireless/radio technologies

Please send abstracts for articles and editorials to be published in the Proceedings to: John Facella at pantherpinesconsulting@gmail.com with copies to David Bart at jbart1964@gmail.com.

Please send abstracts for potential presentation topics at RCA events to: John Facella at TechSymp2018@radioclubofamerica.org.

For general questions about RCA, an article idea or submission, please contact Amy Beckham at Amy@radioclubofAmerica.org.

The Annual RCA Awards Banquet is the premier industry event to honor exceptional achievements by those who devote themselves to wireless communications. The event also showcases the achievements of middle and high school students involved in the RCA Youth Activities Program. Through your sponsorship your Company will receive: Recognition, Logo Visibility, Opportunity to reach a targeted market of Technical Executives, not to mention…your Sponsorship makes it possible for us to keep this event affordable for attendees and shows your support for our industry’s finest performers—both established and up-and-coming— whose invention, ingenuity and dedication benefit us all.

Exclusive sponsor of the Pre-Banquet Cocktail Reception, including signage, logo on napkins and specialty VIP drink of your choosing to be served to attendees, logo on Hotel’s Signage for location of the Reception. Pre-Banquet exposure on RCA Webpage.

Capture the Audience in a most Exclusive Sponsorship of the RCA Banquet and Tech Symposium Step-and-Repeat Photo Wall with Logo. A true Image Statement. No one will miss this!

Exclusive sponsor of Technical Symposium, including signage at food/drink tables and continental breakfast, and company logo on the podium sign. Will reach Live Audience of 80-100 Technical Associates and Livestreaming Audience of ~1000 people. Logo will also be wrapped into Slides and Video’s for downloading.

Exclusive Sponsorship with Company name on red/white wine bottles at each Banquet table.

Logo on signage on Speaker table, 2 Banquet tickets with seating at keynote speaker/RCA Presidents table. Company logo on event banners and recognition on PowerPoint at Banquet and Technical Symposium. Company logo in printed commemorative program.

Company logo on table signage at Banquet.

Company logo and URL on RCA website.

Recognition in Proceedings (Bi-annual electronically publication reaching all RCA Members).

Company Logo in Aerogram (Quarterly Published Newsletter for all RCA Members)

Company logo on signage supporting Young Achievers

There’s more! Networking Event Sponsorships, Lanyards, Awards, etc. The RCA is offering a variety of new sponsorships in 2019 which can give your company recognition and business opportunities. We can also create a custom sponsorship that meets your needs. Radio Club of America is a 501 (c) 3 non-profit organization, therefore, your sponsorship can qualify for a tax-deduction. Please consult with your tax advisor for specific information.

(as you would like it to appear in promotional materials):

You can pay online at www.radioclubofamerica.org or call Jane Winter @ 781-795-2476 or jwinter@eaa.org for more information, to pay by check or for the specifications for your company logo.

BUSINESS & PROFESSIONAL DIRECTORY

ADVANCED WIRELESS MARKETING

Jack Armstrong, President

200 Warren Road

Cockeysville, MD, 21030

PHONE: (443) 823-5100

jack@advancedwirelessmarketing.com

www.advancedwirelessmarketing.com

Manufacturer’s Representative

BLUE WING

Andy Maxymillian, PMP, Principal Consultant

235 Summer Hill Drive

Gilbertsville, PA 19525

PHONE: (610) 473-2171

CELL: (610) 316-2660

FAX: (610) 473-2536

andrew.maxymillian@bluewing.com

www.bluewing.com

Consultant Services

INFINITY ADVANCED TECHNOLOGIES/WORLDWIDE TECHNOLOGIES DIRECT

A DIV. OF KIRMUSS & ASSOCIATES, LLC, SINCE 1979

Charles Kirmuss, Founder, Principal

51 West 84th Ave., Suite 301

Denver, Co. 80260

PHONE: (303) 263-6353

ckirmuss@frontier.net

www.wwtechnologiesdirect.com

Radio pioneer, Director of RCA and Rampart Search & Rescue: Custom solutions & products for the Public Safety, Search & Rescue and Military markets. Proud supporter & sponsor of RCA’s Youth Program.

ANDERSON-INTELLI-SMART BATTERY DIVISION KIRMUSS & ASSOCIATES, LLC

Charles Kirmuss, Founder, Principal 51 West 84th Ave., Suite 301 Denver, CO 80260

PHONE: (303) 263-6353

ckirmuss@frontier.net

www.anderson-intellismartbattery.com

Manufacturer of OE and replacement batteries for the two way radio industry. iNTELLi Smart Battery™ technology at lower cost than traditional OE standard batteries.

CAPITAL AREA COMMUNICATIONS

Stephen J. Shaver, Project Manager

4120 Swatara Drive Harrisburg, PA, 17113

PHONE: (717) 561-0800

CELL: (717) 645-0086

FAX: (717) 561-9805

steves@cacradio.com

www.cacradio.com

Wireless Communication Systems Solutions Provider

JACOBS

Margaret J. Lyons, PE, PMP

Senior RF/Communications Engineer

100 Walnut Ave, Suite 604

Clark, NJ 07066

PHONE: (732) 396-2253

CELL: (908) 4030171

margaret.lyons@jacobs.com

www.jacobs.com

ANTIQUE WIRELESS ASSOCIATION

Robert Hobday, Deputy Director

David Bart, Board of Directors

PO Box 421

Bloomfield, NY 14469

PHONE: (312) 634-4733

FAX: (312) 634-5520

david.bart@rsmus.com

www.antiquewireless.org

Preserving the Past for Posterity

DH SALES GROUP LLC

PO Box 5680

Lago Vista, TX 78645

CELL: (512) 751-5472

TOLL FREE: (800) 966-3357

FAX: (512) 267-7760

dhlago@aol.com

www.dhsalesgroup.biz

Independent Manufacturers Representatives and Consultative Manufacturers Representative

KIRMUSSAUDIO DIV OF KIRMUSS & ASSOCIATES, LLC

Charles Kirmuss, Founder, Principal 51 West 84th Ave., Suite 301

Denver, Co. 80260

PHONE: (303) 263-6353

FAX: (303) 862-7170

ckirmuss@frontier.net

www.kirmussaudio.com

BUSINESS & PROFESSIONAL DIRECTORY

LEONARDO

William P. Fredrickson 11300 W. 89th Street

Overland Park, KS 66214

PHONE: (913) 495-2614

CELL: (913) 909-4492

Bill.fredrickson@ leonardocompany-us.com

www.leonardocc.com

Land Mobile Radio Manufacturer: DMR, P25, Tetra

PANTHER PINES CONSULTING

John Facella, P.E., BSEE, MBA, Principal

PHONE: (978) 799-8900

pantherpinesconsulting@gmail.com

www.pantherpinesconsulting.com

Communications & Management Consulting

RFI AMERICAS

Sean Johnson, President 2023 Case Pkwy

Twinsburg, OH, 44087

PHONE: (330) 486-0706 x302

CELL: (330) 541-6585

FAX: (330) 486-0705

sean.johnson@rfi.com.au

www.rfiamericas.com

Manufacturer of antennas and RF conditioning equipment for LMR

RLA COMMUNICATIONS ENGINEERING, LLC

Robert A. Lopez, P.E., President 8305 Bergenline Avenue #9 North Bergen, NJ 07047

PHONE: (973) 449-5249

rlopez@rlacommunications.com

www.rlacommunications.com

A communications engineering consulting company serving public safety and commercial wireless industries.

TWR

Lauren Libby, International President

300 Greyson Drive

Cary NC 27511

PHONE: (719) 331-7051

llibby@twr.org

www.twr.org

RF and Digital Content to 190 Countries in 230 languages every day

TOWER INNOVATIONS, INC.

Bruce R. McIntyre, President 107 Dunbar Ave., Suite E Oldsmar, FL 34677

PHONE: (813) 818-8766

CELL: (727) 439-3683

FAX: (813) 925-0999

bruce@towerinnovationsinc.com

www.towerinnovactionsinc.com

Wireless consulting, Communications structures

UTILITY TELECOM CONSULTING GROUP

George R. Stoll, President 9850 S. Maryland Pkwy

Las Vegas, NV, 89183

PHONE: (303) 840-2878

CELL: (303) 475-0414

FAX: (303) 840-1129

george.stoll@utcg.com

www.utcg.com

Consulting Engineers

TSR CONSULTING ®

Dr. Theodore S. Rappaport, P.E., Ph.D

PO BOX 888

Riner, VA 24149

Technical consulting, engineering and design services in the field of wired and wireless communications systems, equipment and devices.

MASSIVELY BROADBAND ®

WIRELESS TOWERS, INC.

Larry Shaefer, President

115 N. Walker St.

Angleton, TX 77515

PHONE: (713) 522-7000

CELL: (713) 526-8000

Lshaefer@sbcglobal.net

www.wireless-towers.com

Texas Tower Site Leasing

RCA CALENDAR EVENTS

CALENDAR

Visit the event calendar on the RCA website for the most up-to-date event information.

RCA EVENTS

2020 RCA BANQUET AND TECHNICAL SYMPOSIUM

November 20, 2020 Pittsburgh, PA

INDUSTRY EVENTS

ONLINE! CONNECTIVITY EXPO

May 19, 2020 Orlando, FL

AGL VIRTUAL SUMMIT

June 10, 2020

2 PM

APCO INTERNATIONAL

August 2–5, 2020 Orlando, FL

IWCE 2020

August 24-28, 2020 Las Vegas, NV

DAYTON HAMVENTION

May 21–23, 2021 Xenia, OH

AGL LOCAL SUMMIT

September 9, 2020 New York

MOBILE WORLD CONGRESS AMERICAS

October 28-30, 2020 Los Angeles, CA

AGL LOCAL SUMMIT

November 12, 2020 Denver, CO

AWA ANNUAL CONVENTION

August 17–21, 2021 Rochester, NY

SUPPORT RCA WITH A TAX-DEDUCTIBLE CONTRIBUTION

Help RCA continue its mission of advancing wireless art and science for the betterment of society by making a tax-deductible donation today! RCA believes in the future of the industry and your contribution will help us with the important work of encouraging the next generation of wireless pioneers and entrepreneurs. Consider making a donation in someone’s honor as a memorial or gift.

Donate online at www.radioclubofamerica.org/donate-to-rca/ or call us at (612) 405-2102 to contribute.

www.radioclubofamerica.org

OPPORTUNITIES TO SUPPORT RCA

The Radio Club of America provides many opportunities to support the organization and its activities. Sponsors can make specific requests or provide funding for general operations.

INDIVIDUAL SUSTAINING DONATIONS

Make a difference in how quickly we progress with our many initiatives for young people, young wireless professionals and those in established careers. We encourage any member who is impressed with the operations of the club to make a tax-deductible donation earmarked to sustaining operations. Donations to support our day-to-day operations are critical to our future as an organization. You can also select RCA as your full or partial beneficiary on an IRA, so funds are tax-free to RCA, or set up a monthly donation through a credit card or ACH withdrawal.

CORPORATE SPONSORSHIPS AT SPECIFIC EVENTS

Networking is a key reason many of our members get involved and stay active with RCA. Breakfasts, cocktail parties and other social events can be underwritten by sponsors who receive promotional considerations for their donations and heightened visibility to the membership.

3 YEAR SUSTAINING CORPORATE SPONSORS

There is a unique set of advantages to corporate sponsors who participate in our three-year program. See our summary of benefits by level of sponsorship.

SCHOLARSHIPS

Donate to an existing scholarship fund or create your own and you will be supporting university students pursuing wireless communications as a career.

YOUTH ACTIVITIES

The Youth Activities program brings the excitement of learning about amateur radio and vivid lessons in science, math and electronics to middle and high school children in this unique and innovative program sponsored by RCA.

HOW YOU CAN APPLY YOUR DONATIONS

A variety of funds are available to support specific goals of the initial donors and RCA operations. Please contact RCA for more information on these opportunities.

• General Club Operations (unrestricted)

• Archive Preservation

• Barone-DiBlasi-Facella

• Biggs

• Brownson

• DeMello Award

• Continuing Education

• Dettra, Finch

• General Grants in Aid

• Goldwater

• Grebe

• Gunther

• Legacy Fund

• Link

• Meyer

• Meyerson

• Poppele

• Tom Sorley Memorial Fund to RCA

• Youth Activities

• Richard G. Somers Youth Edu Fund

RCA is classified as a 501(c)(3) organization under IRS rules. Contributions may be tax deductible in the United States depending on a person’s individual tax situation.

HOW TO SPONSOR/DONATE

The RCA donations form is on the website. Please contact our Executive Secretary, Amy Beckham, for more information on any of these opportunities. She can be reached at 612.405.2012 or amy@radioclubofamerica.org.

SHARE YOUR RCA STORY

We had a record number of new members last year help us continue this momentum by spreading the word about why you belong to the oldest, most prestigious group of wireless professionals in the world! Direct potential members to the Why RCA? page of the website to learn what sets us apart.

Signing up for RCA Membership has never been easier! Use the new online membership application to submit your information in a matter of minutes.

SHOP AMAZON & HELP RCA

Amazon has a program called Amazon Smile, through which Amazon will donate .5% of a qualified purchase to a charitable organization of your choice. To designate proceeds towards RCA, go to smile.amazon.com and use your Amazon login. You will be asked to select a charitable organization (Radio Club of America) and start shopping. It is an easy way to help the Radio Club and at the same time get a great deal on amazon.com. If you are an Amazon Prime member, you will continue to receive the benefits of your Prime membership.

HAS YOUR CONTACT INFORMATION CHANGED?

If you have recently changed your address, email, or phone number, please send us an update.

Email amy@radioclubofamerica.org or call (612) 405-2012.

HEADQUARTERS OFFICE

ADDRESS:

13570 Grove Drive #302 Maple Grove, MN 55311

PHONE: (612) 405-2012

EMAIL:

amy@radioclubofamerica.org

WEBSITE:

www.radioclubofamerica.org

www.radioclubofamerica.org