Decomposition of electromagnetic interferences in the time-domain

Abstract

Electromagnetic interferences are potentially very complex signals formed by the superposition of transient (broadband) and continuous wave (narrowband) components with significant randomness in both amplitude and phase. Decomposing the electromagnetic interference measured in the time domain into a set of intrinsic mode functions is useful to gain insights of the process that generates the interference. Evaluating the intrinsic mode functions contributes to improving the measurement capabilities of the time-domain electromagnetic emissions measurement systems based on the general-purpose oscilloscopes. In this paper, a combination of techniques that includes empirical mode decomposition and transient mode decomposition is used to separate the main components of complex electromagnetic disturbances. This approach requires no prior information on the spectral content of the measured EMI and it does not perform a domain transformation. Examples of electromagnetic interference decomposition verify the effectiveness and the accuracy of the proposed approach. Finally, a discussion on the advantages, practical applications, limitations, and drawbacks of the described techniques is addressed.