Matthew M. Radmanesh
Radio Frequency and Microwave Electronics Illustrated
Published by Prentice-Hall, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458, 2001
Hardcover, pp. 849, USD $ 63.50
ISBN 0-13-027958-7
http://www.prenhall.com

In general about the book

The field of RF and Microwaves has undergone a significant paradigm shift in the last decade. Several books on RF and microwave technology have been published since the landmark research and development effort that went into the development of radar and related techniques during World War II. Perhaps the most noteworthy and seminal publication in this area was the MIT Radiation Laboratory series which still stands. The authors were world's leading scientists and engineers who actually carried out the research and development work, the results of which were presented in this series. The numerous books on RF and microwave technology have provided rigorous mathematical analysis underlying the fundamental scientific principles. There has existed a need for a textbook that, through the use graphical illustrations, rather than rigorous mathematical analysis and have served their purposes as university text and reference guides for practitioners, what was a significant gap in the available literature. This book is directed at bringing this gap and serves as a foundational treatise for graduated students, practicing engineers and scientists.

This book is written with emphasis on fundamentals and for this reason all new technical terms are thoroughly defined in the body of the text as they are introduced. This approach is based upon the results obtained in recent investigations and research in the field of education. The current work starts from very general postulates, considerations and laws, and chapter by chapter, narrows the focus to very specific concepts and applications, culminating in the design of various RF and microwave circuits. The book, divided into five parts and 21 chapter, develops and presents these chapters with the progressive development of concepts following the same pattern as presented in the pyramid of knowledge in Chapter 1, which are:

* Part I - The Highest Fundamentals includes Chapters 1-4 and describes the foundation of electronics;

* Part II - Wave Propagation in Networks, with chapters 5-8. The reader is introduced of two-part networks and its presentation in term of set of parameters, as y, h and s, that can be cast into a matrix form;

* Part III with chapters 9-11 leads the reader to impedance matching concepts and passive circuit design where with a great deal Smith Chart as a graphical tool in all microwave engineering and its applications of impedance matching network is presented;

* Part IV with chapters 12-14 deals with the design considerations of microwave amplifiers and noise concepts in amplifier design;

A list of symbols used in each chapter and a series of problems are included at the end of each chapter to help the reader again a fuller understanding of the presented materials. The book ends with a glossary of technical terms and several important appendixes. Bound into the back of the book is a CD-ROM with contains a powerful interactive tool for learning the textbook contains, as well as for solving numerical problems. The software includes 90 solved problems based on numerical examples in the book. This book is intended to be used in a 2-semester course in microwave electronics engineering for senior level or graduate students and should serve as an excellent reference guide for practicing RF and microwave engineer in the field as well.