And matching materials to the equipment that will advance our world.

Whatever we may learn about the origins of Covid-19, and however inconclusive the information may be, we can be almost certain it had nothing to do with radio waves. I’m sure I’m not alone in feeling disappointed about the attacks made on mobile phone masts during this crisis, carried out in the misguided belief that this kind of vandalism can halt the virus.

Fortunately, instances of such extreme technophobia have been few. It seems every new technology wins vocal detractors, however beneficial its effect on peoples’ lives. In recent years, our industry has had to deal with claims about grisly health risks associated with mobile phones, the effects of “wind turbine syndrome,” and the evil propagated by 5G.

Advanced technologies will hold the key to our defense against Covid-19. We will need the knowhow of pharmaceutical labs to create an effective and practicable vaccine, and engineering skills to develop new respirator designs better adapted to the needs of coronavirus patients than are conventional ventilators or CPAP devices. Moreover, effective virucides will be needed to enhance cleaning in places such as hospitals, waiting rooms, factories, warehouses, public transport vehicles, and aircraft. Irradiating at-risk areas using germicidal UV-C lamps could be an option and could easily be automated using mobile robots.

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A call for performance-centric materials specifications.

The combination of rising performance expectations and intense commercial pressures means choosing the right substrate materials for new-product designs is more important than ever. A wider selection of materials, with more finely nuanced properties, increasingly complicates making the “right” choice. Help is available from suppliers and industry bodies. But designers can also help themselves by being more willing to share information with their suppliers.

As PCB industry veterans, we know well the board is typically the last part of the project specified when a new product is designed. On the other hand, it’s the first item needed when serious development begins. Designing the circuitry to go on the PCB obviously gets most of the attention, but the substrate itself is usually the lowest priority in engineers’ minds. When the time finally comes to consider it, teams will often simply default to the same materials used previously. As performance demands imposed on successive product generations continue to intensify, and factors such as conductive anodic filament (CAF) formation that seriously affect reliability become more critical, this approach is increasingly unsatisfactory.

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