Issues in validation of complex-valued simulations for signal integrity analysis

Signal integrity is concerned with such design issues as signal distortions caused by the effects of unmatched impedances, designed-in or parasitic capacitance/inductance and current return paths. It is of increasing importance because of the widespread use of high-speed digital circuitry and it is, therefore, a natural ally to EMC engineering. Circuit simulators, such as SPICE are widely used to analyze circuit performance, with significant success. More interest is being generated in mixed circuit/field models and full wave simulators in order to extend the applicability of signal integrity investigations. Like more established EMC studies, the validation of numerical models for this purpose is an issue to be addressed. This is particularly important, as the models may be required to compare complex valued data as opposed to only magnitude (or single valued data) as in the case of electric network characterization or equivalent circuit extraction. This paper considers how the feature selective validation (FSV) scheme can be applied to quantifying complex valued data.