What Is the Electromagnetic Compatibility Society?

The IEEE Electromagnetic Compatibility Society (IEEE EMCS) is a professional society within the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers dedicated to advancing the scientific, technological, and educational aspects of electromagnetic compatibility. It serves engineers, scientists, and technical managers who work on the design, measurement, testing, and regulation of electronic systems with respect to their electromagnetic emissions and susceptibility. The society fosters the development of standards, organizes technical symposia, and publishes peer-reviewed journals and a practitioner-focused magazine that together form the primary literature base for the EMC engineering community.

The EMCS grew out of the IEEE Professional Group on Radio Frequency Interference, itself a successor to informal technical networks that formed in the mid-1950s around military-sponsored conferences on radio interference reduction. The society assumed its current name in 1978, following the broader shift in the field from radio frequency interference as a primarily military concern to electromagnetic compatibility as a civilian engineering discipline spanning consumer electronics, telecommunications, automotive, and industrial systems.

History and Mission

The precursor organization, the IRE Professional Group on RFI, held its first formal radio interference reduction conference in December 1954 at the Armour Research Foundation in Chicago under tri-service sponsorship. When the IRE and the American Institute of Electrical Engineers merged to form the IEEE in 1963, the group became the IEEE Professional Group on RFI and continued to focus on the measurement and mitigation of radio frequency interference in military systems. The scope broadened throughout the 1970s as civilian EMC standards proliferated, and the society's formal mission expanded accordingly to encompass interference reduction, measurement methodology, standardization, and education across all sectors of industry. The mission today includes generating engineering standards, developing measurement techniques and test procedures, improving interference reduction techniques, and promoting education in electromagnetic compatibility. The history of the IEEE EMC Society is documented in the Engineering and Technology History Wiki, which traces the committee lineage from its 1954 origins through the present organizational structure.

Publications and Standards

The society publishes three peer-reviewed journals. The IEEE Transactions on Electromagnetic Compatibility, which began as the IRE Transactions on Radio Frequency Interference in 1959, is the flagship research journal and covers interference mechanisms, measurement methods, computational electromagnetics, and signal integrity. The IEEE Transactions on Signal and Power Integrity addresses the intersection of signal integrity, power distribution network design, and electromagnetic compatibility at the board and package level. The IEEE Letters on Electromagnetic Compatibility Practice and Applications provides rapid publication of shorter contributions. In addition to journals, the society produces the IEEE EMC Magazine, a quarterly publication featuring practical technical papers, society news, and standards updates aimed at practitioners rather than researchers. The IEEE EMCS also participates in standards development through the IEEE Standards Association, contributing expertise to IEEE standards on shielding, antenna measurement, and EMC test methods.

Symposia and Community

The IEEE International Symposium on Electromagnetic Compatibility, Signal and Power Integrity (previously the IEEE International Symposium on EMC) is the society's flagship annual technical conference. It brings together researchers, compliance engineers, standards developers, and equipment vendors to present new findings, debate evolving standards, and conduct workshops on measurement techniques. Regional chapters organized under the society hold local events throughout the year, providing a venue for practitioners to exchange experience outside the formal symposium cycle. IEEE Xplore archives the full proceedings of the EMC Symposium, making decades of conference papers searchable alongside the society's journal output.

Applications

The IEEE Electromagnetic Compatibility Society serves a wide range of engineering communities, including:

• Consumer electronics manufacturers navigating FCC, CE, and international certification requirements
• Automotive engineers implementing ISO and CISPR standards for vehicle and component compliance
• Aerospace and defense contractors working to MIL-STD-461 and DO-160 requirements
• Regulatory agencies and accredited test laboratories developing and applying EMC test methods
• Academic researchers publishing fundamental work on interference mechanisms and numerical methods