Phil Robl
Lead Electronics Engineer

Phil's areas of expertise include:

• Project management including generation of proposals and cost estimates
• Technical design team management, electronics shop supervisor
• High speed analog and digital circuit design including drive of high speed optical components, power, amplifiers
• Magnetic design and simulation; Technical applications programming; High voltage system design; X-ray system design, firmware
• Computers, software Win9x, NT, Visual Basic, Fortran, Visio, VAX, VMS

Phil has used his skills and expertise to:

• Redesign, build and debug a 1.2 Gbaud serial copper transmission system for CMS trigger group. Supervise the construction and testing of production units. Also, work on a project to develop network interfaces between a high-speed (250 Mb/s) router and several kinds of networks. The networks were Fibre Channel, SONET OC-12C and 100 Mb/s 4b/5b. Design the interface to the 4b/5b network using Xilinx 4000 series FPGA.
• Design several power systems for End cap Muon sub-system of the Compact Muon Solenoid detector. Design high voltage distribution system to be used with anode panels in cathode strip chambers. Execute and field test first design for low voltage power system to source and distribute power to all End cap muon electronics (100kW) in high magnetic and radiation field environment.
• Design an 8-channel photomultiplier pulse integrator and companion flash digitizer for the UW High Energy Physics Department as part of the triggering system in a particle detector (ZEUS). Implement the design with surface mount technology, then supervise production and testing of 700 boards.
• Co-design and develop the X-ray Microbeam, a national research facility. It is a clinical x-ray instrument designed to track motions of the tongue, lips and jaw during speech production. It was built for the UW Speech Motor Control Laboratory and funded by the National Institutes of Health.

In his current PSL position Phil uses his specialized skills in:

• Coordinate electronics division efforts at PSL; interview, hire and supervise electronics engineers.
• Design instruments for a broad range of research projects at the University of Wisconsin.
• Generate proposals and cost estimates, manage projects, test, debug and supervise construction.
• PSL developed a hot water drill to drill holes in the polar ice cap to depths of 3 km. As project manager supervised design, construction, test and shipment of the drill and associated electronics. Supervised refurbishment and improvement of two hot water drills for '99-'00 Antarctic season, and is currently supervising re-design of the drills for IceCube.
• Past project manager for producing optical modules (OMs) for the AMANDA project. Supervised design and construction of manufacturing and test facility for OMs at PSL, and is working with current IceCube OM production manager and OM design team.
• Project manager for control system upgrades to SURF II electron storage ring at the National Institute of Standards and Technology. Control system was part of an overall upgrade including a new magnet and custom magnet mapper. Designed custom high stability floating DAC system to control main magnet current power supply. Specified and procured VME I/O system components. Supervised construction and test of control system at PSL. Participated in on-site installation at SURF II facility.