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What is a Decibel" | ||||||||||||
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We may all be familiar with the term decibel as it applies to sound level, but what does it really mean" And what does it have to do with EMFs"
Decibel is not really a unit of measurement. Rather, it is a way to describe the ratio of one intensity measurement to another. Expressing it this way is a useful for engineers to make comparisons and is much simpler than using percentages.
We can use decibels for describing the ratio of both fields and powers. But which one should we use and why"
* Field measurements such as mG, V/m etc. We can use this formula to compare the effectiveness of an EMF shield. Also using this formula, we can generate the following graph which allows us to easily convert from dB to % shielding (notice that because of the logarithmic relationship, values in excess of 20 dB represent field strength reduction of more than 90%!):
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** Power measurements such as mW/cm² etc. Notice that using this formula, values in excess of 20 dB represent field strength reduction of more than 99%!):
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dB | Power Ratio | % Attenuation | % Transmission | Field Ratio | % Attenuation | % Transmission |
0 | 1.000 | 0 | 100 | 1.00 | 0 | 100 |
1 | 1.259 | 21 | 79 | 1.12 | 11 | 89 |
2 | 1.585 | 37 | 63 | 1.26 | 21 | 79 |
3 | 2.000 | 50 | 50 | 1.41 | 29 | 71 |
4 | 2.512 | 60 | 40 | 1.58 | 37 | 63 |
5 | 3.162 | 68 | 32 | 1.78 | 44 | 56 |
6 | 4.000 | 75 | 25 | 2.00 | 50 | 50 |
7 | 5.013 | 80 | 20 | 2.24 | 55 | 45 |
8 | 6.310 | 84 | 16 | 2.51 | 60 | 40 |
9 | 7.941 | 87 | 13 | 2.82 | 65 | 35 |
10 | 10 | 90 | 10 | 3.16 | 68 | 32 |
15 | 31.6 | 96.8 | 3.2 | 5.62 | 82 | 18 |
20 | 100 | 99 | 1 | 10 | 90 | 10 |
25 | 316 | 99.7 | .3 | 17.8 | 94.4 | 5.6 |
30 | 1000 | 99.9 | .1 | 31.6 | 97 | 3 |
35 | 3162 | 99.97 | .03 | 56.2 | 98.2 | 1.8 |
40 | 10,000 | 99.99 | .01 | 100 | 99 | 1 |
50 | 100,000 | 99.999 | .001 | 316 | 99.7 | .3 |
60 | 1,000,000 | 99.9999 | .0001 | 1000 | 99.9 | .1 |
80 | 100,000,000 | 99.999999 | .00001 | 10,000 | 99.99 | .01 |
100 | 1,000,000,000 | 99.99999999 | .000001 | 100,000 | 99.999 | .001 |
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