From Circuit to PCB: A Workshop on Circuit Design and Simulation using Proteus

The first workshop on PCB layout design in the history of IEEE Bangladesh was organized by the IEEE Women in Engineering (WIE) Group in BUET Campus on March 27, 2014. The venue was the DSP Lab of EEE Department. M.A. Awal and Parvez Ahmmed were the guest instructors who shared first-hand knowledge about how to design and simulate a circuit with “Proteus” software and make a layout for Printed Circuit Board (PCB) through nice audio-visual presentation and their very own projects built on PCB. Approximately 40 undergraduate students from different universities attended the workshop and enthusiastically learnt how to use the software to implement amazing projects on PCB.

Dr. Celia Shahnaz, Chair, WIE Affinity Group, IEEE BD section, inaugurated the workshop at 9:30 am. Fariah Hayee, Secretary, WIE, IEEE BD section, introduced to the participants the two instructors who have been recognized by NASA for their projects on Robotics.

The workshop was divided into two sections. In the first section, the participants were introduced to different features of ISIS, Proteus and PCB. The instructors showed how to modify a simulation file to transfer to ARES, Proteus and add PCB packages for components which do not have PCB footprint. Simulation was showed for circuits starting from simple circuits like a 7-segment display counter to complicated ones like a digital thermometer. They also showed how to design a PCB layout with both single layer and double layer.

The second section covered critical issues of Power Circuit PCBs; for example, changing default settings for different trace width for power and signal connections and creating separate zones in a PCB for high power application.

Approximately 40 undergraduate students from different universities attended the workshop and enthusiastically learnt how to use the software to implement amazing projects on PCB. It is hoped that the workshop will be of great use to the participants in their course projects as well as in national and international project competitions. At the end of the day-long workshop, each participant received a certificate of participation from Dr. Pran Kanai Saha, Chair, IEEE BD section.