The second International Symposium on Power-Line Communications and its Applications took place March 24-26, 1998 at the beautiful facilities of the Soka University in Hachioji, Japan. The Symposium was organized by Prof. Gen Marubayashi with the help of local students under the supervision of Toshi Imoto. The meeting was sponsored by the IEEE Information Theory Society Tokyo Chapter and IEICE Spread Spectrum Technology Society. More than 100 participants from 11 countries discussed the actual topic of power-line communications and its applications. At the symposium 3 invited lectures and 23 regular presentations were delivered. The invited lectures included an overview of Prof. Baier (University of Kaiserslautern) of spread spectrum technologies. Prof. Baier can be considered as one of the pioneers in the field of power-line communications in connection with spread spectrum systems. An overview of existing systems used in Japan was given by Juji Ibuki from Tokyo Electric Power Company, Japan. The symposium is unique from several points of view. It combines engineers in electrical engineering, ranging from industry to pure research and standardization committees. Furthermore, the problem of power-line communications is interesting for engineers working in the field of EMC, circuits and systems, measurement and control and communications. The regulations and transmission circumstances are different in several parts of the world, which give the discussions a real international flavor. Session 1 considered properties of power lines. It is an important topic to determine the noise and attenuation for different configurations of networks. Session 2 contained several lectures about models that can be used to describe transmission properties. In session 3 some communication systems were presented. Communication systems with high data rates are shown to be feasible, but are yet in the beginning of their development. Regulations, EMC problems and lack of knowledge of the characteristics of the transmission medium are the main obstacles. In session 4 measurement techniques were presented. Gen Marubayashi, the main organizer, concluded that the transmission environment for power-line communications seems to be much worse than that for mobile communications. However, due to changing regulations regarding telecommunication monopolies in Europe, it can be expected that the development of transmission systems with high speed and high quality transmission attract a lot of attention in the near future. The participants were very pleased with the announcement that the 3rd symposium will be organized by Prof. Honory in March 1999 in Lancaster, England. The social program included a get-together, banquet and farewell party for foreign guests. For further information regarding the proceedings of the symposium (ISBN 90-74249-18-3, 261 pages) please contact Prof. Tohsi Imoto, Soka University, email: imoto@t.soka.ac.jp.
Proceedings of the 1st symposium are still available from CINEMA@exp-math.uni-essen.de.