NEWS
Jul 28, 2020

Comment on Liu et al. “Discrepancies of Measured SAR between Traditional and Fast Measuring Systems.”

Mark Douglas and Niels Kuster, International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 2020, Volume 17, Issue 14, online 14 July 2020; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17145045

The article, “Discrepancies of Measured SAR between Traditional and Fast Measuring Systems”, by Zicheng Liu, Djamel Allal, Maurice Cox, and Joe Wiart was published in March 2020 in International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. The publication compares two types of specific absorption rate measurement systems – a fast system using a time-domain array and a traditional system using probe scanning. While the time-domain array system is analyzed in detail under idealized conditions, the probe-scanning system evaluation used a fixed set of scanning and evaluation parameters that are not fully compliant with the requirements of the published standards. This leads to a false comparison and the incorrect conclusion that time-domain array systems can be theoretically more accurate than probe-scanning systems. We have repeated the analysis applied in the paper using the same raw data but with state-of-the art scanning and evaluation parameters. The results confirm the high accuracy of probe-scanning systems for any field distribution. Due to the high precision, robustness, and reliability of probe-scanning systems, the results of these systems are often referred to as reference results.

The scientific and technical impact of the study can be summarized as:

  • The IT’IS Foundation, in collaboration with two authors of the original study, repeated the analysis applied in the paper by Liu et al. (2020) using the same raw data with state-of-the art scanning and evaluation parameters of the DASY technology
  • The results demonstrate that the maximal post-processing error is less than 3% when applying the recommended parameters in DASY6 using the EX3DVx probes
  • The authors of the original study confirmed these findings in their Reply paper

More information can also be found on the SPEAG website.