SkinDepth is a simple Java desktop application designed to calculate attenuation of electromagnetic waves in conductive media. This depth of attenuation, also referred to as the "skin depth" of the material, depends on the material's electrical conductivity, its relative magnetic permeability, and the frequency of the excitation field. This attenuation depth is important for such applications as electromagnetic shielding, conventional and remote field eddy current nondestructive testing, and stealth material development.

The attenuation depth isn't too difficult to calculate, but it does require you to have a few material properties handy. I originally wrote SkinDepth to automate the calculation and to keep the material properties for me-now when I need to find the attenuation depth in a new material, I can add it to the SkinDepth database and never have to look it up again.

As a Java application SkinDepth should run under just about any operating system with a Java Virtual Machine (JVM) installed. I've used SkinDepth under several operating systems including Windows 98, Windows XP, 32-Bit Linux (Debian 3.0/3.1, Slackware 9.0/9.1/10.0, Kubuntu), and 64-Bit Linux (Ubuntu, Fedora Core 3 and 4) and it should work just as well under the various BSDs and under OS X. It works fine using JVM 1.4 or 1.5-it may work on earlier JVMs but I haven't tested it under these conditions.

You can download a ZIP archive of SkinDepth here; included in the package is a library of a few materials to get you started and a sample shell script for FreeBSD/Linux users to run SkinDepth from the console. To install SkinDepth under any operating system, just extract the contents of the ZIP into a single folder on your computer or even on a thumbdrive. To uninstall just delete the contents of the folder. That's it!

You can of course add your own materials-read the Quick Intro to get a feel for the program and how to use it. If you still have questions feel free to drop me a line.

Latest News

• May 8 2007: Added several new materials to the database, including hard to find graphite and graphite epoxy composites. I'm considering revamping SkinDepth to allow you to run it from a thumbdrive-is anyone interested?
• November 7 2005: Fixed a minor window closing bug and brought up to date with Java 1.5 (so you'll need a JVM of 1.5 or better to run this version).
• November 5 2005: Added support for platform-specific look and feel.

Resources

• The latest version of SkinDepth can be downloaded as a ZIP file from here. Included in the ZIP is an executable (SkinDepth.exe) for Windows users; a conventional JAR file for the rest of us; a sample shell script for Linux/BSD users; and a starter pack of materials. This version of SkinDepth requires Java 1.5 or higher.
• If you don't have Java 1.5 installed, the previous version of SkinDepth is still available.

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