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Application of Egyptian Fractions to Parallel Resistors

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Conference

2018 ASEE Mid-Atlantic Section Spring Conference

Location

Washington, District of Columbia

Publication Date

April 6, 2018

Start Date

April 6, 2018

End Date

April 7, 2018

Tagged Topic

Diversity

Page Count

8

DOI

10.18260/1-2--29455

Permanent URL

https://peer.asee.org/29455

Download Count

795

Paper Authors

biography

Jeffrey L. Schwartz P.E. Queensborough Community College

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Jeffrey L. Schwartz received the B.S. and M.S. degrees in electrical engineering from MIT in 1993. From 1993 to 2001, he was a Product Design Engineer on car radios with Ford Motor Company and Visteon Corporation. His first full-time teaching job was at DeVry Institute of Technology from 2001 to 2007, which is where he first became aware of the traps that students fall into when learning basic electronics. He worked as a Component Engineer at Mini-Circuits from 2007 to 2009, where he became aware that standard values and ideal values for design do not always match. Since 2009, he has been an Assistant Professor with the Engineering Technology Department, Queensborough Community College, Bayside, NY.

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Abstract

Professors of introductory electronics courses often want to use integer-based problems with integer-valued solutions. This paper shows how applying the ancient method of Egyptian fractions can be used for this purpose when teaching parallel resistors, whether a professor has a total resistance or a particular resistor in mind, or whether they want to use standard manufacturers’ values.

Schwartz, J. L. (2018, April), Application of Egyptian Fractions to Parallel Resistors Paper presented at 2018 ASEE Mid-Atlantic Section Spring Conference, Washington, District of Columbia. 10.18260/1-2--29455

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