The term comes from the standing wave traits of transmission lines, wherein the apparent impedance at any point is a function of two values:
the ratio of the line's characteristic impedance Z
0 to its terminating impedance Z
Load
and one's position along the line.The algebra involved is awful looking but i made my way through it decades ago (and changed my minor to Nuclear)
For a quarter wave ,
Z
in = 1/Z
load
which is an inversion
note that a quarter wave open stub ( Zload = infinite ) behaves as a short circuit , Z
in = 0
and that's the inversion.
Now - Smith Charts are the layman's way to solve transmission line problems.
It's not a one-minute task to learn their use.
But here's some reading:
http://www.rle.mit.edu/per/JournalPapers/JPtpejul07p1531.pdf
http://emcesd.com/pdf/zin-eqckt.pdf
http://www.authorstream.com/Present...ission-Lines-li-Entertainment-ppt-powerpoint/ slides 35 and 36 in particular
http://rfic.eecs.berkeley.edu/~niknejad/ee117/pdf/lecture6.pdf page 31
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quarter-wave_impedance_transformer
So were i asked for a brief description of "Impedance Inversion" i'd say
A poorly chosen name for the well known trait of unmatched transmission lines wherein apparent impedance is a function of both position along the line and mismatch Z0/Zload,
specifically for a 1/4 wave normalized to Z0 : zin = 1/zload
In my high school class we built a transmission line of two parallel wires maybe fifteen feet long and three inches apart. We built an instrumented trolley to ride on the wires with both capacitive and inductive pickups, so we could plot the standing waves of voltage and current.
We studied this 'transformer ' effect but called it by that name , not inversion.
Then we learned to use Smith charts.
So when we studied the same subject in 3rd year EE i had an advantage in visualizing those awful looking algebra equations .
It's important to visualize those standing waves along the line and realize that impedance
DOES vary with position, but only if there's a standing wave. Each term in those ornate equations has a physical counterpart. At a point along the line where voltage is low and current high, Z is low and vice versa. That's how you "transform" - pick your spot.
It's not a one-minute subject.
I really urge you to get some Smith Charts and become proficient at using them. Because the phase inverts too. And remember - no mismatch, no standing wave to transform with.
Note to any educators reading this - our 'trolley' experiment really gave a lot of high school boys a head start.
old jim