Abstract — An effective mutual inductance is proposed in this paper to efficiently describe the inductive interactions among coupled signal lines. An efficient estimate of the crosstalk noise among multiple coupled RLC interconnects is achieved by simplifying the system of coupled lines into only two coupled RLC interconnects. The concept of an effective mutual inductance is further applied to a shielding technique, providing guidelines for inserting shields to reduce crosstalk noise in the presence of both capacitive and inductive coupling. I