In research undertaken prior to the transition from analog to digital television broadcasting, it was discovered that electromagnetic interference from lightning, high voltage AC power transmission, AC rectifiers, and ballasts used in fluorescent lighting, greatly affected low-band VHF channels (In North America, channels 2,3,4,5, & 6) making it difficult to impossible to use them for digital television. These low-numbered channels were often the first television broadcasters in a given city, and were often large, vital operations which had no choice but to relocate to UHF. In so doing, it made modern digital television predominantly a UHF medium, and IOTs have become the output tube of choice for the power output section of those transmitters.