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Faculty Awards & Honors

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November 11, 2009 Sheila Hemami

“IEEE Signal Processing Society Distinguished Lecturer”

Professor Sheila Hemami has been elected an IEEE Signal Processing Society Distinguished Lecturer, with a two-year term starting 2010.

Prof. Hemami's work reflects the integration of the goal of providing "anytime, anywhere visual communications" with characterizing the human visual system (HVS). To understand HVS characteristics, she explores how the human brain perceives visual information by developing better models for visual cortex processing, as well as models which include understanding and cognition. She simultaneously develops both theory and practice for signal processing techniques which can fully exploit HVS characteristics. The resulting models provide improved processing, higher efficiency, and/or better compression performance. This dual approach consisting of signal- processing informed psychophysics and psychophysics-informed signal processing has yielded substantial gains over traditional decoupled approaches.

The IEEE Signal Processing Society's Distinguished Lecturer Program provides means and financial support for IEEE chapters to have access to individuals who are well known educators and authors in the fields of signal processing. Prof. Hemami's research accomplishments in visual communications have earned her the recognition. During her term as a Distinguished Lecturer, she will give lectures to IEEE local chapters across the world.

November 11, 2009 Rajit Manohar

“Rajit Manohar appointed as Interim Associate Dean”

Associate Professor Rajit Manohar has been appointed as Interim Associate Dean for Research and Graduate Studies in the College of Engineering from January 1, 2010 – June 30, 2010.

As Associate Dean for Research and Graduate Studies, Rajit will oversee and support faculty research and the graduate programs in the College of Engineering, handle conflict of interest matters, coordinate the Master of Engineering program and graduate department reviews, administer college fellowship funds and limited college funds in support of research, and serve as a member of the senior leadership team of the college. The Associate Dean also cultivates collaborative, cross-disciplinary research by identifying and coordinating major, college-wide funding opportunities. The Associate Dean works with departments to strengthen the quality, standing, and impact of the M.Eng., M.S. and Ph.D. programs.

September 21, 2009 Clifford Pollock

“Marsha D. McCormick Award for Excellence in Advising”

Professor Clifford Pollock receives the Marsha D. McCormick Award for excellence in advising first year students. Advising first year students takes on particular significance since this is the initiation period for young adults into a unique and intense learning community. At Cornell, this means knowing how to make referrals for academic issues, career and guidance counseling, and mental health assessment. Professor Pollock was able to customize each relationship, blend skills of interest, and guide and mentor each of his advisees. Professor Pollock received nominations from first year students, faculty and administration.

September 3, 2009

“Engineering College Teaching Award”

ECE faculty members Dave Delchamps, Aaron Wagner, and Steve Wicker receive prestigious Engineering College Teaching Awards.

The three ECE educators were nominated by colleagues within the department and selected by a committee, comprised of former teaching prizewinners from within the College of Engineering. The Engineering College Teaching Award is the highest award for teaching in the college.

August 10, 2009

“José Martínez and Kevin Tang receive 2009 IBM Faculty Awards”

José Martínez and Kevin Tang have each received a 2009 IBM Faculty Award. The IBM Faculty Award program is a worldwide competition intended to "(1) foster collaboration between researchers at leading universities worldwide and those in IBM research, development and services organizations; and (2) promote courseware and curriculum innovation to stimulate growth in disciplines and geographies that are strategic to IBM."

José MartínezJosé Martínez is associate professor at the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, which he joined in 2002.


Kevin Tang joined the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Cornell in 2007, where he is now an assistant professor. During the 2006-07 academic year, he was a junior fellow with the social and information sciences laboratory at the California Institute of Technology.

June 18, 2009 Paul Kintner

“Jefferson Science Fellow with the US Department of State”

ECE Professor Paul KintnerPaul Kintner has been selected to become a Jefferson Science Fellow with the US Department of State in Washington, DC. Paul will take a sabbatical leave from Cornell during the academic year 2009-2010.

Each Fellow spends one year at the U.S. Department of State or the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) for an on-site assignment in Washington, D.C. that may also involve extended stays at U.S. foreign embassies and/or missions. All JSF assignments will be designed in consultation with regional and/or functional bureaus within the U.S. Department of State/USAID. While in general JSF assignments will involve providing up-to-date expertise in the rapidly advancing STE arenas that routinely impact the policy decisions encountered by the U.S. Department of State/USAID, each Fellow will also be expected to become conversant with the functional operation of the U.S. Department of State/USAID. Following the fellowship year, the Jefferson Science Fellow will return to his/her academic career, but will remain available to the U.S. Department of State/USAID for short-term projects over the following five years.

Criteria for selection:

  • Ability to articulate science and technology issues to the non-specialist/general public.
  • Ability to rapidly and accurately understand scientific advancements outside their discipline area and to effectively integrate this knowledge into U.S. Department of State policy discussions.
  • Open-mindedness and receptive attitudes toward public policy discussions at the U.S. Department of State/USAID.
  • Stature, recognition and experience in the national and international scientific or engineering community.

He was appointed to the faculty in 1981. Kintner is a Fellow of the American Physical Society and a senior member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers.

June 15, 2009 Michael Spencer

“AFOSR MURI Award”

ECE Professor Michael Spencer The award (1 million per year for 5 years) will be shared approximately equally between Cornell and Columbia (Columbia is the lead). The principal investigator is Rick Osgood at Columbia and Professor Spencer will lead the Cornell efforts. Other members on the Cornell team include: ECE faculty Sandip Tiwari, Edwin Kan, Farhan Rana as well as Paul McEuen in Physics.

The award centers on the exploitation of the material graphene for new device applications. Graphene or single monlayer, single crystal graphite has seen an explosion of interest worldwide. Columbia building on DARPA funding and Cornell building on NSF CCMR funding have large numbers of faculty interested in the properties and applications of these materials. In addition to the recent MURI funding, and the ongoing CCMR funding Cornell and Columbia are in the finals of a NSF STC competition centered on graphene research.

According to the Department of Defense (DoD), “The awards are the result of the fiscal 2009 competition that … AFOSR conducted under the DoD Multidisciplinary University Research Initiative (MURI) program. The MURI program supports research by teams of investigators that intersect more than one traditional science and engineering discipline in order to accelerate both research progress and transition of research results to application. Most MURI efforts involve researchers from multiple academic institutions and academic departments. Based on the proposals selected in the fiscal 2009 competition, a total of 69 academic institutions are expected to participate in 41 research efforts.” [read more]

Professor Spenser (photo above) received his Ph.D. from Cornell University in 1981 and then joined the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering.

May 8, 2009 David Delchamps

“2009 Kendall S. Carpenter Memorial Advising Award.”

ECE Professor David DelchampsDelchamps was one of four [Carpenter Memorial Advising] awardees honored on May 23rd at a Trustee-Faculty dinner “which recognizes the winners of university-wide teaching and advising awards along with newly tenured faculty”. A committee of previous winners provided nominees for the award to President Skorton who in turn made the final selection based on Professor Delchamp’s “wonderful testimonials from students and colleagues about [his] advising”.

Cornell Trustee Stephen Ashley established the Carpenter Awards in honor of Kendall S. Carpenter, a professor of business management at Cornell from 1954 -1967. The Kendall S. Carpenter Memorial Advising Award recognizes an individual’s “sustained and distinguished contributions of professorial faculty and senior lecturers to undergraduate advising.”

Professor Delchamps has been on the faculty of the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering since 1982. His research focuses on applying techniques from dynamical systems theory, game theory, and stochastic processes to the modeling, analysis, and design of natural and artificial complex multi-agent systems.  Such systems arise in variety of application areas ranging from biology to telecommunication networking to economics.

May 20, 2009 Zygmunt Haas

“Professor Haas receives an invitation to join the IEEE ComSoc Distinguish Lecturers Tour (DLT) ”

Prof. Zygmunt J. Haas was invited to deliver a series of lectures in the Scandinavian countries as part of the IEEE ComSoc Distinguish Lecturers Tour (DLT) program. In this tour, Dr. Haas will present the work conducted in his Wireless Networks Lab at 7 academic and industrial institutions in Sweden, Finland, and Denmark. The tour is planned to take place in a 2-week period, starting end of May and ending beginning of June.

May 14, 2009 Rajit Manohar

“Ruth and Joel Spira Outstanding Teaching Award in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering in 2009”

Rajit Manohar, Associate Professor receives the Ruth and Joel Spira Outstanding Teaching Award in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering in 2009. This award is presented annually to a faculty member who has made extraordinary efforts in teaching.

Manohar has taught a variety of courses in the School. ECE/CS 314 - Computer Organization, ECE 571 - Asynchronous VLSI Design, ECE 474 - Digital VLSI, ECE 697 - Topics in Computer Systems, ECE 320 - Systems and Networks, ECE 475 - Computer Architecture, ECE 439/539 - VLSI Digital System Design and ECE 308 - Fundamentals of Computer Engineering.

The theme from Professor Manohar student evaluations comment on his excellent lecture style, his preparedness and that he takes the time to connect with the students and make sure that they understand the topic before moving on.

In addition to teaching, Manohar serves on various School, College and University committees. He is currently the Director of Graduate Studies for Electrical and Computer Engineering.

April 23, 2009 Michal Lipson

“Provost Award for Distinguished Scholarship”

Cornell recognizes Michal Lipson who recently received the Provost Award for Distinguished Scholarship for research in the field of silicon photonics.

ECE Professor Michal Lipson In a letter from Provost Kent Fuchs, The Provost Award for Distinguished Scholarship is "given to recognize distinguished research by outstanding tenured faculty early in their careers. It is an opportunity for the university to recognize its talented researchers". In Professor Lipson’s case, "the award was granted for her research in the field of silicon photonics which develops technology for manipulating light signals on a microelectronics chip for future low power consumption".

Michal joined the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Cornell University in 2001 as an Assistant Professor. Her research at Cornell involves novel on-chip Nanophotonic devices. She was the recipient of the NSF CAREER award in 2004, is the inventor of 8 patents on novel micron-size photonic structures for light manipulation and is the author of over 40 papers in the major research journals in physics and optics. She is currently a topical editor of Optics Letters.

December 23, 2008 David Hammer

“The American Physical Society (APS) Council elects David Hammer to the Executive Board ”

The American Physical Society (APS) Council has elected Prof. David Hammer to the APS Executive Board for a two-year term. The Council is the body that makes decisions for the Society membership that are not within the powers granted to the President of the APS or the Executive Officer, and the Executive Board is responsible for planning many of the actions taken by the Council. Prof. Hammer is currently serving a four-year term as the Plasma Physics Division's "Councillor."

Prof. Hammer is the J. Carlton Ward Professor of Nuclear Energy Engineering and Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering. He has been on the Cornell faculty since 1977.

November 21, 2008 Lang Tong

“2009 IEEE Signal Processing Society Distinguished Lecturer”

Professor Lang Tong named as an 2009 IEEE Signal Processing Society Distinguished Lecturer. Professor Tong conducts research in the general areas of statistical signal processing, wireless communications, network and information theory. His lecture topics include distributed sensing and inference, roles of signal processing in secure and anonymous networking, and opportunistic spectrum access for cognitive radios.

The IEEE Signal Processing Society's Distinguished Lecturer Program provides means and financial support for IEEE chapters to have access to individuals who are well known educators and authors in the fields of signal processing.

November 18, 2008 Sheila Hemami

“IEEE Fellow”

The IEEE Board of Directors, at its meeting on 12 November 2008, has elevated Sheila Hemami to IEEE Fellow, effective 1 January 2009, with the following citation: for contributions to robust and perceptual image and video communications.

The primary objective of her research is to enable high-quality, reliable visual communications for all users. All users, regardless of their individual network connection bandwidths, qualities-of-service, or terminal capabilities, should have the ability to access still images, video clips, and multimedia information services, and to use interactive visual communications services. Specific research topics include motion estimation and compensation for video coding, psychovisually-based image processing and compression, and error-resilient coding for transmission applications.

Sheila is currently the Editor-in-Chief for the IEEE Transactions on Multimedia. She chaired the IEEE Image and Multidimensional Signal Processing Technical Committee, and has served as an Associate Editor for the IEEE Transactions on Signal Processing. In 1997 she received a National Science Foundation CAREER Award. She held the Kodak Term Professorship of Electrical Engineering at Cornell University from 1996-1999. In 2000 she received the National Eta Kappa Nu C. Holmes MacDonald Outstanding Teaching Award, and she has won numerous teaching awards at Cornell. In 2005 she received the Alice H. Cook and Constance E. Cook Award at Cornell University for her leadership of the Women in Science and Engineering committee.

November 10, 2008 G. Edward Suh

“Young Investigator Program (YIP) Award”

ECE's Edward Suh is one of the 39 scientists and engineers from across the nation to receive the Young Investigator Program Award from Air Force office of Scientific Research AFOSR.

The objective of Young Investigator Program is to foster creative basic research in science and engineering, enhance early career development of outstanding young investigators, and increase opportunities for the young investigators to recognize the Air Force mission and the related challenges in science and engineering.

According to AFOSR officials, competition for the YIP award is intense. This year AFOSR received 210 proposals in response to the AFOSR broad agency announcement solicitation in major areas of interest to the Air Force. The areas of interest include: aerospace, chemical and material sciences; physics and electronics; and mathematics, information and life sciences. AFOSR officials select proposals based on the evaluation criteria listed in the broad agency announcement.

Edward will study heterogeneous multicore platform through diversity and redundancy for enhancing the security of future systems.

[read more]
September 5, 2008

“James and Mary Tien Excellence in Teaching Award”

Sunil Bhave, Bruce Land, and Richard Shealy have been selected as College of Engineering’s outstanding teachers and will be recognized this fall as winners of the James and Mary Tien Excellence in Teaching Award. This is the highest award for teaching in the college. The three ECE educators were nominated by colleagues within the department and selected by a committee, comprised of former teaching prizewinners from within the College of Engineering.

May 27, 2008 Paul Kintner

“International Ionospheric Effects Symposium First Prize”

Paul KintnerPaul Kintner wins first prize for a paper, entitled Simulating Inosphere-Induced Scintillation for Testing GPS Receiver Phase Tracking Loops, which was submitted at the 125th International Ionospheric Effects Symposium (IES) in Washington, DC on May 13-15th. Approximately 125 papers were submitted.

To view the paper, visit: http://www.ies2008.com/IES2008-A106.txt. To learn more about IES, please visit the following url: http://www.ies2008.com/.

May 8, 2008

“Ruth and Joel Spira Outstanding Teaching Award in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering in 2008”

Wesley SwartzWesley Swartz, Senior Research Associate receives the Ruth and Joel Spira Outstanding Teaching Award in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering in 2008. This Award was made in recognition of Wesley’s dedication to teaching and willingness to capture the students’ interest, guide and offer assistance to help them succeed.

Swartz received his B.S. from Drexel University in Electrical Engineering and his M.S. and Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Penn State. Swartz joined the School in 1972. During that time he has grown and enhanced the curriculum for our students. Swartz teaches ECE 303, Electromagnetic Fields and Waves and ENGRD 230, Introduction to Digital Logic Design in the fall and ECE 488, RF Circuits and Systems in the spring semester. One student commented, "Professor Swartz is one of the best professors I have had at Cornell. Not only was he prepared for each lecture and stimulated my interest in the subject, he extended above and beyond his role as professor to help students succeed in the course. He showed that he truly cares about his students and really made me like my major more than before this course." The general theme from student evaluations is that Professor Swartz's lectures were well organized and that he made himself available for all of his students.

March 25, 2008

“DARPA 2008 Young Faculty Awards”

Three ECE assistant professors, Ehsan Afshari, Sunil Bhave, and Farhan Rana, have been identified by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to receive DARPA 2008 Young Faculty Awards. DARPA made awards to 39 "rising stars in university microsystems research" who are on the faculty of 27 universities located in 17 different states. The DARPA Young Faculty Award program is designed to seek out ideas from non-tenured faculty in order to identify the next generation of researchers working in microsystems technology [Full Story].

March 5, 2008 James Thorp

“2008 Benjamin Franklin Medal in Electrical Engineering”

The 2008 Benjamin Franklin Medal in Electrical Engineering will be presented to Emeritus professor James Thorp for his career work at Cornell in the "development and application of microprocessor controllers in electric power systems. These devices make synchronized measurements to monitor and protect components throughout the power grid, playing a key role in diminishing the frequency and impact of blackouts." He is sharing the award with Prof. Arun Phadke of Virginia Tech. The award will be presented on April 17 in Philadelphia.

Related articles:

"Two Virginia Tech electrical engineers named among the greatest in science, engineering, and technology in the world"
-Virginia Tech News

The 2008 Benjamin Franklin Medal in Electrical Engineering (Announcement)
- Franklin Institute Website

January 25, 2008 G. Edward Suh

“National Science Foundation Faculty Early CAREER Award”

G. Edward SuhG. Edward Suh, assistant professor in Electrical and Computer Engineering, recently received a five-year National Science Foundation Faculty Early CAREER Award for his project, "Flexible Multi-Core Substrate for Trustworthy Computing Systems". Multi-core architecture with 4 to 8 cores on a die is a reality today and future generations of processors are expected to contain even more processing cores per chip. The project aims to realize the full potential of large-scale multi-core processors as a secure and trustworthy computing substrate by investigating strong isolation techniques and building a flexible framework for dynamic inspection of various correctness properties. The research will deliver the benefits of hardware support in security and verification without requiring dedicated resources for a single fixed mechanism.

October 24, 2007 Michal Lipson

“Fellow of Optical Society of America”

Michal Lipson Michal Lipson was elected Fellow of the Optical Society of America (OSA) by the Board of Directors at their September 2007 meeting. Prof. Lipson is recognized for outstanding contributions to the field of silicon nanophotonics, including the development of high-bandwidth modulators and low-power nonlinear optical devices. OSA members who have served with distinction in the advancement of optics may be proposed for election to the class of Fellow. This honor is reserved to no more than 10% of the total membership.

[read more]
August 25, 2007

“Kendall S. Carpenter Memorial Advising Award”

John BelinaCornell Engineering Magazine
Summer 2007
Pg 32

"... John Belina has recently been awarded the university’s Kendall S. Carpenter Memorial Advising Award. The $5,000 award recognizes “sustained and distinguished contributions of professorial faculty and senior lecturers to undergraduate advising.” Previously, he was named the 2006–2009 Rosenblatt Endowed Faculty Fellow for his sustained contributions to students outside the classroom and to the life of the residential communities.
'Advising is one of the most important things at Cornell because [the university] is very decentralized,' says Belina..."

[download the article]
[read the magazine]

August 12, 2007 Zygmunt Haas

“Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers”

ECE Professor Zygmunt J. HaasProfessor Zygmunt J. Haas was elected Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) in 2007 for "contributions to wireless and mobile ad-hoc networks".

The grade of Fellow recognizes unusual distinction in the profession and is conferred by the Board of Directors upon a person with an extraordinary record of accomplishments in any of the IEEE fields of interest. The accomplishments honored shall have contributed importantly to the advancement or application of engineering, science and technology, bringing the realization of significant value to society.

The IEEE Fellows are an elite group from around the globe. The IEEE looks to the Fellows for guidance and leadership as the world of electrical and electronic technology continues to evolve.

September 11, 2007

“Ruth and Joel Spira Outstanding Teaching Award in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering in 2007”

Professor David A HammerProfessor David A. Hammer received the Ruth and Joel Spira Outstanding Teaching Award in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering in 2007. This Award was made in recognition of Professor Hammer's dedication to teaching and willingness to help students and to provide them with a course they will reflect back upon as one of their most interesting undergraduate classroom experiences.

Over the past several years, Professor Hammer has taught two courses in the Spring semesters: ECE 484, Introduction to controlled Fusion: Principles and Technology, and ECE 588 Energy Seminar II; and he teaches one course in the Fall semesters: ECE 581 Introduction to Plasma Physics, which is the cornerstone to the University’s plasma physics program. To ECE 484 and 588 he brings his research experience into the undergraduate classroom with great effectiveness. In the energy seminar he captivated the students’ interest in energy issues by organizing excellent speakers and in 484 he enlightens students about “the holy grail of energy production” as one student puts it. A consistent theme from the student evaluations is that Professor Hammer cares deeply about students.

August 18, 2007 Alyssa Apsel

“John Swanson College Teaching Award for 2007”

ECE Assistant Professor Alyssa ApselAssistant Professor Alyssa Apsel was recently awarded the John Swanson College Teaching Award for 2007.  Professor Apsel teaches courses in analog and mixed signal integrated circuit design, most recently ECE 453 and ECE 554. Her award noted her success at adding a strong design component to 453, converting the course into one of the school's capstone design courses required for ABET.  The design project became the focus of this revised course, with lectures and homework building toward the goal articulated in a final project. Prof. Apsel’s lectures were designed to couple student's design-driven curiosity with the lecture material.

April 6, 2007 Paul Kintner

“ECE Professor Goes to Washington...”

ECE Assistant Professor Alyssa Apsel In an effort to explain an alarming event which resulted in the disruption of global positioning signals (GPS) “around the world”, professor Paul Kintner joined other researchers at a conference in Washington DC. Although Kintner and his grad-student Alessandro Cerruti predicted an event like this is likely to occur (see award-winning student paper), the effect, said professor Kintner, was “more profound and widespread than we thought possible”.

- April 8, 2007 Washington Post [read more]

May 18, 2007 C. Johnson Jr.

“Professor Johnson is the Featured Guest on NPR's Science Friday Show – May 18, 2007”

Richard Johnson“… can number crunching determine whether art is authentic? We'll talk with a scientist (Professor Richard Johnson) who says that a technique called 'stylometry' may be able to distill the essence of an artist's technique down to a set of geometric data points. He met this week with representatives of the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. Can the technique determine whether a purported 'van Gogh' was really painted by the master? We'll run the numbers….”

-- NPR’s Science Friday, [read more, listen to the show!]. An archive of the show will be stored on Science Friday's website after it airs on the radio.

National Public Radio's Talk of the Nation: Science Friday® is a science talk show that can be heard each Friday afternoon, 2-4 p.m. on selected NPR stations.

Van Gogh's sunflower painting Science of art:
Scientists say ‘stylometric’ analysis could tell if a version of a Van Gogh sunflower painting bought by a Japanese insurance company (left) is a forgery. At right is an authentic painting from the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam.
-- AP

 

Related article:

Is that painting real? Ask a mathematician.
Engineers use a mathematical process dubbed 'stylometry' to set apart real Van Gogh paintings from forgeries.
-- By Elizabeth Svoboda | Contributor to The Christian Science Monitor

"On May 14, teams of engineers that Mr. Johnson recruited will meet with art students and curators at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam to announce what they think sets real Van Gogh paintings apart from forgeries. By analyzing a database of 101 paintings by the artist and his known imitators, the scientists have arrived at what they say are key elements of Van Gogh's 'visual signature,' which can be distilled into numbers. This, they say, will give art experts an important new tool to assess works like 'Vase With Fifteen Sunflowers.' They can compare how closely a disputed painting's visual signature matches the baseline "signature" derived from the database."[read more]

April 9, 2007 Sunil Bhave

“National Science Foundation Early Career Award”

Sunil BhaveSunil Bhave, assistant professor in Electrical and Computer Engineering,recently received a five-year National Science Foundation Faculty Early CAREER award under the Integrative, Hybrid, and Complex Systems. Prof. Bhave proposes a comprehensive study and design of dielectrically transduced MEMS resonators for communication and computation. The CAREER project focuses on the key challenges for solid- and liquid-dielectrically transduced, high-quality factor RF resonators,including tuning methods, electrode optimization, substrate isolation,and large array synchronization behavior.

January 26, 2007 Aaron Wagner

“National Science Foundation Early Career Award”

ECE Assistant Professor Aaron WagnerAssistant Professor Aaron Wagner has received a National Science Foundation Early Career Award for his proposal “A New Look at the Fundamental Limits of Lossy Network Compression.” The Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Program is NSF's most prestigious award in support of the early career-development activities of teacher-scholars.

Lossy compression plays a key role in our information economy. By far, most of the information that we generate as a society represents pictures, sounds, and videos, and for this kind of data, lossy compression yields a tremendous reduction in transmission and storage requirements. The aim of Prof. Wagner's project is to understand the fundamental limits of lossy compression, especially in the context of networks, which dominate today's communication infrastructure.

January 26, 2007 Alyssa Apsel

“NSF Early Career”

TITLE: Designing with Light: Comparative Analysis and Design of Optical Interconnects for Chip-to-Chip Communication

ECE Associate Professor Alyssa Apsel Abstract:

CMOS electronics have become ubiquitous in modern society, continuing to create both technological and economic opportunities in such areas as portable computing and handheld devices. In the past, the capabilities of CMOS processors have been limited internally by transistor density, power consumption, and speed. All of these characteristics have improved consistently with transistor scaling, governed empirically by Moore's Law. However, as CMOS feature sizes decrease into the sub-micron regime, electrical signaling and interconnect problems promise to become the ultimate limit of high performance systems at both the board and chip levels. Integration of optical interconnects into high-performance computing offers a promising and necessary approach to solving the inter-chip communication bottleneck....

December 1, 2006 Rajit Manohar

“Global Indus Technovators Award”

ECE Associate Professor and Director of Graduate Studies The Indian Business Club at MIT has awarded 10 young (under-40) innovators and entrepreneurs of South Asian origin Global Indus Technovators Awards. The ten were recognized for their outstanding contributions to biotechnology, information technology and grassroots technology, among others. Rajit Manohar received an award in the information technology area for his work on asynchronous FPGAs.

December 4, 2006 Lang Tong

“Prof. Lang Tong named to Irwin and Joan Jacobs Chair in Engineering”

The Trustees have named Prof. Lang Tong to have the Irwin and Joan Jacobs Chair in Engineering. This is the endowed chair that Toby Berger held before his retirement last January. It is great to see the Chair stay within the School, and it is appropriate that it also is going to someone who has had a strong impact in the communications field.

Lang has distinguished himself in many ways in our school, but was noted in particular for his pioneering scholarship in the field of communications signal processing, his leadership in the school, and his effort and success at team building for funded research among the faculty in the school and college. Even as this award is announced, Lang is busy assembling a large proposal for an Army-funded center that will involved over 6 Cornell faculty plus a number of other schools. He has been an active leader in helping others get research funding since he arrived.

This is a great honor both for Lang and for the School. A Chair represents the highest rank that can be achieved in a university; it is well-deserved and appropriate honor for Lang.

Cornell Chronicle

November 15, 2006

“IEEE Micro Top Picks”

“Leveraging Optical Technology in Future Bus-based Chip Multiprocessors”, by José Martínez, Alyssa Apsel, David Albonesi, and Ph.D. students Nevin Kırman, Meyrem Kırman, Rajeev Dokania, and Matthew Watkins, is among this year's IEEE Micro Top Picks from Computer Architecture Conferences
November 1, 2006 Sheila Hemami

“Hemami promoted to Full Professor”

Effective November 1, 2006, Sheila S. Hemami will become the first woman in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Cornell to be promoted to the rank of Full Professor. Sheila is an outstanding teacher, scholar, and leader at Cornell, and we are delighted that she has been recognized in this appropriate manner.
May 8, 2006 Bruce Land

“Bruce Land Receives Ruth and Joel Spira Outstanding Teaching Award in 2006”

Bruce Land Bruce has been teaching in the School in various capacities for the last 20 years. For the last 8 years he has taught our capstone course ECE 476 Digital Systems Design using MicroControllers. This has become the most popular course in the school, due primarily to Bruce's enthusiasm, teaching skills, and personal guidance in the lab.

In ECE 476, Bruce teaches the students about designing systems using microcontrollers, and then allows each student to build and test a self-generated design projects. Bruce has helped students build robots, health monitors, computer games, energy controllers, and "smart trains". It’s an amazing array of projects that he leads each year. His web page, http://instruct1.cit.cornell.edu/courses/ee476/FinalProjects/ shows most of the projects from over the years.

Each year Bruce encourages all students to submit their designs for publication. Many students have seen their projects published in national magazines.

This award is not the first time Bruce has been recognized for his outstanding teaching. In 1993 he was awarded the “Faculty of the Year” teaching award in Computer Science. In 1996 he won first place in "Instructional Materials" at the national ACM SIG User Conference XXIV. In 1995 he presented a series of lectures on "Innovation in Undergraduate Teaching" at Oregon State University. Bruce is a leader in instruction.

June 30, 2006 José Martínez

“IBM Faculty Award”

Assistant Professor José Martínez received a 2006 IBM Faculty Award in recognition of the quality of his research program and its importance to industry.
June 30, 2006 Michal Lipson

“IBM Faculty Award”

Assistant Professor Michal Lipson received a 2006 IBM Faculty Award in recognition of the quality of her research program and its importance to industry.
January 1, 2007 Sandip Tiwari

“IEEE Cledo Brunetti Award”

Professor Sandip Tiwari (ECE) was named the 2007 recipient of the IEEE Cledo Brunetti Award with the accompanying citation: "For pioneering contributions to nano-crystal memories and to quantum effect devices". The Brunetti Award recognizes outstanding contributions to the advancement of information storage with emphasis on technical contributions in computer data storage device technology.

Visit the IEEE website for more information about the Cledo Brunetti Award, award recipients, and Sandip Tiwari.

June 15, 2006 José Martínez

“National Science Foundation Early Career Award”

Assistant Professor José Martínez has received a National Science Foundation Early Career Award for his proposal "Power-Performance Considerations of Thread-level Parallelism in On-chip Multicore Architectures." The Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Program is NSF's "most prestigious award in support of the early career-development activities of those teacher-scholars who most effectively integrate research and education within the context of the mission of their organization."

As the microprocessor industry moves toward multicore solutions (several processor cores on a single chip), performance growth on these inherently power-constrained platforms will increasingly rely upon their ability to support thread-level parallelism efficiently. Martínez's project seeks to develop the necessary insights for the successful design of mechanisms that can address the unique power-performance opportunities and challenges of running parallel applications on multicore chip architectures.

October 1, 2006

“2006 IEEE Leon K. Kirchmayer Graduate Teaching Award”

Professor Toby Berger, Electrical and Computer Engineering, has been selected as the recipient of the 2006 IEEE Leon K. Kirchmayer Graduate Teaching Award "for sustained excellence in graduate education and research information theory." This award honors teachers of electrical and electronics engineering and the related disciplines, 'for inspirational teaching of graduate students in the IEEE fields of interest.' Recipient selection is administered by the IEEE Awards Board through the Technical Field Awards Council, and is based on the following criteria: excellence in teaching graduate students, curriculum development with the inclusion of current research and development knowledge that reflects the state of the art in courses, authorship of course material for graduate students; and involvement with and direction of students to prepare them for effective careers in engineering and the sciences, and the quality of the nomination. The award is made to one individual only, and consists of a bronze medal, certificate and honorarium. Professor Berger is the second faculty member of ECE to receive this prestigious award; the first recipient was Professor Lester F. Eastman, who received the award in 1999.
July 15, 2005 Robert Thomas

“2005 IEEE PES OUTSTANDING POWER ENGINEERING EDUCATOR AWARD”

Awarded each year by the IEEE Power Engineering Society for excellence in teaching and ability to inspire students, and leadership in electric power engineering education through publication of textbooks and writings on engineering education. The citation reads “For outstanding contributions to teaching and research in the field of power ”

February 1, 2005 José Martínez

“Best Paper Award”

José Martínez and Ph.D. students Nevin Kırman, Meyrem K#&305;rman, and Mainak Chaudhuri, have received the Best Paper Award at the Intl. Symp. on High Performance Computer Architecture (HPCA), for their paper "Checkpointed Early Load Retirement."
January 31, 2005 Lang Tong

“Lang Tong Elected Fellow of the IEEE”

Lang Tong was Elected to Fellow of the IEEE "for contributions to statistical signal processing for communications and wireless networks." The election to Fellow is awarded to less than 1/20th of a percent of the IEEE membership each year, and represents one of the highest honors that IEEE can bestow.
January 31, 2005 Lang Tong

“Lang Tong and M. Dong Receive Best Paper Award fr”

Lang Tong and one of his former students, M. Dong, were selected to receive the 2004 IEEE Signal Processing Society Best Paper Award for their paper, "Optimal Design and Placement of Pilot Symbols for Channel Estimation."
December 6, 2004

“NSBE Educator of the Year Award”

Kevin Kornegay is the recipient of the 2004 Dr. Janice A. Lumpkin Educator of the Year Award from the National Society of Black Engineers. This award recognizes an active classroom collegiate faculty member with demonstrated commitment to advancing education in engineering, science and mathematics. Kevin will receive his award at the 8th Annual Golden Torch Awards Ceremony, to be held in Boston in March 2005.
August 23, 2004

“Career Communications Group "50 Most Important Bla”

Kevin Kornegay has been selected as one of the "50 Most Important Blacks in Research Science" for 2004 by the editors of Science Spectrum and US Black Engineer and Information Technology magazines. The top 50 were chosen for this annual list based on their work in making science part of our global society. Kevin and his family will attend an awards recognition luncheon with the other honorees in Nashville on Friday, September 17 during the Emerald Awards Conference.
March 17, 2004 C. Johnson Jr.

“Stephen H. Weiss Presidential Fellowship”

Professor C. Richard Johnson, Jr., was the recipient of one of the 2004 Stephen H. Weiss Presidential Fellowships for effective, inspiring and distinguished teaching of undergraduate students. The award recognizes excellence in teaching, advising and outstanding efforts toward instructional improvement and development.

Professor Johnson is the recipient of numerous teaching awards, including the 2003 Joel Spira Excellence in Teaching Award from Cornell's School of Electrical and Computer Engineering; the 2002 J.P. and Mary Barger '50 Teaching Award and the 1996 Michael Tien '72 Teaching Award, from Cornell's College of Engineering; and was the recipient of the 1983 C. Holmes MacDonald Outstanding Teacher Award, a national award from the electrical engineering honorary society Eta Kappa Nu. [read more]
June 15, 2004

“Kevin Kornegay Honored”

Science Spectrum magazine has named Kevin Kornegay as one of the top minorities in science today. The honorees, described as "Science Spectrum Trailblazers," represent outstanding Hispanic, Asian-American, Native American and African American professions in a science field "whose work on the job and in the community extends throughout and beyond their industry." Kornegay will be honored at the Baltimore Convention Center during the Minorities in Research Science Conference in September. This is different from the award he earned earlier in the year from Science Spectrum magazine and US Black Engineer & Information Technology magazine where Kevin was named as one of the "50 Most Important Blacks in Research Science" for 2004.
April 8, 2004

“Provost's Ronay and Richard Menschel Award”

This award is in recognition of Prof. Kornegay's strong research program in RF and VLSI circuits, his mentoring of our faculty, and his active involvement with student groups, especially the world champion Autonomous Underwater Vehicle team.
March 11, 2004 Farhan Rana

“NSF Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER)”

Farhan Rana has received an award of $400,000 for his proposal, "Semiconductor Lasers for Generating High Energy Ultrashort (sub-50 fs) Optical Pulses: From Nanotechnology to Ultrafast Optics." The NSF program is intended to support the early development of academic careers dedicated to stimulating discovery process, in which the excitement of research is enhanced by inspired teaching and enthusiastic learning.
February 16, 2004 José Martínez

“IEEE Micro, "Top Picks"”

"Speculative Synchronization: Programmability and Performance for Parallel Codes," written by Jose Martinez, with his then Univiversity of Illinois advisor Jose Torrelas, was named in the November/December 2003 issue of IEEE Micro as a "Top Pick." Top Picks were papers from conferences over the past year that were judged to have had a major impact on the field.

Quoted from IEEE Micro: "Jose F. Martinez, in recognition of the inclusion of 'Speculative Synchronization: Programmability and Performance for Parallel Codes' in the 2003 Micro Top Picks special issue on the most industry relevant and significant papers of the year in computer architecture. Congratulations on your contributions to our field. P.B., Editor-in-Chief, IEEE Micro."

February 16, 2004

“2003-04 Affinito-Stewart Award”

Cornell President's Council on University Women Affinito-Stewart Award
February 16, 2004

“Best Student Paper Award”

McKee was received the Best Student Paper Award, International Conference on Supercomputing, June 2002, just before joining the Cornell ECE faculty.
February 16, 2004

“Candidate for Best Paper Award”

Supercomputer 2003, November 2003
February 6, 2004 James Thorp

“Best Paper”

Jim Thorp, his student Jie Chen, and Tim Mount from AEM won the award for best paper in The Complex Systems Track at HICSS in January. (Hawaii International Conference in System Science). This was the not a best student paper award, it was the best paper award.
February 5, 2004

“Best Student Paper Award for 2003”

Kevin Kornegay's research group received a Best Student Paper Award for 2003 from the Device Research Conference. The paper, "A Fin-Type Independent-Double-Gate NFET," by David M. Fried, Edward J. Nowak, Jakub Kedzierski, Jon S. Duster, and Kevin T. Kornegay, was selected by the Technical Program Committee as one of the two Best Student Papers for 2003. David Fried, a PhD student in Kevin's group, is the recipient. The formal award will be presented at the 2004 Device Research Conference at Notre Dame, Indiana June 2004.
February 5, 2004 David Hammer

“2004 Plasma Science and Applications Award”

Dave is being recognized by the Society "for fundamental contributions to the understanding of intense relativistic electron beam propagation, intense ion beam generation and propagation, innovative plasma diagnostic development for intense beam devices, x-ray source development using novel plasma pinches, and for his commitment to the mentoring of graduate students in the field of plasma science." This prestigious award is presented annually to an individual who has demonstrated "outstanding contributions to the field of plasma science." It is awarded by the IEEE Nuclear and Plasma Sciences Society. In recognition of this award, Professor Hammer will present a plenary address at the 2004 IEEE International Conference on Plasma Science in Baltimore June 2004.
February 5, 2004 Alyssa Apsel

“2004 Lockheed Martin University Research Grants Pr”

Her project is "Resonant Monolithic Photodetectors and On-Chip Waveguides for Integrated Optoelectronics." [read more]
December 18, 2003 Paul Kintner

“American Physical Society Fellow”

Prof. Paul Kintner, ECE, has been elected a fellow of the American Physical Society. He was recognized for his "investigation of microstructure, wave-particle interactions, and plasma acceleration in space plasmas using sounding rocket and satellite experiments and for innovative applications of GPS technology to space plasmas experiments."
December 18, 2003 Thomas Parks

“IEEE Jack S. Kilby Signal Processing Medal”

ECE Prof. Tom Parks has been named as a co-recipient of the 2004 IEEE Jack Kilby Signal Processing Medal, along with James McClellan, "for fundamental contributions to digital filter design and interpolation, especially for Parks-McClellan algorithm." The IEEE Jack S. Kilby Signal Processing Medal was established by the Board of Directors in 1995 and may be presented "for outstanding achievements in signal processing." The medal is named in honor of Jack S. Kilby. His innovation was a monumental precursor to the development of the signal processor and digital signal processing. The award consists of a gold medal, bronze replica, certificate, and a cash honorarium. [read more]
December 16, 2003 Zygmunt Haas

“IEEE Expert Lecturer”

Zygmunt J. Haas was reselected as "IEEE Expert Lecturer" for the IEEE Communications Society, 2002-03 and 2003-04.
December 16, 2003 Zygmunt Haas

“Highly Commended Paper Award”

Zygmunt J. Haas received the "Highly Commended Paper" Award "Performance Evaluation of the Modified IEEE 802.11 MAC for Multi-Channel Multi-Hop Ad Hoc Network", IEEE International Conference on Advanced Information Networking and Applications (AINA 2003), Xidian University, Xian, China, March 27-29, 2003.
December 16, 2003 David Hammer

“Vice-Chair of the Division of Plasma Physics of th”

Dave Hammer has been elected the Vice-Chair of the Division of Plasma Physics of the American Physical Society (APS/DPP). He has responsibility for the program of the annual meeting of the APS/DPP in November 2003. From November 2003 - November 2004, he will Chair the Division.
December 16, 2003 Lester Eastman

“Distinguished Educator Award”

Lester Eastman received the Distinguished Educator Award, 2003, for IEEE Microwave Theory and Technique Society.
December 16, 2003

“Chicago Museum of Science and Industry Information”

The Chicago Museum of Science and Industry has invited Kevin Kornegay to be included in an exhibit that showcases contributions made by African Americans to the field of Information Technology. This exhibit is the centerpiece of the annual Black Creativity Program, and will be on exhibit from January 15 through March 1, 2003. The exhibit will feature a biography as well as information about Kevin's research on broadband communications systems and the BRAIN team. It will also include the vehicle used in this year's Autonomous Underwater Vehicle Competition.
December 16, 2003

“IBM Faculty Award”

Kevin Kornegay received a 2003-04 IBM Faculty Award, which is a highly competitive and recognizes the quality of his research program and its importance to IBM. The award was presented by the IBM Austin Center for Advanced Studies.
December 16, 2003 Michael Kelley

“Fulbright Grant”

Mike Kelley has been awarded a Fulbright grant for Greece during the 2002-2003 academic year. He is one of about 800 U.S. faculty and professionals who will travel abroad to some 140 countries in the next academic year under the Fulbright Scholar Program. Established in 1946, the program's purpose is to build mutual understanding between the people of the U.S. and other countries. Recipients of the Fulbright awards are selected on the basis of academic or professional achievement and because they have demonstrated extraordinary leadership potential in their fields.
December 16, 2003 Stephen Wicker

“NSF Award”

National Science Foundation has awarded a $2.5 million Information Technology Research Grant to Cornell University for the development of "Self-Configuring Sensor Networks for Disaster Prevention, Mitigation, and Recovery." The project team, led by Professor Steve Wicker, School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, includes molecular biologists, device physicists, telecommunications engineers, information theorists, game theorists, and civil engineers. The focus of the research effort will be the development of self-configuring wireless sensor networks that can quickly and reliably determine the location of survivors and the presence of toxic chemicals, biohazards, extreme heat, and radiation at disaster sites. The goal is to more quickly rescue survivors while protecting the lives of rescue personnel against unseen dangers. The project will be conducted in collaboration with Wadsworth Laboratories at the New York Department of Health.
December 16, 2003

“2003 NSF Career Award”

Sergio Servetto received a 2003 NSF Career Award for Fundamental Performance Limits of Large-Scale Wireless Sensor Networks.
December 16, 2003 Zygmunt Haas

“"Michael Tien'72 Award," Cornell College of Engine”

Zygmunt J. Haas was recieved this award for 2002-2003, November 2003.
December 15, 2003 Charles Seyler

“Outstanding Teacher”

Recognition for great work in the classroom. It is based on exemplary performance, and reflects positively on both the professor and the school.
December 15, 2003 C. Johnson Jr.

“Outstanding Teacher”

Recognition for great work in the classroom. It is based on exemplary performance, and reflects positively on both the professor and the school.
December 15, 2003 Terrence Fine

“Outstanding Teacher”

Recognition for great work in the classroom. It is based on exemplary performance, and reflects positively on both the professor and the school.

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