MESSAGE FROM THE CHAIR
began my term as department chair about eighteen
months ago. It has been an exciting time for me and for the department.
This newsletter highlights some of the changes and accomplishments of
faculty, staff, and students during this period.
The department continued to hire aggressively in strategic
areas. Assistant Professor Azadeh
Davoodi joined us in July 2006. Her research is in the area of electronic
design automation for deep sub-micron Very Large Scale Integration (VLSI)
design.
Associate Professor Bernard Lesieutre
will be joining the department in March 2007. He brings forth an unique
combination of expertise in the areas of power distribution and energy
policy. He comes to us from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Prior
to that, he was a faculty member at Massachusetts Institute of Technology
(MIT) and Cornell University. Professor Lesieutre will be one of the
participating faculty members in the new Energy Institute. This institute
was created to bring together over 50 faculty in disciplines ranging
from chemistry, physics and engineering to geology, life sciences, environmental
studies, public policy, business and law. Its goal is to leverage existing
education and research programs in campus to better understand and address
key global energy issues.
Assistant Professor Stark Draper
will be joining the department in Fall 2007. He is spending a year at
the Mitsubishi Electric Research Institute (MERL) after completing a
post-doctoral appointment at University of California, Berkeley. His
expertise is in the areas of wireless and sensor networks.
Research productivity continues to be exceptionally
high. In 2005-2006, the faculty, staff researchers, and students co-authored
over 200 journal and 225 conference publications. In keeping with recent
tradition, the details of these scholarly achievements are available
online in our annual report at www.engr.wisc.edu/ece.
I strongly encourage you to visit the website and see the accomplishments.
The faculty and scientists were also very successful in the highly competitive
arena of federally supported research. The total research expenditures
including federal, industrial, and gifts exceeded $16.5 million in 2005-2006.
ECE faculty members also continue to receive prestigious
honors and awards. Professors
Ian Dobson and Ian
Hiskens became IEEE Fellows in 2006, both for their work in the
power engineering area. Professor Dobson was cited for contributions
to understanding and analysis of voltage collapse and Professor Hiskens
was cited for contributions to modeling and analysis of power systems.
Assistant Professor
Irena Knezevic received the prestigious CAREER award from National
Science Foundation for her work in quantum transport in ultrafast nanoscale
devices.
Assistant Professor
Hongrui Jiang’s work on smart liquid microlens was featured
on the cover of August 2006 issue of the journal Nature.
Professor Barry
Van Veen and his students and Profesor Thomas
Jahns and his students received best paper awards in their respective
areas.
At the campus level, Professors Robert
Blick, Franco
Cerrina, and Robert
Nowak were honored with endowed professorships. Professor Blick
and Cerrina were both appointed as Lynn H. Mathias Professors in Engineering
while Professsor Nowak was appointed was McFarland-Bascom Professor
in Engineering.
The department has undertaken a major initiative
this year to reconnect with its alumni. With generous support from several
companies, we are holding alumni receptions in different cities. We
held receptions in Chicago, San Diego, Santa Clara, Boston, Milwaukee,
and Madison. The receptions were enthusiastically received by our alumni.
We plan to continue and expand this initiative in the coming years.
A record number of companies came to the College of
Engineering’s Career Fair in September 2006. We see rapidly growing
interest and need for ECE’s research and educational expertise,
opening many exciting new avenues for scholarship and service. My colleagues
and I share great enthusiasm for the future and are looking forward
to making even more contributions to our state, nation, and the world.
Parameswaran
Ramanathan , Chair
2416 Engineering Hall
1415 Engineering Dr.
Madison, WI 53706
Tel: 608/263-0557
Fax: 608/262-1267
E-mail:
ecechair@engr.wisc.edu
