Panos J. Antsaklis has been appointed H.C. and E.A. Brosey Professor of Electrical Engineering, and Wolfgang Porod has been appointed the Frank M. Freimann Professor of Electrical Engineering.
A faculty member since 1980, Antsaklis also is director of the Center for Applied Mathematics. His research interests are in the areas of control and automation, with emphasis on hybrid and discrete event dynamical systems; autonomous, intelligent and learning control systems; and reconfigurable control and failure diagnosis.
With more than 240 technical publications to his credit, Antsaklis also has authored the graduate textbook "Linear Systems," a research monograph on Petri nets, and has edited four books on hybrid systems and intelligent control. He is the recipient of several professional honors, has received a Fulbright Award, and has been an Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) fellow since 1991. He also was a recipient of Notre Dame's John Kaneb A ward for Excellence in Teaching and Curriculum Development.
Antsaklis earned master's and doctoral degrees from Brown University.
A faculty member since 1986, Porod also is director of the Center for Nano Science and Technology.
He is the co-inventor of the Quantum-dot Cellular Automata (QCA), a transistorless approach to computing. His research focuses on solid state physics and its application to electronics device reliability, degradation and breakdown quantum devices and architectures for nanoelectronics and the limits imposed by the laws of physics on computation. Porod is a fellow of IEEE and has authored 270 publications and presentations. He serves on the advisory and program committees of several international meetings and is a reviewer of proposals to the National Science Foundation, NASA and several technical journals. Porod also is a founding member of the IEEE Circuits and Systems Society Technical Committee on Nanoelectronics and Gigascale Systems. He has received numerous awards, most recently the Ruth and Joel Spira Teaching A ward from the College of Engineering. Porod earned master's and doctoral degrees in theoretical physics from the Universitiit Graz (Austria).Dr. Liu's citation reads: For his fundamental contribution in Nonlinear Circuit Theory, Analog Fault Diagnosis, and Blind Signal Processing, and for his unceasing leadership in enhancing and sustaining the technical vibrancy of the Circuits and Systems Society.
Another member of the faculty, Dr. Anthony N. Michel, Frank Freimann Professor of Electrical Engineering, also received this award in 1995.
Of the 22 faculty members in the Department of Electrical Engineering at University of Notre Dame, 8 are Fellows of the IEEE and one of them is also a Fellow of the American Physical Society. Five have served as Presidents of IEEE Technical Societies (Information Theory Society, Control Systems Society, and Circuits and Systems Society), seven have served as Vice Presidents of those societies.
James L. Merz receives the Alexander von Humboldt Research Award
James L. Merz, Frank M. Freimann Professor of Electrical Engineering at the University of Notre Dame, has been selected to receive the Alexander
von Humboldt Research Award for senior U.S. scientists.
The award invites distinguished researchers to collaborate with German colleagues in universities and laboratories throughout the Federal Republic of Germany. Merz will spend six
months next spring at the Paul Drude Institute for Solid State Electronics in Berlin.
Each year, the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation grants up to 150 of these prestigious research awards worldwide
to foreign scholars who have gained international acclaim. The awards are conferred in recognition of lifetime
achievements in science and engineering. Awardees are invited, in cooperation with their specialist
colleagues in Germany, to carry out research projects of their own choice for a period ranging
from about six months to a year.
Merz is the fourth member of Notre Dame's Electrical Engineering Department to receive a
Humboldt award, joining Anthony N. Michel, Ruey-wen Liu and Daniel J. Costello.
Merz will work with Klaus H. Ploog in the Drude Institute investigation wide bandgap semiconductor
materials based on the compound gallium nitride. These materials are expected to play a major
role in the development of short wavelength optoelectronic devices.
Although semiconductor lasers with high output brightness have been fabricated, the material
science of this system remains poorly understood. Merz will participate in the ongoing investigations
of the Drude Institute's laboratory to determine the properties of non radioactive defects, the
occurrence of nonuniform growth and/or spontaneous ordering in the ternary compounds, and the possibility
of producing self-assembled quantum dots in this system.
Spectroscopic techniques having high spatial resolution, such as microphotoluminescence and near-field
scanning optical microscopy, will be employed in both Notre Dame and Drude Institute laboratories.
Merz and Ploog also will collaborate with Marc llegems of the Department of Physics at the Ecole
Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne, Switzerland, where Merz will spend the fall semester of 2002.
Merz has been a national and international leader in investigations of II-VI and other II-V
compound semiconductor systems. He was awarded an honorary doctorate from Sweden's Linkoping
University in 1993, and received the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE)
Third Millennium Medal in 2000.
Merz is a fellow of the American Physical Society and IEEE. In 1989, he was selected by the U.S.
National Academy of Science and the Chinese Academia Sineca to serve as distinguished research lecturer
in China.
A former vice president for graduate studies at Notre Dame, Merz was appointed Frank M. Freimann
Professor of Electrical Engineering at the University in 1994.
Alexander von Humboldt was a nature researcher, explorer, scientist and patron of young scholars
and talents. One-and-a-half years after his death, the foundation named after him was established
in Berlin in 1860. Its aim was to sponsor research travel abroad by German scholars.
After the loss of the foundation's capital during a depression in 1923, it was reestablished in
1925 with the aim of assisting non-German scholars in undertaking postgraduate studies in Germany.
After the collapse of the German Reich in 1945, the foundation ceased its activities.
At the suggestion of former Humboldt guest lecturers, the foundation was reestablished in 1953.
More than 20,000 scholars from 125 countries have been sponsored to date.
EE Alumnus, Larry Augustin, will deliver the inaugural address in the Distinguished Engineering Lecture Series on Friday October 6, 2000
Larry Augustin, president, chief executive officer and director of VA Linux Systems and one of the world's leading figures in the high-tech industry, will deliver a public lecture at 12:50 p.m. on Friday in the DeBartolo Hall auditorium, Rm. 101. The talk is titled "The Future of Software Development and the Internet." It is the inaugural address in the Distinguished Engineering Lecture Series. Augustin is a 1984 graduate of Notre Dame with a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering. He worked on high speed digital switching for three years at AT&T Bell Laboratories before going on to earn master's and doctoral degrees in electrical engineering from Stanford University.
William C. Hurd delivered the eight annual Emil T. Hofman Lecture, "A Bird's Eye View of Opthalmology: From Memphis to Madagascar," on Saturday September 16, at 9a.m.
On Saturday, September 16 at 9 a.m. in room 101 DeBartolo, William C. Hurd gave a talk on advances in eye surgery and his missionary excursions to Africa, South America, and China.
Five Faculty Members Receive Third Millennium Medals from IEEE
Five faculty members, Drs. Panos Antsaklis, Daniel J. Costello, Ruey-wen Liu, James L. Merz and Anthony N. Michel, received the Third Millennium Medals from the IEEE. This medal honors distinguished IEEE members for their outstanding contributions in their respective areas of activity. The IEEE is the world's largest professional society for electrical and computer professionals with more than 330,000 members in over 160 countries.
Nanoelectronics Research Group Receives $1M from W.M. Keck Foundation
Electrical Engineering department's Nanoelectronics Research Group, teaming up with faculty members in Physics and Chemistry Departments, received $1M from W.M. Keck Foundation to conduct research in quantum-dot cellular automata.
Four Electrical Engineering faculty members received the IEEE Circuits and Systems Society's Golden Jubilee Medals
Dr. Michael K. Sain, Dr. Anthony N. Michel, Dr. Ruey-wen Liu, and Dr. Yih-Fang Huang are the four Electrical Engineering faculty members to receive the IEEE Circuits and Systems Society's Golden Jubilee Medals. The IEEE-CASS Golden Jubilee Medal is given to IEEE-CASS members (less than 1%) to express its appreciation for their exceptional contributions toward advancing in various forms the Society's goals during the first fifty years of its existence.
Dr. Yih-Fang Huang Named Distinguished Lecturer for IEEE Circuits and Systems Society
Dr. Yih-Fang Huang, Professor and Chair of Electrical Engineering, was named Distinguished Lecturer for the IEEE Circuits and Systems Society effective January 1, 2000. The topics of Professor Huang's lectures will be focused on Adaptive Signal Processing with applications to Communication Systems.
Dr. Daniel J. Costello, Jr., is the third EE faculty member to receive the Alexander von Humboldt Forschungspreis, a prestigious research award given to senior US scientists
Dr. Daniel J. Costello received the 1999 prestigious Alexander von Humboldt Forschungspreis research award given to distinguished senior US scientists. Within the last two years three members of the EE faculty, Dr. Anthony Michel, Dr. Ruey-wen Liu, and Dr. Daniel J. Costello, have all won this award.
Electrical Engineering Department Hosted the Graduation Ceremony for the class of 2000
The Department of Electrical Engineering hosted the commencement ceremony and reception for all EE Bachelor of Science graduates on Sunday, May 16, 2000.
Andrew Viterbi gives Thomas Edison Lecture entitled "The Evolution of Wireless Technologies and Markets in the 21st Century," organized by the Electrical Engineering Department
Andrew Viterbi, Vice Chairman of Qualcomm Inc., will be the Thomas Edison Lecturer on Thursday, April 15th, at Notre Dame (Time: 3:00 pm, Place: 141 Debartolo Hall). The Thomas Edison Distinguished Lecture Series is funded by the Edison Foundation given to the College of Engineering at the University of Notre Dame in April of 1990.
Andrew Viterbi is a member of the National Academy of Engineering, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, and a Fellow of the IEEE. He is a leader in wireless communications. He will also give a graduate seminar in the Department of Electrical Engineering, entitled "New Results on Serial Concatenated and Accumulated-Convolutional Turbo Code Performance."
Karl Martersteck of San Jose, CA, the first recipient of the IEEE Medal for Engineering Excellence (1988) gives his medal to Notre Dame's Electrical Engineering Department
Mr. Martersteck received a Bachelor of Science degree in Physics from the University of Notre Dame in 1956, and a Master of Science degree in Electrical Engineering from New York University in 1961. He is currently a telecommunications consultant, after retiring in January as President and Chief Executive Officer of ArrayComm, Inc., of San Jose, CA. Prior to his position at ArrayComm, Inc., he held the position of Vice President at AT&T Bell Laboratories from 1989-1995. Mr. Martersteck is a member of the National Academy of Engineering and a Fellow of the IEEE.
The NanoDevice Team Received The DARPA ULTRA Program Award
The NanoDevices team (Snider, Bernstein, Lent, Merz, Porod) received
the "Excellent Performance Award" at the recent program review meeting
of the DARPA ULTRA program. This award, given jointly with the Univ. College
London team, is for work on "quantum-dot cellular automata," a revolutionary
approach to transitor-less computing.
The university of Notre Dame took to the air on April 19 1899, and completed
the first wireless telegraph transmission in North America. Professor
Jerome Green conducted this transmission after reading about Marconi's
work in Europe.
Transistor-Less computing. Quantum dot cellular
automata (QCA) might make possible a new type of transistor-less computing.
A quantum dot is essentially a zero-dimensional artificial atom, isolated
on (or in) a semiconductor substrate. Using a pair of electrons within
a cell of four closely spaced dots-the electrons can tunnel from dot to
dot - creates a binary bit: the configuration of the electrons establishes
either a 1 or a 0. Put many of these cells together and you have
a programmable cellular automata network. Wolfgang
Porod at Notre-Dame reported on the modeling and operation of the manipulation
of a single electron by another nearby single electron.
Progress in civil engineering today means making not just better buildings,
but smarter ones. Hanagan's device is an example of what is called
an active control system because it adds energy to the system. Some
civil engineers worry that, if not exactly calibrated, such devices could
actually contribute to destabilization. That's why B.F. Spencer Jr.
of the University of Notre-Dame in Indiana is experimenting with semi-active
control systems. However, mechanical values are vulnerable to weather
and wear. So Spencer, along with Michel
K. Sain, an electrical engineer at Notre Dame, is working with a new
magnetorheological (MR) fluid. At the presence of magnetic field, all the
iron particles begin to line up and get organized. That makes the
fluid increasingly stiff. Spencer and Sain say that in order
to make buildings earthquake-resistant , it is possible to use special
pistons, filled with magnetorhelogical fluid and controlled by a computer.
This fluid has other potential benefits. The fluid is already being
used in some truck sits to make the ride smoother for drivers.
Prestigious award given by the Vice President's National Program for
Reinventing Government. As a member of the Federated Laboratory Team,
as one of the individuals who conceived of and created the Federated Laboratory
Concept, Professor Iafrate
received the Hammer Award presented by Vice President Gore.
Oliver M. Collins, associate professor of electrical engineering at the University of Notre Dame, is the recipient of the 1998 Judith A. Resnik Award presented by the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE).
Collins's work was instrumental in allowing the Galileo probe of Jupiter to transmit information without needed telecommunications upgrades, and his concepts helped the Jet Propulsion Laboratory complete a decoding machine in 1990.
A member of the Notre Dame faculty since 1995, Collins specializes in deep space communications, satellite communications, and coding theory.
Collins attended the California Institute of Technology, where he earned his bachelor's degree in engineering and applied science in 1986 and master's and doctoral degrees in electrical engineering in 1987 and 1989, respectively. In 1994 he was awarded the IEEE Thompson Prize and the Marconi Young Scientist Award by the Marconi Foundation.
The Judith A. Resnik Award was established by the IEEE Board of Directors
in 1986 in honor of the late Challenger astronaut and is presented to an
individual for outstanding contributions to space engineering within the
disciplines of IEEE, the largest and most prestigious society in the world
of electrical engineers. The award is the highest international honor from
IEEE, and consists of a bronze medal, a certificate and $3,000.
The first experimental demonstration of a transistorless approach to computing, called quantum-dot cellular automata (QCA), is reported by University of Notre Dame researchers in the Aug. 15 issue of Science.
In this experiment, a single electron was used for the first time to control the position of another electron, in an effort to bring information storage down to the molecular level, said Gregory L. Snider, assistant professor of electrical engineering, who headed the research team.
Conventional microelectronic technology has relied on shrinking transistors to produce increasingly smaller, faster and more powerful computers. But, because the laws of physics prevent conventional devices from working below a certain size, that method is nearing its physical limits.
QCA leapfrogs that barrier with an entity known as the "quantum dot," a tiny structure in which an electron can be confined. These quantum dots can be created and arranged into cells through microelectronic techniques, and in turn these cells can be lined up end to end to form "binary wires" or arrayed to form switches and various computer logic devices.
If successful, a 4-square-cm QCA chip could contain as many as 1 trillion devices, as opposed to the 6 million devices in the most advanced conventional chip. And since it does not rely on flowing electrons to transmit a signal, no electric current is produced and heat problems are avoided.
In this first demonstration of a basic cell, the device studied was made of four metal dots, connected with tunnel junctions and capacitors and operated at a temperature less than 50 mK, which at -459.6 degrees Fahrenheit is very near absolute zero
"Our particular challenge is that our device requires such painfully cold temperatures," Snider said. "We now need to scale our device down to a size that can operate at room temperature."
According to Snider, while the achievement is very exciting, it may take another 20 years of research before computers and other electronic equipment can incorporate QCA.
Other members of the research team include Gary H. Bernstein, professor of electrical engineering; Craig S. Lent, professor of electrical engineering; Wolfgang Porod, professor of electrical engineering; and James L. Merz, Friemann professor of engineering and vice president of graduate studies and research.
This research is funded by Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)/Office of Naval Research (ONR).
For more information, contact Snider in his office at (574) 631-4148; Bernstein, 631-6269; Lent, 631-6992; Porod, 631-6376; and Merz, 631-6291.
A web page containing more information about Quantum-dot Cellular Automata
is located at http://www.nd.edu/~qcahome/
University of Notre Dame
Department of Electrical Engineering
275 Fitzpatrick Hall
Notre Dame, Indiana 46556
Phone: (574) 631-5480
Fax: (574)-631-4393
Web address: http://www.nd.edu/~ee