SENSING THE FUTURE $100M TRANSFORMATIVE INITIATIVE ECE MAKES A GLOBAL IMPACT BUILDING CRITICAL SPACES POWERFUL VIDEO PROCESSING UNDERSTANDING THE SPACE ABOVE 10 ANSWERS RESONANCETHE MAGAZINE OF ECE ILLINOIS FALL 2013 JUST A DROP. HOW ECE IS HELPING TO DRIVE BIO APPLICATIONS TOP OF MIND RESONANCE Fall 2013 EDITORIAL BOARD William H. Sanders Interim Department Head W. Brad Petersen Director of Communications and Editor Later in this magazine you’ll read about the $100 million commitment the Jeanette Beck College of Engineering at Illinois received early this year to launch the Assistant to the Department Head Grainger Engineering Breakthroughs Initiative. The incredible generosity of The Grainger Foundation of Lake Forest, Illinois, will help departments Jennifer Carlson across the college—including ECE—through support of new professorships, Academic Programs Coordinator student scholarships, and investment in our facilities. Breanne Ertmer At a time when support from the State of Illinois is at an all-time low, private Corporate Relations Coordinator support is extremely important to ensure we can continue to fulfill our land- Steve Franke grant mission. Student scholarships are one area of strong need. In 1990, Associate Head for Graduate Affairs the state provided $3.36 in funding per student tuition dollar. As of 2012, that number is down to 62 cents. Jamie Hutchinson Publications Office Editor Early next year the College of Engineering will announce a massive scholar- ship fundraising initiative designed to ensure that great students still have Sarah Heier access to a great education at Illinois. Through this initiative we’ll ensure Alumni and Student Relations Coordinator that students of all backgrounds will have a chance to get an ECE ILLINOIS education. Erhan Kudeki Associate Head for Undergraduate Affairs One example of the power of alumni and industry support is the new ECE Martin O’Donnell building currently under construction on the engineering campus. By next Assistant Director of Advancement fall, ECE will be moved into this state-of-the-art facility built around the needs of our students. Though fundraising is ongoing, when the building is complete exactly half of the $95 million project cost will have been supplied Winter Agency by alumni, industry, and other private donors. This building will impact our Design students and faculty in profound ways. The funding landscape continues to change for colleges and universities, and Illinois is no exception. Gifts of all sizes will play an instrumental role in helping ECE maintain and grow its academic and research programs in the years ahead. ECE.ILLINOIS.EDU Resonance is published twice a year by the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) at the University of Illinois at Urbana- Champaign. Comments and suggestions William H. Sanders are welcome. Contact the editor at the Interim Department Head address below. Donald Biggar Willett Professor of Engineering Electrical and Computer Engineering University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign 53 Everitt Laboratory, MC-702 1406 W. Green Street SHARE YOUR OPINION AT ECE.ILLINOIS.EDU/LINKEDIN Urbana, IL 61801 [email protected] RESONANCE CONTENTS FEATURES Just a Drop 8 Helping to drive bio applications $100M Commitment 13 Grainger Engineering Breakthroughs Initiative established Vietnam Education 16 ECE curriculum crosses borders New Spaces 16 21 Generous gifts ensure great spaces in new building Tackling Digital Imagery 26 ADSC puts Illinois experts in Singapore Research : SONIC 28 New center solving “small” problem The Ionosphere 30 Researchers rocket into ionosphere DEPARTMENTS 2 Top of Mind: William H. Sanders 4 Across the Spectrum 18 Focal Point: Solar Array 24 Field Report: Mark Andersen 32 The List: PhD Graduates 34 Ten Answers: Elaine Chapin 35 Around Campus “I think that is a thing that Illinois should be very proud of. We make a global impact...” Minh N. Do Speaking about the Vietnam Education Foundation, page 16 FALL 2013 3 ACROSS THE SPECTRUM CARE CARE OPEN TO STUDENTS On March 26, a new student service was officially launched by the College of Engi- neering: the Center for Academic Resourc- es in Engineering (CARE). Located on the fourth floor in the Grainger Engineering Library, CARE offers resources and exper- tise that support students in achieving their academic and professional goals: free walk-in tutoring, workshops, peer advis- ing, and review sessions for core classes (including ECE 110). CONGRESSIONAL VISITS DAY This facility provides ample space for col- In mid-March, four ECE students attended laborative and independent study, includ- the annual Science, Engineering, and ing group study rooms, dual-monitor com- Technology Congressional Visits Day. The puter workstations, and over one hundred two-day event brought academic and in- study carrels. Caterpillar, Inc. provided dustry leaders to Washington, DC, where CARE with furniture and equipment. they met with members of Congress and their representatives. For the students, this was an opportunity to discuss the im- PURELY RESEARCH portance of funding engineering research Promoting Undergraduate Research in En- and education. gineering (PURE) pairs undergraduates with graduate student mentors for a se- ECE graduate student Gloria See, who orga- mester-long research collaboration. Estab- nized the student coalition, met with Illi- lished as an ECE program in Fall 2007, PURE nois representatives, as did undergraduate has since expanded to computer science, Anthony Shvets. Undergraduates Alex Hsu and Rockwell Collins has joined as a corpo- and James Su met with representatives of rate sponsor, providing the student teams California and Maryland, respectively. with funding for the past two school years. BRONZE TABLET Fifteen ECE students were named on the 2013 Bronze Tablet, the university’s high- est honor for graduating students: Muneeb SEE MORE NEWS AT: Ahmed, Pourya Assem, Jerry Chang, Yu- jie Chen, Xiong Kai Benjamin Chng, Neil ECE.ILLINOIS.EDU Christanto, Miguel Luigi De Dios, David Goldstein, Jeff Lale, Shiyang Liu, Matt Tischer, Eric Wei, Jeff Wheeler, Zhixing Xu, and Jerry Zhou. UNIVERSITY HONORS RESONANCE NEWS + EVENTS RECORD NUMBERS A record number of ECE students were offered Graduate Research Fellow- ships from the National Science Foundation this year. Three are current graduate students: Nicole Bohannon, Choden Königsmark, and Josiah Mc- Clurg. The others—Genevieve LaBelle, Maryann Tung, and Eric Wei—com- pleted their undergraduate degrees last spring. CAREER AWARD ECE Assistant Professor Maxim Raginsky recently received a CAREER Award from the ALUMNI HONORS National Science Foundation (NSF). This In a ceremony held at the US Patent and five-year grant will be used to develop an Trademark Office in May, three ECE alumni information-theoretic approach to machine joined the legendary echelon of innovators learning problems, particularly those that inducted into the National Inventors Hall involve multiple resource-constrained learn- of Fame: Donald Bitzer (BSEE ’55, MSEE ’56, ing agents in a large network. These awards PhD ’60), Gene Slottow (PhD ’64), and Rob- are given specifically to junior faculty mem- ert Willson (PhD ’66). They were recognized bers who demonstrate excellence in research for the plasma display, which they invented and teaching. in the mid-1960s while Bitzer and Slottow were Illinois faculty and Willson a graduate student. UNIQUE EQUIPMENT ECE ILLINOIS recently became the only engi- Plasma displays are forerunners of the high- neering program in the country to possess a definition, flat-panel television screens non-linear vector network analyzer (NLVNA). ubiquitous today and are well known for their This state-of-the-art technology—capable excellent contrast ratio, wide viewing angle, of generating behavioral models of nonlin- and rapid response time. ear devices—was first introduced by Agilent Technologies in 2008. ILLINOIS MARATHON The acquisition was made possible through A large number of ECE faculty and students the support of ECE alumni at Agilent, along participated in the fifth annual Christie with funding from Illinois administration, Clinic Illinois Marathon. The course winds Engineering at Illinois, the ECE Department, throughout Champaign and Urbana, and and the Ralph E. and Winifred T. Kuehn En- passes Everitt Lab early in the race. This year, dowment Fund. over 20,000 athletes entered the races. ECE grad students (left to right) ECE grad students (left to right) Dan Fisher, Tim Duly, and Tom Gehrels Surrounding ECE Professor Naresh Shanbhag: with ECE Associate Professor Jonathan Makela Yingyan Lin, Sai Zhang, Tianqi Gao, and Min-sun Keel. FALL 2013 5 ACROSS THE SPECTRUM CHARTER FELLOW Nick Holonyak Jr. was chosen as a charter fel- ›PROFESSORS low of the National Academy of Inventors. The inaugural class of fellows comprises 101 scien- ›BRESLER›CHEW›CHOQUETTE tists and innovators from academic and non- profit research institutions around the world, who collectively hold more than 3,200 patents ›DALLESASSE›DO›FENG›LIBERZON with the US Patent and Trademark Office. Holonyak, who famously invented the first ›LOUI›LYDING›MILENKOVIC›MITRA visible-spectrum light-emitting diode (or LED), was honored for his many innovations, which resulted in 49 US patents. ›OVERBYE›PILAWA-PODGURSKI ›SINGER VASUDEVAN›VISWANATH NEW FACULTY FACULTY APPOINTMENTS ECE Assistant Professor Yihong Wu joined the ECE Professor Andreas C. Cangellaris, who department this spring, following a postdoc- had served as department head