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2011 - Arogyaswami J. Paulraj
Arogyaswami J. Paulraj’s development of multiple input-multiple output (MIMO) antenna technology for wireless communications has revolutionized both local area and mobile broadband communications, enabling high-speed access to multimedia services. Employing multiple antennas at both the transmit and the receive stations, the success of MIMO is its ability to provide both higher data rates and wider coverage areas. Dr. Paulraj first developed the idea of MIMO in 1992 while at Stanford University. Using the spatial multiplexing concept that exploits MIMO antennas, he demonstrated that spectral efficiency could be improved by transmitting independent data streams from each transmit antenna and then exploiting the distinct spatial signatures of each stream at the receive antennas to separate them. He was issued a patent for the MIMO concept in 1994, but he faced skepticism from industry and funding sources. However, he persisted and held annual workshops at Stanford on the technology that eventually helped interest in MIMO take hold in the late 1990s. Dr. Paulraj founded Iospan Wireless Inc. in 1998 as the first company to incorporate MIMO technology in a commercial system. The lessons learned at Iospan gave the wireless industry confidence to incorporate MIMO into emerging wireless standards. Iospan’s technology underpins today’s 4G wireless systems. Intel Corp. acquired part of Iospan in 2003 to help launch its own push into wireless broadband, further establishing the importance of Dr. Paulraj’s MIMO concept.
An IEEE Fellow, Dr. Paulraj is a Professor Emeritus at Stanford University, Calif. and a senior advisor to Broadcom Corp., Irvine, Calif.
2010 - John M. Cioffi
Dr. Cioffi began his mission of creating DSL technology, which uses the copper wires already in telephone lines, during the 1980s at a time when industry thought optical fiber should be the focus. Dr. Cioffi and his students at Stanford University developed discrete multitone modulation (DMT), which enables ADSL technology to operate near the theoretical channel capacity of the telephone line. Dr. Cioffi then founded Amati Communications to commercialize his technology. Behind his leadership at Amati, the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) chose DMT technology as the U.S. standard for DSL in 1993. Now, all worldwide DSL standards are exclusively based on DMT technology.
Dr. Cioffi continues to support DSL development through research at Stanford University and at ASSIA Inc., a company he founded in 2003 and in which many major DSL service providers have invested and/or purchased ASSIA products. His focus is on dynamic spectrum management (DSM) to improve performance in multiuser DSL and wireless transmission channels. An IEEE Fellow, Dr. Cioffi is the Hitachi America Professor Emeritus of Electrical Engineering at Stanford University, Calif., and also the chairman and chief executive officer at ASSIA Inc., Redwood City, Calif.
2009 - Robert J. McEliece
Robert J. McEliece is best known for his many seminal contributions to the theory and implementation of algebraic error-correcting codes. His numerous research articles have been invaluable to the understanding of a wide range of problems in information theory and coding. Dr. McEliece was one of the first researchers to study convolutional codes, which became a staple of channel coding for deep-space communications systems, and of notable importance was his work on NASA’s Galileo mission to Jupiter. When the spacecraft’s high-gain antenna failed to deploy, threatening the ability to transmit photos and data from Jupiter, Dr. McEliece was an important member of the team that reprogrammed the on-board convolutional encoder in a way that saved most of the data.
His other achievements include the much-celebrated “McEliece, Rodmich, Rumsey, Welch Bound.” The MRRW Bound is the best known upper bound on the tradeoff between rate and minimum distance of the best binary codes.
He also created the McEliece Theorem, which identifies the largest power of p that divides all the weights in a p-ary cyclic code, and which contains the Ax divisibility theorem as a special case, considered to be one of the deepest mathematical results to come out of coding theory.
Dr. McEliece has contributed to the design of error-correction telecommunication systems for NASA/JPL spacecraft and for mass-market data storage systems (flash memories and disks) for Sony consumer electronics. An IEEE Life Fellow, Dr. McEliece is the Allen E. Puckett Professor and Professor of Electrical Engineering Emeritus at the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, and is also a consultant to the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena.
2008 - Gerard J. Foschini
Gerard J. Foschini, distinguished inventor at Bell Laboratories, Alcatel-Lucent, has made key contributions that have changed wireless communications. Dr. Foschini discovered how, using multiple antennas, wireless signals could be expressed across time and space for maximally efficient spectrum usage. His research has influenced several emerging wireless communications technologies including Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO), IEEE WiFi (802.11n) and WiMAX (802.16e) wireless data communication standards as well impacting discussions on 4G cellular standards worldwide (3GPP and 3GPP2).
A Fellow of Bell Labs where he joined in 1961 and an IEEE Fellow, Dr. Foschini has authored more than 100 published works and holds 14 patents related to communications technology. His work has been one of the most widely cited in technical journals and other publications, earning him the designation of “One of the most highly cited scientists” by the Institute of Scientific Information. He has previously taught at Princeton University, in Princeton, N.J. and is currently on the Graduate Electrical Engineering Faculty of Rutgers University, Piscataway, N.J. He has received numerous awards and honors, including the IEEE Eric E. Sumner Award and the Patent Award from the Research and Development Council of New Jersey. Dr. Foschini holds a bachelor’s from the New Jersey Institute of Technology, a masters from New York University, both in electrical engineering, and a doctorate in mathematics from Stevens Institute of Technology, Hoboken, N.J.
2007 - Norman Abramson
Norman Abramson is a pioneer in the field of wireless and local area networking. While at the University of Hawaii, he led efforts that gave rise to the construction and operation of the ALOHAnet, the first wireless packet network, and to the development of the theory of random access ALOHA channels. ALOHA channels have yielded significant advancements within wireless and local area networking, with versions still in use today in all major mobile telephone and wireless data standards. This influential work also developed the core concepts found today in Ethernet.
Dr. Abramson previously served as chair of the University of Hawaii’s information and computer sciences department and director of the ALOHA System research project. Dr. Abramson is a founder of ALOHA Networks, Inc and of SkyWare, Inc., both wireless communications companies located in San Francisco.
Additionally, Dr. Abramson served as a consulting expert in communication systems, data networks and satellite networks for the International Telecommunication Union (Geneva), the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (Paris) and the United Nations Development Programme (Jakarta).
An IEEE Life Fellow, he holds eight U.S. and international patents, and has published more than 50 technical papers. Dr. Abramson has a bachelor’s degree in physics from Harvard University, a master’s degree in physics from The University of California, Los Angeles, and a doctoral degree in electrical engineering from Stanford University, California. Dr. Abramson has received the IEEE Koji Kobayashi Computers and Communications Award, the Golden Jubilee Award sponsored by the IEEE Information Theory Society and the Eduard Rhein Foundation Technology Award.
2006 - John M. Wozencraft
John M. Wozencraft’s pioneering work on error-correcting codes provided one of the foundations for the design of reliable digital transmission systems over the past 50 years. Coding is an integral part of today’s nearly error-free communications systems, including deep-space communication, the Internet and next-generation mobile telephony.
Based on the notion of random coding, sequential decoding was the first error-correcting algorithm whereby arbitrarily-accurate fixed-data-rate communication could be attained over noisy transmission channels with reasonable computational complexity. This approach paved the way for other algorithms that ultimately revolutionized the communications industry. It was a critical conceptual milestone in the evolution of error-correction coding from abstract mathematics to today’s palette of computationally practical error-correction techniques.
Sequential decoding became the method of choice for the low signal-to-noise ratio environment of deep space communications. It was first chosen for the Pioneer 9 deep space mission and was NASA's standard coding system for deep space for nearly a decade.
An IEEE Life Fellow, Dr. Wozencraft is Professor Emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. He co-authored the book, "Principles of Communication Engineering," which sparked a revolution in how communications engineers think about digital communication. It was widely recognized as the bible of communications theory for more than two decades.
2005 - James K. Omura
As a university professor, corporate leader and consultant, Dr. Jim K. Omura has been responsible for the theoretical underpinning and application of several benchmark technologies for communications systems and data networks.
During his tenure as a professor of electrical engineering at University of California, Los Angeles, he co-authored the textbook "Principles of Digital Communications and Coding" with Andrew Viterbi and designed several communication systems emphasizing spread spectrum communications. He then co-founded Cylink Corporation in Sunnyvale, California, where he and his team developed the first commercial 1024-bit public key encryption chip used to secure large, commercial data networks. His designs for spread spectrum data radios formed the basis for the development of spread spectrum cordless telephones licensed for commercial applications and were precursors to today's widely used WiFi wireless-access radios.
Most recently, Dr. Omura has served as Technology Strategist for the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation in San Francisco and as an advisor to several companies in the wireless communications industry.
An IEEE Fellow, Dr. Omura is former chairman of the San Francisco Section of the IEEE Information Theory Society (ITS), former secretary and a former member of the board of governors of the IEEE ITS. From 1973-75, he was editor of the IEEE Newsletter of the IEEE ITS. He is also a member of the U.S. National Academy of Engineering.
2003 - Joachim Hagenauer
Joachim Hagenauer's open-minded approach to coding has resulted in several innovations with profound implications for communication systems. He pioneered the development of the soft-in/soft-out principle, which prevented the loss of valuable information that came with forcing hard decisions during the decoding process. This principle touched off research around the globe and yielded in the implementation of fast (Gigabit per second) analog VLSI decoders working only with soft bits.
Professor Hagenauer's work paved the way for the development of turbo coding and caused a paradigm shift in the way channel coding is applied to digital communication and storage problems. His contributions also can be seen in such digital receiver design applications as third generation mobile transmission systems, satellite transmission and more.
He published several key papers on the new decoding paradigm, thereby contributing significantly to a better understanding of the emerging coding and decoding systems.
After serving as an assistant professor at Darmstadt University, Professor Hagenauer held a postdoctoral fellowship at the IBM T.J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, N.Y. Since 1977, he has been with the German Aerospace Center DLR in Oberpfaffenhofen, where he became director of the Institute for Communication Technology in 1990. Since 1993, he has chaired the Communciations Technology department at the University of Technology in Munich, Germany.
An IEEE Fellow, Professor Hagenauer has served on the board of the IEEE Information Theory Society as its president in 2001. He has been honored with the Erich Regener and Otto Lilienthal Prizes of the German Aerospace Association, the Armstrong Award of the IEEE Communications Society, and a Best Teacher Award from the Students Union of the Munich
University of Technology. He was recently elected to the Bavarian Academy of Science.
2002 - Tsuneo Nakahara
Since joining Sumitomo Electric Industries, Ltd., in 1953, Dr. Tsuneo Nakahara has been a major force in the conception, design and manufacturing of optical fiber and cables. Under his guidance, the company developed the vapor phase axial deposition optical fiber manufacturing technology, which has become the standard in Japan and is one of the top three fiber manufacturing processes worldwide. His team also designed extremely low-loss optical fiber with pure silica as the core and fluorine in the clad. This technology was widely used for undersea long distance cables. He has also been a leader of important research into multi-count optical fiber, leaky coaxial cable, milliwave and beam waveguide, and more.
An IEEE Life Fellow, he has served in many capacities, including Region 10 director, secretary of the Board of Directors and Foundation Board director. Outside the IEEE, he also serves as vice president of the Engineering Academy of Japan, foreign associate of the U.S. National Academy of Engineering and president of Japan’s New Technology Association. Executive advisor to the CEO of Sumitomo Electric Industries, Ltd., Dr. Nakahara holds nearly 300 patents in the United States and Japan combined, and has published over 100 papers. He has received numerous awards, including an IEEE Millennium Medal, the Okabe Memorial Award from the Institute of Electronics and Communications Engineers of Japan, and the Blue Ribbon Medal from the Emperor of Japan.
