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Three UCLA Electrical
Engineering Faculty
Elected to National Academy of Engineering
By David Brown
Three faculty members from the UCLA Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science have been elected to the prestigious National Academy of Engineering - one of the highest professional distinctions accorded engineers. All three new members are from the school's electrical engineering department.
They are Tatsuo Itoh, for advances in electromagnetic engineering for microwave and wireless components, circuits and systems; Henry Samueli, for pioneering contributions to academic research and technology entrepreneurship in the broadband communications system-on-a-chip industry; and Eli Yablonovitch, for introducing photonic band-gap engineering and applying semiconductor concepts to electromagnetic waves in artificial periodic structures.
Samueli, who is also a co-founder of Broadcom Corp., and his wife, Susan, contributed $30 million in 1999 to the engineering school that now bears his name.
"I am enormously proud of these three faculty members. Through their specific contributions to the field of engineering, they have helped advance our school's position as a leader in technology," said Vijay K. Dhir, interim dean of the school. "These awards are a testament to their extraordinary individual accomplishments and to the tremendous role the School plays in the rest of the nation and throughout the world in advancing the state of engineering."
Itoh has been a member of the UCLA engineering faculty since 1991. He holds the Northrop Grumman Endowed Chair in Microwave and Millimeter Wave Electronics. Currently, he holds a visiting professorship at the University of Leeds in the United Kingdom, and is an external examiner of the graduate program of City University of Hong Kong.
Itoh received his Ph.D. in electrical engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1969. He has received a number of awards, including the 1998 Shida Award from the Japanese Ministry of Post and Telecommunications and the 1998 Japan Microwave Prize.
Samueli's research interests include digital signal processing, communications systems engineering and CMOS integrated circuit design for applications in high-speed data transmission systems. He received his B.S., M.S. and Ph.D. in electrical engineering at UCLA. After working in the private sector, he returned to UCLA in 1985 as a faculty member and became a full professor in 1994. He has been on a leave of absence from the UCLA faculty since 1995.
Samueli is also chief technical officer and vice president of research and development at Broadcom, an integrated circuit supplier to the broadband communications industry in Irvine, Calif.
In 1999 Samueli and his wife donated $50 million to the schools of engineering at UCLA and the University of California, Irvine. The Samuelis designated $30 million of their gift to UCLA and $20 million to UCI.
Yablonovitch joined the UCLA faculty in 1992. His work has covered a broad variety of topics including nonlinear optics, laser-plasma interaction, infrared laser chemistry, photovoltaic energy conversion, strained-quantum-well lasers and chemical modification of semiconductor surfaces. Currently his main interests are in optoelectronics, high-speed optical communications, high-efficiency light-emitting diodes and nano-cavity lasers, photonic crystals at optical and microwave frequencies, quantum computing, and quantum communication.
He graduated with a Ph.D. in applied physics from Harvard University in 1972. Yablonovitch is a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers, the Optical Society of America and the American Physical Society, and a life member of Eta Kappa Nu. He also heads UCLA's portion of the Center for Nanoscience Innovation for Defense, a $20 million, multi-campus project sponsored by the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency and Defense MicroElectronics Activity. The purpose of the project is to facilitate the rapid transition of research innovations in the nanosciences into applications for the defense sector.
This brings to 15 the number of National Academy of Engineering members on the UCLA engineering school faculty.
Other academy members include: Robert S. Elliott, professor emeritus, electrical engineering; Sheldon K. Friedlander, professor, chemical engineering; John J. Gilman, adjunct professor, materials science and engineering; Chih-Ming Ho, professor, mechanical and aerospace engineering; Leonard Kleinrock, professor, computer science; Tung Hua Lin, professor emeritus, civil and environmental engineering; John D. Mackenzie, professor emeritus, materials science and engineering; Russell O'Neill, professor emeritus and dean emeritus, mechanical and aerospace engineering; David Okrent, professor emeritus, mechanical and aerospace engineering; Kumar Patel, professor, electrical engineering; Judea Pearl, professor emeritus, computer science; and Lucien A. Schmit, professor emeritus with joint appointments in civil and environmental engineering and in mechanical and aerospace engineering.
The National Academy of Engineering is a private, independent, nonprofit institution that provides leadership and guidance on the application of engineering to technical problems and issues. Academy membership honors individuals who have made important contributions to the field. Members are elected to the academy by their peers.
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