News

Newsweek Magazine recently published a list of "America's Greatest Disruptors: Medical Marvels," celebrating researchers and companies "pushing the technological boundaries of health care." WNCG faculty member Dr. Andrea Thomaz was featured along with her colleague Dr. Vivian Chu and their company, Dilligent Robotics. Dilligent Robotics developed robots for deployment in healthcare settings—an innovation that has become especially critical to healthcare processes during the COVID-19 pandemic. Read more here via Newsweek.

WNCG alumnus Xingqin Lin is the recipient of the 2021 IEEE Vehicular Technical Society Early Career Award. The annual award recognizes outstanding scientists or engineers under the age of 35 who have contributed to the field of mobile radio, motor vehicles, or land transportation. Lin was commended for his “contributions to mobile communication systems and connected aerial vehicles.”

WNCG alumnus Namyoon Lee has been named recipient of the 2021 IT Young Engineer Award, an IEEE-IEIE Joint Award. The annual award recognizes an engineer under the age of 40 whose contributions to the field have made a significant impact on society.

WNCG professor Andrea Thomaz appeared on The Robot Brains Podcast this week to talk about her research, her robots, and how her company Diligent Robotics has been changing healthcare during the pandemic. The podcast is hosted by renowned artificial intelligence researcher, professor and entrepreneur Pieter Abbeel. Pieter is joined by leading experts in AI Robotics from all over the world as he explores how far humanity has come in its mission to create conscious computers, mindful machines and rational robots.  Listen to the episode on The Robot Brains Podcast website.

Diligent Robotics, a healthcare technology company founded by WNCG professor Andrea Thomaz, is on the forefront of the fight against COVID-19. As highlighted in Forbes, robots like Diligent's Moxi are increasingly being used for essential functions in the patient-care setting. Read more at Forbes.com.  

WNCG professor Andrea Thomaz was interviewed by Austin Monthly on how her company Diligent Robotics is "revolutionizing health care in the age of COVID-19." Read the full interview on Austin Monthly.

WNCG student Nithin Ramesan received the Best Student Paper Award at the 18th International Symposium on Modeling and Optimization in Mobile, Ad Hoc and Wireless Networks (WiOpt 2020).  This is the second year in a row that the award has gone to a WNCG student. Ramesan’s winning paper, "Wireless Queues in Poisson Interference Fields: the Continuum Between Zero and Infinite Mobility," was co-authored with his advisor, Prof. François Baccelli.

WNCG alumnus Harpreet S. Dhillon has received the 2020 IEEE ComSoc Radio Communications Committee (RCC) Early Achievement Award for contributions to radio communications. According to IEEE, the award “recognizes members of the IEEE Communications Society who have achieved early career visibility in the field through research and service to the RCC.” Candidates must have completed their Ph.D. within 10 years of their nomination. The award is conferred once a year at the International Conference on Communication.

WNCG alumnus Ahmed Kord has been named to the 2020 Forbes 30 Under 30 List in Science. Kord received the designation for the work he completed as a Graduate Research Assistant developing a new class of magnet-less circulators, which are smaller and enable more applications. Circulators are crucial for devices to transmit and receive data at the same time. Kord was the recipient of the 2018 IEEE MTTS Fellowship for this research. Dr. Kord received his Ph.D. from Texas ECE under the supervision of Prof. Andrea Alù. He is currently a postdoctoral research scientist at Columbia University.

WNCG faculty member Todd Humphreys has received a Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE). Humphreys was one of five faculty members from The University of Texas at Austin to receive the award for 2019. The PECASE is the “highest honor bestowed by the United States Government to outstanding scientists and engineers who are beginning their independent research careers and who show exceptional promise for leadership in science and technology.”