Magdy F. Iskander, Director

My message can be best expressed through Q and A that was published by the Center’s Newsletter Waves before my joining HCAC. I have edited it to include some of the progress made since then.

The WAVES editor asked for more details from Dr. Iskander:

Q: What are the reasons you decided to join HCAC?
A: The Center presents a very attractive environment for intellectual and professional growth, has the potential to make a significant impact on Communications technology as well as contribute to technology-based economic development in the State of Hawaii. While working as a Program Director at the National Science Foundation, I emphasized and strongly promoted multidisciplinary research in the area of wireless communication. HCAC fits this vision and working with colleagues in the Electrical Engineering Department, College of Business Administration, Computer Science and across the UH campus will help HCAC continue to promote this vision that I believe is critically important to the successful implementation of this technology and the realization of its much anticipated benefits. The State of Hawaii and Board of Regents’ commitment to establish and continue to support the Center is very significant and having it as a separate unit in the College of Engineering provides ample opportunity for outreach and multidisciplinary research and educational activities across departmental boundaries. For example, the recently established Engineering Clinic Program will significantly benefit from this arrangement and will help attract multidisciplinary projects from industry. The Center is also located in the beautiful State of Hawaii, “The Ultimate Global Gathering Place,” and we will be able to showcase the Center’s achievements and enhance its international reputation by organizing conferences and international symposia here in Hawaii.

Q: What do you see as the strengths of the Center?
A: The Center has several key elements that contribute to its strength and high potential for success. This includes:

* Outstanding faculty and a long standing reputation of excellence in the area of communications research. This is very important as our technical reputation and innovative research will ultimately be our core asset that will ensure the Center’s growth and continued success. Grants and research contracts, sustained industrial participation, international collaborations, and recruitment of excellent students can only be achieved through reputation of excellence in research.

* The State, Board of Regents, and the College of Engineering have a keen interest and sincere commitment to the Center and its success. We have a broad vision, ambitious mission, long and short-term goals, and much of this will require nurturing and support. This can only be achieved through a collaborative work environment and strong support from all involved.

* The beauty of the State of Hawaii and its globally charming environment significantly contribute to the Center’s strength and enhances its chances for success. So far, we have been able to attract several (7) conferences to Hawaii and will continue to promote this as it contributes economically and intellectually to the State.

Q: What is your vision for the HCAC and the programs/specific goals that will evolve from that vision?
A: Our vision statement is: To be a leading Center for multidisciplinary research in Telecommunications Technology with joint research and educational activities that promote international collaboration and partnership with industry.
Our broad mission is to conduct multidisciplinary research and develop innovative educational activities to enable next generation telecommunications technology, better prepare the workforce for this industry, boost and support telecom industry in Hawaii, and promote national and international collaboration.
The following are examples of programs that have and will continue to evolve from this vision and mission statement:

* Conduct multidisciplinary research and facilitate faculty participation across the UH campus.

* Establish a College-wide Engineering Clinic program. This will attract industrial support for undergraduate projects and will also help facilitate faculty interaction with industry.

* Establish state-of-the-art software and hardware laboratory facilities. We were fortunate to receive an NSF Major Research Instrumentation grant (over $700K, including matching, and efforts are underway to establish an indoor antenna range, wireless testbed, and microwave test and measurement lab.

* Establish strong outreach program for industrial membership in the Center and national and international collaboration in its activities. Once again, we are very pleased to announce that we are now a partners in the NSF funded Industry/University Cooperative Research Center with both the Arizona State University and the University of Arizona.

* Promote research activities in new application areas of the wireless technology. An example may include the biomedical application area, and in a broader sense participate in the University-wide Information Technology Alliance program.

Q: What are the resources that you will be seeking to attain your goals?
A: Clearly as the Center continues to grow and expand in new wireless technology applications it will need additional resources and continued support from the State, the University, and the College of Engineering. New faculty positions, laboratory facilities, space, and financial resources for participating faculty and graduate students. Let me emphasize that we understand that this continued support will be contingent upon making real progress toward achieving the stated goals.

Q: What new partnerships will you seek?
A: We will very aggressively be seeking partnerships with industry as we see this as a major source of technical talent, technology expertise, and financial support. Collaborations with other universities that complement the expertise in our Center also make sense particularly when competing for large government grants and multi-university research proposals such as DoD MRUIs and the NSF ERCs. We are currently partner with NSF Industry/University Cooperative Research Center and have already established the Engineering Program. This together with the new lab facilities will certainly help attract and maintain productive and mutually beneficial relationships with industry.

BIOGRAPHY
Magdy F. Iskander is a Professor and Director of the Hawaii Center for Advanced Communications in the College of Engineering at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. Prior to this position, he was a Professor of Electrical Engineering at the University of Utah for 25 years. From 1997-99, he had an appointment as Program Director, in the Electrical and Communication Systems Division of the National Science Foundation. At NSF he formulated and directed a "Wireless Information Technology" initiative in the Engineering Directorate and funded over 29 projects in microwave/millimeter wave devices, RF MEMS technology, propagation modeling, and the antennas areas. His experience at NSF has also influenced his activities in the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Society where he has been a member of the AdCom (1997-99) and was the General Chair of the 2000 IEEE AP-S Symposium and URSI meeting in Salt Lake City which promoted interdisciplinary research and strong industrial participation. He was a Distinguished Lecturer for the AP-S (1994-97) and during this period gave lectures in Brazil, France, Spain, China, Japan, and at a large number of US universities and IEEE chapters. He was an associate editor of the IEEE AP-S Transactions (1995-98) and an associate editor of the AP-S Magazine. He was elected the 2001 Vice President of the Antennas and Propagation Society and the 2002 AP-Society President.

Dr. Iskander served as the Director of the Center of Excellence for Multimedia Education and Technology (CAEME) while at the University of Utah. NSF is presently funding CAEME to formulate the Conceptual Learning of Engineering (CoLoE) consortium and develop educational software that implements this concept. In 1986, he established the Engineering Clinic Program to attract industrial support for projects for engineering students. Under his direction, the program attracted more than 105 projects sponsored by 37 corporations from across the US. The Clinic program now has an endowment for scholarships and a professorial chair at the University of Utah.

Dr. Iskander received the 1985 Curtis W. McGraw ASEE National Reseach Award, 1991 ASEE George Westinghouse National Education Award, 1992 Richard R. Stoddard Award from the IEEE EMC Society, and the 2000 University Distinguished Teaching Award. He was selected to Chair the TTEC Panel for Telecommunications in 2000-01. This panel is funded by DOD agencies to assess US competitiveness in this technology and explore avenues for international collaborations in this highly competitive industry. He is a Fellow of IEEE and was a member of the National Research Council Committee on Microwave Processing of Materials. He spent sabbatical and other short leaves at Polytechnic University of New York; Ecole Superieure D'Electricite, France; UCLA; Harvey Mudd College; Tokyo Institute of Technology; Polytechnic University of Catalunya, Spain; and at several universities in China. He was a member of the WTEC panel on "Wireless Technology: and as a part of the panel, he visited many wireless companies in Europe and Japan and made presentations on the US perspective and summary of panel findings.

He authored a textbook on Electromagnetic Fields and Waves, Prentice Hall, 1992; edited the CAEME Software Books, Vol. I, 1991, and Vol. II, 1994; and edited four books on Microwave Processing of Materials, all published by the Materials Research Society, 1990-1996. He edited two special issues of the Journal of Microwave Power, a special issue of the ACES Journal, and the 1995 and 1996 proceedings of the International Conference on Simulation and Multimedia in Engineering Education. He was the General Chair of the 1996 Frontiers in Education Conference in Salt Lake City. He has published over 170 papers in technical journals, has 8 patents, and has made numerous presentations in technical conferences. He is founding editor of the journal, Computer Applications in Engineering Education (CAE), published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., which received the excellence in publishing award, 1993. The journal can be found at www.interscience.wiley.com. His ongoing research contracts include "Propagation Models for Wireless Communication," funded by the Army Research Office; "Low-Cost Phased Array Antennas," funded by both the Army Research Lab and NSF; "Microwave Processing of Materials," funded by Corning, Inc.; and the "Conceptual Learning of Engineering" project funded by NSF. ***