Chairman's Corner

The 1995/96 academic year produced a number of exciting events within the ECE Department, with the promise of more to come in the near future. One significant item was the full funding by NASA of the student designed satellite project called CATSAT (Cooperative Astrophysics and Technology SATellite). This project involves a number of ECE graduate and undergraduate students, supervised by Andrzej Rucinski and Frank Hludik from the ECE Department in collaboration with research faculty from the Small Satellite Laboratory within the UNH Institute for the Study of Earth, Oceans and Space. The design team now has a commitment to launch in approximately two years, so the pressure is on.

Last fall Dr. Jennifer T. Bernhard joined our faculty from Duke University as an Assistant Professor. She brought with her an expertise in the rapidly growing area of portable wireless data communications. In addition to her unique technical expertise, Jennifer brought with her an assortment of fresh ideas about engineering education. Jennifer has been hard at work throughout the year setting up a research laboratory, initiating related student projects, designing new courses and pursuing research funding. She is already a favorite with the students, and I have no doubt that you will be seeing her impact on the Department in future editions of Signals and Noise.

During the year we carried out a major renovation of the old power lab areas of Kingsbury Room 105. Recent ECE alumni will remember parts of this complex of rooms as the space where they had sophomore analog and digital circuits laboratories on lab benches spaced between large power panels and electrical machines. Older alumni will remember this area as the lab where they learned about electro-mechanical energy conversion, and occasionally about the amazing effects of high current short circuits on solid pieces of brass. All of the large motors and generators were removed, along with associated power panels and conduit, providing a large laboratory for Jennifer Bernhard's research plus two smaller student project rooms, without reducing the space available for the core sophomore labs.

The ECE Department's Industrial Associates Program welcomed three new members this year: HADCO Corporation, National Semiconductor Corporation and Signal Restoration Technologies. HADCO, located in Derry, New Hampshire, is a leading manufacturer of printed circuit boards. The first ECE student intern is already in place at HADCO and we look forward to further interaction with them during the coming year. National Semiconductor Corporation in Portland, Maine manufactures a variety of semiconductor devices. Faculty and students of the ECE Department's Design Automation Laboratory look forward to collaborating with engineers from National Semiconductor during the coming year. Signal Restoration Technologies, located in Houston, Texas, develops custom hybrid VLSI circuits. During the past year Signal Restoration Technologies supported the design and fabrication of custom VLSI devices by ECE seniors and graduate students in our course EE715/815 Introduction to VLSI. Other member companies of the IAP include the Automotive Technology Center Subsidiary of Textron Inc., Cabletron Systems Inc., the Raytheon Company, and Sanders, A Lockheed Martin Company.

The three new members to our Industrial Associates Program reflect a renewed interest in industry/university cooperation triggered largely by recent growth trends in regional high-tech industries. UNH ECE graduates were recruited heavily this year and there was considerable interest expressed by industry representatives in developing student internships, sponsoring senior and graduate student projects, and other forms of close interaction. Generally, the opportunities for professional work experiences for students have not been higher in recent years both on and off of the UNH campus. On campus, major research groups such as the Small Satellite Laboratory and the InterOperability Laboratory, along with the various smaller research groups within ECE and elsewhere, provide many opportunities for basic and applied research experiences. Off of campus, the IAP member companies and others provide a variety of part-time employment and internship opportunities in areas ranging from industrial research and development to manufacturing engineering. If these promising trends can be sustained, they should have significant beneficial impact on the overall ECE student experience at UNH.

On a negative note, Gene Filley will be leaving us this summer. Gene, who has been with the ECE Department for nine years as the technician responsible for computers and other digital technology, will be pursuing graduate studies in psychology at UNH. Many alumni from that period will remember Gene as the person you relied upon when the lab computer went down and your lab report was due the next morning (or later that afternoon!). Faculty and staff of the Department have all had the same experience. Murphy's Law states (among many other things) that equipment items, and especially computers, are most likely to fail to function correctly when you need them the most. It has not been uncommon in the ECE hallways to hear disparaging remarks about Gateway or Microsoft mixed with cries for help to Gene. We wish Gene well and will certainly miss his contribution to the ECE Department.

Kim Beisner, who has been the ECE Department secretary for the past three years, will also be leaving us this summer to pursue a promotional opportunity in the office of the UNH Physics Department. Kim is well known by students from those three years as one of the two individuals in the ECE office who really knew how things worked within the University (the other being Helen). "Go ask Kim" was the favorite phrase of ECE faculty (and ECE Department Chairs) when students wanted to know what UNH form had to be filled out or what some UNH deadline was. We will all miss her cheerful demeanor and her substantive help. We will also miss the pictures of Elvis (yes that Elvis) that have adorned the ECE office walls during Kim's tenure. Maybe she will leave us some.