Chair,ECE
- Details
It gives me great pleasure to welcome you to the Department of Electrical Communication Engineering (ECE), at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore. I take this as a great personal privilege for me to be leading this great Department at a crucial time.
Started modestly as a Communications Laboratory in 1943 at the Electrical Engineering (EE) Department of IISc, we became a separate department in 1947, and emerged as one of the most prominent departments in IISc conducting research on communications, networking, signal processing, microelectronics, radio frequency systems, and photonics. High quality research published at the best of avenues in the discipline is the character of ECE.
The Department can indeed be proud of its faculty and students. With a majority of Professors in the Department elected as Fellows of the Indian National Academy of Engineering (INAE) and four among them elected as Fellows of the Institution of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), the Department is indeed at the forefront. Many of these colleagues participate in voluntary professional work in India and internationally as editors of reputed journals, and in key organization positions in technical conferences. A number of text books and monographs are other facets of their contributions.
Research projects sponsored by the Government and private industries in India are the main sources of funding for our research. Many of these are funded by the strategic sector in the country. In recent years, many projects funded by international corporations have also been taken up by our faculty members. Innovation, patenting, technology transfer and entrepreneurship are relatively new for many in India. Yet, colleagues from the Department have taken strong, solid steps in these directions as well. Many are associated with start-up companies incubated at the Society for Innovation Development (SID) at the Institute.
Extremely talented young students in the Department are fueling all of these endeavors. In addition to offering PhD and M.Tech. (Research) programs, the Department offers an M.Tech. program. Alumni of the department have taken up leading roles in many organizations, both national and international.
While welcoming new students in the midst of a pandemic, we will be attempting all possible steps to ensure their learning will be on par with their seniors. In order to change with the times, apart from classes, all seminars, talks, colloquia and meetings will be online. Steps are being taken to continue this, even after the “new” normalcy returns and every one come back to this beautiful campus. To compensate for the lost opportunity to interact with peers in person, we are taking steps to publish video bytes of research papers and student theses online. I am sure some of these would be useful in connecting with institutions that are geographically away. I request your help to reach out to you and your friends better, by linking with us on social media platforms. Indeed, the new situation is providing us a lot of new opportunities, in addition to many new challenges.
The Department has strong plans to grow from strength to strength in the years ahead, and we look forward to working with strong collaborators, motivated students and energetic young faculty colleagues.
At a time when the Department is poised to celebrate 75 years of its formal opening, I welcome you again to this virtual presence of the Department. Your suggestions to improve is always welcome!!
August 26, 2020
