EECS graduate student Ava Jiang Tan (advisor: Sayeef Salahuddin) has won the 2020 Best Paper Award at the 78th Device Research Conference (DRC) for "Reliability of Ferroelectric HfO2-based Memories: From MOS Capacitor to FeFET."  The paper, co-authored by Profs. Salahuddin and Chenming Hu, grad student Yu-Hung Liao, postdoc Jong-Ho Bae, and Li-Chen Wang of MSE, introduces nonvolatile ferroelectric field-effect transistors (FeFETs) which boast impressive programmability and a strong potential for further scalability.  The paper also demonstrates for the first time a systematic, reliable, and rapid method to qualitatively predict the FE endurance of prospective gate stack designs prior to running a full FeFET fabrication process.  Tan works in the Laboratory for Emerging and Exploratory Devices (LEED), and is particularly interested in the architectural potential of nonvolatile ferroelectric CMOS-compatible memories for realizing brain-inspired computing paradigms and energy-efficient hardware for deep learning. The DRC, which is the longest-running device research meeting in the world,  was held in June.

EECS director of operations Josephine Williamson is one of 18 unsung heroines at UC Berkeley being honored this month as part of the Berkeley 150W project.  Williamson, whom Vice Provost Tsu-Jae King Liu describes as “an exemplary builder of positive working relationships,” knows the department inside and out.  She began her relationship with EECS as an undergraduate workstudy, helping students, faculty, staff and visitors, behind the Soda Hall front desk.  After graduating and exploring some other career options, she returned to campus as the manager of budget and planning in the College of Engineering, and was hired away two years later to serve as EECS's manager of financial services.   She has been in her current position as director of operations for almost ten years, and was recognized for her leadership skills with a Chancellor's Outstanding Staff Award (COSA) in 2017, the Berkeley Chancellor's highest staff honor.  Williamson is treasured by her staff  as a compassionate and positive leader who has created a supportive, nurturing work environment that has remained strong even during difficult times.  She has taken steps to make the department more welcoming to a greater diversity of people, and has created a more open, convivial, and respectful culture for everyone.  "During my years at Cal, I learned that it is not only important to recognize our strengths, but also to seek out areas where we need to change and further develop," she says.  "It’s important to create a safe place for people to share stories, listen and reflect in order to come together as a team."

EECS alumnus Vikram Iyer (B.S. '15) has won a Marconi Society Paul Baran Young Scholar Award, which honors "the world's most innovative young engineers in Information and Communications Technology (ICT)." Iyer's research focusses on bio-inspired and bio-integrative wireless sensor systems that enable traditionally stationary Internet of Things (IoT) devices to move, "putting a new and scalable category of data collectors into the world to help us understand our environment at scale and with a fine degree of detail."  When Iyer was a student at Berkeley, he was a TA for EE16A and an undergraduate researcher for Prof. Bernhard Boser.  He is now a graduate student at the University of Washington.

EECS Alumna Chen-Nee Chuah (M.S. '97/Ph.D. '01, Advisor: Randy Katz) has won a UC Davis’ ADVANCE Scholar Award, which honors UC Davis faculty members for advancing diverse perspectives and gender equity in STEM.  This award also recognizes Chuah's research achievements in electrical and computer engineering.  She joined the Department of ECE at Davis in 2002, and is a leading researcher in the area of communication networks, with an emphasis on internet measurements, routing, and learning-based networked applications. She is also the co-director of the newly formed Center for Data Science and Artificial Intelligence Research, or CeDAR.  “Through her extensive mentoring of women, campus service in the ADVANCE Mentorship and Networking Initiative, and service to the profession, Chuah has contributed greatly to increasing gender diversity and advancing the careers of members from underrepresented groups in STEM,” the award announcement states.  Chuah has been invited to attend an award symposium next year to talk about her research and mentorship activities.

Assistant Prof. Rikky Muller has been selected as one of ten Rising Stars in Computer Networking and Communications in 2020 by N2 Women (Networking Networking Women), a discipline-specific community of researchers in the fields of networking and communications.  Muller was nominated "for her impressive achievements in development of wirelessly connected and wirelessly powered implants--important components for the medicine of the future. Besides academic achievements she has proven her abilities as entrepreneur being co-founder and CTO of a successful company bringing some of her ideas to the level of real product. She can literally 'infect' people with her ideas and enthusiasm, which makes her a greater motivator and supervisor of students."  N² "Rising Stars" have less than ten years of professional experience after completing their Ph.D.s ("Stars" have ten years or more of professional experience).  Prof. Sylvia Ratnasamy was named a Rising Star in 2016 and a Star in 2019.

Assistant Prof. Rikky Muller has won a 2020 McKnight Technological Innovations in Neuroscience Award from the McKnight Endowment Fund for Neuroscience (MEFN).  These awards recognize groundbreaking projects that have the potential "to fundamentally change the way neuroscience research is conducted."  Muller is designing and building a high-speed holographic projector that can stream 3D light into the brain at neural speeds, many times faster than current projectors, and so manipulate and test thousands of optogenetically-controlled neurons with pinpoint accuracy.  She will receive a total of $200k over the next two years to support her groundbreaking research.

EECS Profs. Murat Arcak, Kameshwar Poolla, and Claire Tomlin (also alumna, PhD '1998) have been named 2020 Fellows of the International Federation of Automatic Control (IFAC).  The IFAC Fellow Award is given to "persons who have made outstanding and extraordinary contributions in the field of interest of IFAC, in the role as an Engineer/Scientist, Technical Leader, or Educator."  Arcak was cited "for contributions to nonlinear systems, control of networks and applications," Poolla was cited "for contributions to system identification and robust control with applications to manufacturing and energy," and Tomlin was cited "for contributions to cyber-physical and hybrid systems with application to safety in autonomy and learning."  The awards will be presented at the 2020 IFAC World Congress this week.

EECS alumnus John Maidens (PhD 2017) and his advisor EECS Prof. Murat Arcak have won the International Federation of Automatic Control (IFAC) Automatica Paper Prize for “Symmetry Reduction for Dynamic Programming,” co-authored by Axel Barrau and Silvère Bonnabel (Automatica vol. 97, pp. 367-375, 2018).  This journal award recognizes "outstanding contributions to the theory and/or practice of control engineering or control science, documented in a paper published in the IFAC Journal Automatica," and will be presented this week at the triennial IFAC World Congress during the virtual closing ceremony.  Maidens is now a data scientist at Eko where he builds AI to automatically assess heart health.

Graduate student Tijana Zrnic (advisors:  Moritz Hardt and Michael Jordan) has won an Apple PhD fellowship in Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning (AI/ML).  Scholars from invited institutions are selected for this program based on their "innovative research, record as thought leaders and collaborators in their fields, and unique commitment to take risks and push the envelope in machine learning and AI."  Zrnic, who is affiliated with BAIR, the Statistical AI Learning group, and RISELab, was selected for "Fundamentals of Machine Learning."  Winners receive financial support for their research and academic travel for two years, internship opportunities, and a two-year mentorship with an Apple researcher in their field.   Apple says these scholars are "advancing the field of machine learning and AI to push the boundaries of what’s possible, and Apple is committed to supporting the academic research community and their invaluable contributions to the world."

CS alumna Barbara Simons (PhD 1981, advisor: Richard Karp) has won the 2019 Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) Policy Award for long-standing, high-impact leadership.  The award recognizes "an individual or small group that had a significant positive impact on the formation or execution of public policy affecting computing or the computing community."  Over several decades, Simons has advanced technology policy by founding and leading organizations, authoring influential publications, and effecting change through lobbying and public education.  She was president of ACM from 1998-2008 and the founding Chair of ACM's US Public Policy Committee (USACM, now USTPC), which was envisioned "to provide cogent advice and analysis to legislators and policymakers about a wide range of issues including cryptography, computer security, privacy, and intellectual property."  She is internationally known as an expert on voting technology and reform, and is a key player in persuading election officials to shift to paper-based voting systems.  Simons currently chairs the Board of Directors of Verified Voting, a nonpartisan nonprofit organization that advocates for legislation and regulation of elections to improve accuracy, transparency and verifiability.