Answering A Wake-Up CallBY ERICA VONDERHEID

CAN ENGINEERING AND technol-ogy be applied to create worldwide peace?Abhinav Aggarwal says they can.

Aggarwal, an IEEE Senior Member andvice chair of the Eastern North CarolinaSection in the United States, wrote Sep-tember 11: A Wake Up Call (1st BooksLibrary, Bloomington, Ind., USA, 2003) toprovide an engineering perspective to theterrorist attacks against the United Statesby studying what happened through theprism of system dynamics. For this book,he was named the 2002 IEEE Author of theYear, an annual award.

Systems dynamics, a technique createdby Jay Forrester at the Massachusetts Insti-tute of Technology in Cambridge, studiescause-effect relationships between activi-ties to examine how one or more variableslead to a certain event. The variables arethen further analyzed to trace any problemto its root cause. Aggarwal (below) usedthis process to explain that September 11happened because somewhere in the grandsystem of human experience, there was adefect, which has a root cause that led tothe attacks.

THE INSTITUTE | JUNE 2003 1

The

www. ieee.org JUNE 2003 VOL. 27, N0. 2

Unexpected Innovations Through History

BY ERICA VONDERHEID

ON 10 SEPTEMBER 2001, when thebig news was mad cow disease and a U.S.senator’s affair with a missing intern, theterm homeland security was hardlyknown. In the days following, homelandsecurity became a central priority for alllevels of government. Initiatives were sooneverywhere, from the formation of theU.S. Department of Homeland Security(DHS) to community volunteer ambu-lance corps being trained on how to reactduring a biological attack.

But for the IEEE, homeland securitywas nothing new. Through its Members’technical knowledge, the conferences itsponsors, the standards it has helpeddevelop, the publications it distributes,and the public policy committees it hasset up, the IEEE has helped ensure safetyfor many years.

What is homeland security? The U.S. government in its National Strat-egy for Homeland Security defines home-land security as “a concerted national effortto prevent terrorist attacks within the

United States, reduce America’s vulnera-bility to terrorism, and minimize the dam-age and recover from attacks that do occur.”

Less than a month after the attacks,President George W. Bush created theOffice of Homeland Security andappointed former Pennsylvania GovernorTom Ridge as its director. Early this year,the office became a cabinet-level depart-ment in the biggest federal reorganizationin 50 years, and Ridge was sworn in as thefirst Secretary of Homeland Security. Witha budget of US$36 billion, DHS, withadvice from the

It’s Nothing New for the IEEE

U.S. President George W. Bush

watches emergency personnel

attend to victims in a biohazard

demonstration, in March 2002, in

Atlanta, Ga., USA.

[Continued on page 14 ]

Page 10

Homeland Security

[Continued on page 12]

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1 Homeland Security Is Nothing New for the IEEEBY ERICA VONDERHEIDFor decades before the terrorist attacks on the United States, theIEEE has been involved in homeland security technology throughpublications, conferences, public policy, and technical standards.

MEMBER PROFILE

1 Answering a Wake-Up CallBY ERICA VONDERHEIDIEEE Senior Member Abhinav Aggarwal says engineering, science, and technology can create world peace and bring an end to terrorism.

PRESIDENT’S COLUMN

7 “I Need Your Ideas”BY MICHAEL S. ADLERWhat can we do next to make all the technical information theIEEE provides even more valuable?

10 When Serendipity StrikesBY TRACY EDDYAccidents, not careful study and practice of engineering principles, brought the world batteries,X-rays, and microwave ovens.

THE INSTITUTE | JUNE 2003 3

NEWSa

4 Standards Web Site Tailored for Europe

Meet the President-ElectCandidates

Microwave Society Sponsors Virtual Museum Exhibit

DEPARTMENTSa

6 Marketplace of Ideas

7 Letters

8 Deadlines and Reminders

9 Awards

15 Education

16 Foundation Donors

18 Passings

18 Member Recognition

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Wireless CompositionA recently approved standard aids music composition andperformance by connecting musical instrument digital inter-faces over Ethernet and IEEE 802.11 networks.

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contents

Page 19

Microwave SocietySponsors VirtualMuseum ExhibitIF YOUR KIDS THINK that microwavesare only used to make popcorn, have themvisit the new IEEE Virtual Museum. Therethey’ll have a chance to learn thatmicrowaves are also the means by whichcellphones communicate and TV signalsare broadcast.

“Microwaves: From Your Kitchen to theEdges of the Universe” is the museum’s firstexhibit that gives a technical and historicaloverview of technology presented by an IEEESociety. The Web site hosting the MicrowaveTheory and Techniques Society (MTT-S)exhibit debuted in April and is designed fora younger, nontechnical audience.

“It is a great opportunity to reach out topeople we don’t ordinarily communicatewith, namely future engineers,” says PeterStaecker, a past president of MTT-S. Theexhibit offers simple explanations of howmicrowave technologies work, and placeseach in its historical and social context. Keypeople in the technologies’ developmentalso are profiled. Visitors can learn how thesame device that cooks food in a microwaveoven helped the Allies during World War II.Other exhibits show how microwaves areused in communications, missile guidance,weather forecasting, and medicine.

Eighty Society members wrote much ofthe exhibit contents with help from IEEEstaff member Kim Breitfelder, the VirtualMuseum’s project manager, who providedthe exhibit graphics and animations.

Visit the exhibit at www.ieee-virtual-museum.org.

— Helen Horwitz

Meet The President-Elect CandidatesTHERE ARE TWO CANDIDATESfor President-Elect: W. Cleon Andersonof Salt Lake City, Utah, USA; andMichael Lightner of Boulder, Colo., USA.Vijay K. Bhargava has withdrawn hisname as a candidate.

Anderson, (photo, left) a Senior Mem-ber now in his second term as vice presi-dent of Regional Activities and a formerdirector of IEEE-USA, has served as director of Region 6 (the western United States).He is a member of both the Engineering Management and the Computer Societies. Heis employed by L-3 Communication Systems-West (Salt Lake City, Utah), where, as achief project engineer, he designs and directs the development of military and space data-link systems.

Lightner, (photo, right) an IEEE Fellow, is a professor of electrical and computerengineering and computer science at the University of Colorado in Boulder. Amonghis IEEE activities, he is currently the vice president of Publication Services and Prod-ucts, has served as the vice president of Technical Activities, and is a past presidentof the Circuit and Systems Society. He also belongs to four other Societies: Com-munications, Computer, Education, and Engineering in Medicine and Biology.

Interviews with these President-Elect candidates were published in The Insti-tute’s April edition at www.ieee.org/theinstitute. The interviews covered a wide rangeof issues—from what inspired the candidates to become engineers to the mostimportant problems they see facing the IEEE.

On 12 June, the IEEE Philadelphia Section will be hosting a debate between Ander-son and Lightner. Read excerpts from the debate in The Institute’s September print issue.

Watch your mailbox in September when all members eligible to vote will receivetheir election ballot.

For more information about the candidates and their positions, visit www.ieee.org/organizations/corporate/candidates.htm.

—Kathy Kowalenko

NEWSFrom Around the IEEE & the World

STANDARDS DEVELOPERS andusers in Europe now have a new Web por-tal that can provide them with access totechnical standards created by the IEEEand other standards organizations. Theportal, called StandardsEurope, is atwww.standardseurope.net.

The site helps those who want to learnabout standards currently under develop-ment and to obtain some of the most pop-ular technical standards, especially in infor-mation technology, telecommunications,and power and energy. Created by the IEEEStandards Association (IEEE-SA), Stan-dardsEurope is a major component of theassociation’s ongoing globalization initia-tive to help abolish technical barriers totrade for the benefit of industry and society.

This is the third portal dedicated to ageographic region that IEEE-SA has intro-duced within the past year. The others areStandardsAsia and StandardsAmericas.Regional portals are increasingly impor-tant because IEEE standards are usedworldwide, and each portal will helpindustry and others in that part of theworld participate in the IEEE-SA’s work.

“This Web portal adds value to and

focuses on IEEE-SA’s ongoing cooperativework supporting international standardi-zation development efforts,” says JerryPeterson, president of the IEEE StandardsAssociation. The global groups behindthose efforts are the International Elec-trotechnical Commission, the InternationalOrganization for Standardization, and theInternational Telecommunication Union.

Some of the portal’s features include:◆ A link to StandardsWire™, which

provides timely announcements aboutIEEE standards activities.

◆ Access to IEEE “Standard Zones,”which are standards grouped by specifictechnologies such as wireless communi-cations, microprocessors, transportation,and power generation.

◆ Direct log-in capability for customers ofIEEE Standards Online, a subscription-basedcollection of topically related standards.

◆ A newsletter that will showcasenews, events, and profiles about IEEE’sactivities in Europe.

You can find StandardsAsia atwww.standardsasia.net and StandardsAmericas at www.standardsamericas.net.

—Kathy Kowalenko

New Standards Web Site Tailored for Europe

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6 THE INSTITUTE | JUNE 2003

MARKETPLACE OF IDEAS

Responses to March’s QuestionIf a person is convicted of using the Internet to commit acrime, should he or she be barred from surfing the Web, or washacker Kevin Mitnick, who was barred from the Internet dur-ing probation that ended earlier this year, a special case?

As cybersecurity problems arise—from stolen credit card numbers toterrorist threats—there’s good reason for the U.S. government tobecome the leader in developing new cybersecurity measures. In Feb-ruary, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security unveiled its National

Strategy to Secure Cyberspace (read the entire report at www.whitehouse.gov/pcipb). The report focuses on improving cooperation

among federal, state, and local governments, the private sector, and the public. It alsoestablishes a public–private architecture for responding to attacks.

These are all good ideas, but with the borderless nature of the Internet, is any planreally going to prevent attacks? What can the United States do to develop cooperationwith other countries to secure cyberspace? Do you think this report will spur change orwill it be forgotten or ignored like the Clinton administration’s earlier attempt to securethe Internet as expressed in its National Plan for Information Systems Protection?

Q

TO RESPOND, use any of the following contacts: Mail: The Institute, IEEE Operations Center,

445 Hoes Lane, Piscataway, NJ, USA 08855-1331 Fax: +1 732 235 1626 E-mail: institute@ieee.org

An e-mail response is preferred, although no written submission will be ignored. It is

unlikely that space will permit publication of all responses, although we will try to draw a rep-

resentative sample. Comments are subject to editing for brevity and libel protection. Sugges-

tions for discussion subjects are welcome. Please send them to any of the above contact points.

Each month, The Institute poses a question for discussion. Responsesare published on a three-month cycle; reader comments to the ques-tion below will appear in September.

That’s BrilliantI believe brilliant minds must receiveequal opportunity to have brilliant respon-sibilities in the execution of their brilliantjobs. However, if they do break our bril-liant laws, then they must be held respon-sible for their not-so-brilliant actions.

These people have very useful talents.Let’s give reformed hackers a chance touse their talents for everyone’s benefit. If,after given the opportunity, hackers decideto continue to engage in crime, then“Book them, Sergeant!”

Jesus Alfredo Sanchez OhepDurham, N.C., USA

International Internet Defies Local LawsIt’s ridiculous how many U.S. judgesseem to feel they can regulate a person’sbehavior throughout the whole world. I’dlike to know which law enforcemententity is capable of stopping Kevin Mit-nick from accessing the Internet from acybercafe in Mexico, Switzerland, China,Bolivia, or Brazil. Banning the use of theInternet to a free citizen is the same asforbidding him to think, read, laugh, cry,or watch television. The Internet is inter-national and not bound by regionalauthorities.

Luiggi Colpocorto Foz do Iguacu, Brazil

Hands OffWhen someone uses a gun as a tool tocommit a crime, that person is barredfrom ever owning a firearm again. ButInternet access is like having a knife orfork. You cannot eat decently without sucha tool, so if you commit a crime with one,you should be punished separately for thespecific offense.

When it comes down to electronicdevices, be it computers, Web terminals, orATMs, banning such an item should neverbe permanent or a justified punishmentfor its own sake. Imagine you are releasedfrom jail, but forbidden from using yourears, eyes, or one of your hands.

If we are to compromise, such a ban[on surfing the Web] should only beallowed if a convict is still serving his sen-tence and it is part of a parole agreement.

Jade NaamanRiad El Solh, Lebanon

Neutral ToolI think the analogy between guns andcomputers is a bad one.

A gun has only one purpose and it is nota neutral tool. A computer can be used torun a spreadsheet, a word processor, andother useful applications. It is a neutral toolthat can be used for whatever purpose, be itgood or evil, just as an ordinary knife can be.

The fact is that no criminal ever is for-bidden to use a knife because he was con-victed for killing someone with such atool. What society reproaches him for isnot the use of the tool, but the murderitself. And once the criminal has paid hisor her debt to society, there is no reasonwhy he cannot use neutral tools again.

Cybercriminals should be preventedfrom using cracking or hacking tools,which are the real weapons they need tocommit their crimes, but preventing themfrom using tools that any citizen is allowedto own seems unjust.

Laurent GiroudLyon, France

Permanent Vacation from SurfingNot only hackers like Kevin Mitnick, butanyone—including corporate informationtechnology employees—who commitcybercrimes must be severely penalized.

After these criminals complete theirprison terms, they must be taught tobehave like normal people under thesupervision of a psychological treatmentinstitution. Once the treatment phase iscomplete, reformed cybercriminals canget back to their normal daily lives. How-ever, they should be barred from surfingthe Web permanently.

Yakup Gurol GurbuzAnkara, Turkey

Separation AnxietyOf course it is good to separate criminalsfrom their weapons of choice as a reason-able measure of risk reduction, just as

released pedophiles should be separatedfrom children. But separation does notresolve the initial motivation for the crime.

If that person wants to commit anothercrime, he or she will surely find a way—we know them as repeat offenders. If amurderer used pantyhose as the weaponof choice, wouldn’t the same logic dictatethat he or she be barred from havingpantyhose?

Alicia Hinton San Jose, Calif., USA

Leaping Tall Networks in a Single BoundSeparating the criminal from his “weapon”is an excellent idea, but it’s unenforceable.Sure, you can keep a cybercriminal awayfrom the Internet while he’s in prison, butthere is no technology that can prevent himor her from using a computer afterward.Even if you could somehow ban the personfrom buying a personal computer, a hackerwith that technical expertise could buildone from computers tossed in the trash.There’s no real security screen when yousign up with an Internet service provider, soWeb access is guaranteed. Plug the com-puter into a cellphone and everyday tech-nology makes him a Superman.

Just as we cannot reach out and killevery mosquito that may bite us, we canonly make our immediate surroundingsas safe and secure as possible through bet-ter firewalls, password systems, and theproper disposal of old data, equipment,and media.

John J. ChristianoFranklin, N.J., USA

A

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Quick Guide®

THE INSTITUTE | JUNE 2003 7

• PRESIDENT’S COLUMN

BY MIKE ADLER

I Need Your Ideas for New Products and Services

Once in a while I think it’s important to take a moment and reflect uponthe impact of technology on our work. After all, it is we engineers whohave helped to create the technology that has transformed how we workand, moreover, compelled us to accept constant change as partof our professional lives.

Consider how you now acquire the information that enables you to doyour work. Instead of just relying on print publications, attending con-ferences as time permits, or going to your Society or Chapter meetings,you—and a growing number of members—are now also using a widerrange of IEEE electronic services.

For example, most of you now receive an e-mail alert from The Insti-tute to inform and link you to the articles that appear in the publication’smonthly online edition. This is especially important in months when thepaper version is not published.

Depending on the user profile you have provided to us, you may alsoreceive IEEE XploreTM e-mail alerts that advise you when new arti-cles and related information are available in your areas oftechnical interest.

Or perhaps you are one of the more than 160 000 sub-scribers to the monthly What’s New @ IEEE electronicnewsletters. All of these are available as part of yourmembership. Ten focus on a particular technical area,and the editors of IEEE Spectrum produce two more:the weekly IEEE Career Alert and the biweekly IEEETech Alert.

The new IEEE Member Digital Library isanother of the growing array of electronic infor-mation-sharing services for members. With asubscription, you can instantly access, print,and save the most essential technical informa-tion appearing in IEEE publications during thelast five years.

But even with the advent of these electronic serv-ices that, without a doubt, improve how we acquireinformation, I still contemplate this question: what isthe next thing that the IEEE can do to help make all theinformation we provide even more valuable?

Dedicated groups of volunteers—supported by com-mitted staff members—are already working to answerthis question. One concept they have identified as afuture improvement includes developing an advancedsearch tool that will gather information across the

IEEE’s entire Web site, resulting in fewer links and better content. This tool is aimed atimproving how quickly and efficiently you can get to the specific information you want.

Another idea is to enable members to define their expertise so that other memberscan contact them to ask questions, discuss ideas, and share experiences. The

spirit behind this thinking is to go beyond providing information in a printedor electronic format, and instead make the IEEE the place to go to get yourquestion answered—whether it’s from our publications, our member experts,

or even from an alternative provider outside the IEEE. Also under development are the IEEE Virtual Communities (VCs). VCs

have enormous potential. They will provide online interactive forums ontechnical areas or any related topic for which members share common inter-

ests. In these communities, you will be able to network with others while dis-cussing vital issues and sharing experiences and resources without regard

to geographical location or time zones. You can participate fromanywhere and at any time. The IEEE is piloting over 20 VC

communities today at www.ieeecommunities.org. We

are interested in your input about the type of addi-tional communities you might like to see developedor to help form.

The IEEE was founded on the premise that soci-ety stands to benefit when individuals come together

to share experiences and information. This continuesto be true, and the way in which we all leverage our

relationships with one another will determine just howmuch of an impact the IEEE and each of us as members

have on society. I recognize that our needs are a moving target, and we

don’t necessarily know what it is we want, except to observe,“I’ll know it when I see it.” But if you have ideas—whetherabout technical communities or about alternative value-added services that the IEEE should be considering—please share them with me by sending an e-mail to president@ieee.org. •

• The IEEE is founded on the premisethat society stands to benefit whenindividuals come together to shareexperiences and information. This continues to be true.

Two Thumbs UpI like your newly designed print publica-tion. It is attractive, easy to read, providesadditional details, and includes new infor-mation in a format that motivates me. Forinstance, I wanted to get an IEEE creditcard for some time, but was not sure howto proceed. Your advertisement on page 9in the March issue presented the instruc-tions in an easy-to-follow format. Now

I’m on my way to applying for a card.As a long-time IEEE member—my stu-

dent membership started in 1950—I’veserved the organization in a number ofcapacities. Recently, I volunteered to pub-lish the newsletter for the IEEE Consul-tants’ Network of Connecticut, USA. Yournew format will be an inspiration for me.

Loering JohnsonTarrifville, Conn., USA

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devices and technology.

Sponsor: IEEE Electron Devices Society

• IEEE HERMAN HALPERIN ELECTRIC

TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION AWARD

For outstanding contributions to electric

transmission and distribution.

Sponsor: Herman and Edna Halperin

Nominations Invited forIEEE Technical Field Awards IEEE Sections, Societies, and individual members are invited to submit nominations for

2005 IEEE Technical Field Awards (see awards, recognitions, and sponsors below). The

IEEE Awards Board urges members to nominate and endorse outstanding candidates. For

nomination information, visit www.ieee.org/about/awards or contact IEEE Awards

Activities, 445 Hoes Lane, Piscataway, NJ, USA 08855-1331; telephone, +1 732 562 3841;

fax, +1 732 981 9019; e-mail, awards@ieee.org.

• IEEE MASARU IBUKA CONSUMER

ELECTRONICS AWARD

For outstanding contributions in the field

of consumer electronics technology.

Sponsor: Sony Corp.

• IEEE AWARD IN INTERNATIONAL

COMMUNICATION

For outstanding contributions to

international communication.

Sponsor: British Telecom

• IEEE INTERNET AWARD

For exceptional contributions to the

advancement of the Internet technology

for network architecture, mobility,

and/or end-use applications.

Sponsor: Nokia Corp.

• IEEE REYNOLD B. JOHNSON INFORMATION

STORAGE AWARD

For outstanding contributions to

information storage, with emphasis

on computer storage.

Sponsor: IBM Almaden Research Center

• IEEE RICHARD HAROLD KAUFMANN AWARD

For outstanding contributions in

industrial systems engineering.

Sponsor: IEEE Industry Applications Society

• IEEE JOSEPH F. KEITHLEY AWARD IN

INSTRUMENTATION AND MEASUREMENT

For outstanding contributions in

electrical measurements.

Sponsor: Keithley Instruments Inc.

• IEEE KOJI KOBAYASHI COMPUTERS

AND COMMUNICATIONS AWARD

For outstanding contributions to the inte-

gration of computers and communications.

Sponsor: NEC Corp.

• IEEE DANIEL E. NOBLE AWARD

For outstanding contributions to emerging

technologies recognized within recent years.

Sponsor: Motorola Foundation

• IEEE FREDERIK PHILIPS AWARD

For outstanding accomplishments in the

management of research and development

resulting in effective innovation in the elec-

trical and electronics industry.

Sponsor: Philips Electronics NV

• IEEE PHOTONICS AWARD

For outstanding achievement(s) in photonics.

Sponsor: IEEE Lasers and

Electo-Optics Society

• IEEE EMANUEL R. PIORE AWARD

For outstanding contributions in the field

of information processing in relation to

computer science.

Sponsor: Piore Award Fund

• IEEE JUDITH A. RESNIK AWARD

For outstanding contributions to space

engineering, within the fields of interest

of the IEEE.

Sponsor: IEEE Aerospace and Electronic

Systems, Control Systems, and Engineering

in Medicine and Biology Societies

• IEEE ROBOTICS & AUTOMATION AWARD

For contributions in the field of robotics

and automation.

Sponsor: IEEE Robotics and

Automation Society

• IEEE DAVID SARNOFF AWARD

For exceptional contributions to electronics.

Sponsor: Sarnoff Corp.

• IEEE SOLID-STATE CIRCUITS AWARD

For outstanding contributions to

solid-state circuits.

Sponsor: IEEE Solid-State Circuits Society

• IEEE JAMES L. FLANAGAN SPEECH

AND AUDIO PROCESSING AWARD

For outstanding contributions to the

advancement of speech and/or audio

signal processing.

Sponsor: IEEE Signal Processing Society

• IEEE CHARLES PROTEUS STEINMETZ AWARD

For exceptional contributions to the

development of standards in electrical

and electronics engineering.

Sponsor: IEEE Standards Association

• IEEE NIKOLA TESLA AWARD

For outstanding contributions to the

generation and utilization of electric power.

Sponsor: IEEE Power Engineering Society

Award Endowment Fund

• IEEE KIYO TOMIYASU AWARD

For outstanding early to mid-career

contributions to technologies holding

the promise of innovative applications.

Sponsor: Kiyo Tomiyasu Fund

TEACHING AWARDS• IEEE LEON K. KIRCHMAYER

GRADUATE TEACHING AWARD

For inspirational teaching of graduate

students in the IEEE fields of interest.

Sponsor: Leon K. Kirchmayer

Memorial Fund

• IEEE UNDERGRADUATE TEACHING AWARD

For inspirational teaching of undergraduate

students in the fields of interest of IEEE.

Sponsor: IEEE Foundation

DEADLINES & REMINDERS

Information supplied by the IEEE Awards Board.

IMPORTANT: The deadline for receipt of nominations is 31 January 2004.

BY KATHY KOWALENKO

un-ichi Nishizawa, better known as Japan’s “Fatherof Microelectronics,” will be honored by the IEEEwith a new medal next year that pays tribute to hisextraordinary contributions in materials scienceand technology, fiber optics, and power systems.

The IEEE Jun-ichi Nishizawa Medal will recognize out-standing contributions to material and device scienceand technology, including practical applications.

Nishizawa earned his sobriquet because his inventionsare credited with spurring Japan’s leadership in the micro-electronics industry after World War II. An IEEE Life Fel-low, Nishizawa’s landmark inventions include the pindiode and static induction transistor that led to the birth ofthe semiconductor-laser and optical-fiber-communicationindustries. His discovery of ion implantation was a key con-tribution to integrated-circuit manufacture.

Nishizawa is president of Iwate Prefectural Universityin Iwate, Japan where he continues to work in the micro-electronics field. His development of the terahertz staticinduction transistor and terahertz waves generated byusing lattice and molecular resonance are opening upapplications in the nanotechnology field.

“His approach is not confined within thenarrow, vertical field of his own profession,but is interdisciplinary and international aswell,” notes a representative of the Federa-tion of Electric Power Companies Japan ofTokyo, one of the award’s sponsors. Theother sponsor, the Semiconductor ResearchFoundation of Sendai, Japan, is part of theSemiconductor Research Institute (SRI). In1961, Nishizawa donated several patents forhis inventions to establish SRI and has beenits director since 1968.

“Among Japan’s great leaders of industry,Nishizawa’s contribution is really thelargest,” notes a SRI representative. “Hisworks have established new systems andnetworks that benefit society.”

Nishizawa has received numerous hon-ors, including Japan’s Person of CulturalMerits (the Japanese government’s highesthonor) and was the recipient of the 1983 IEEE Jack A.Morton Award and the 2000 IEEE Edison Medal.

The IEEE Jun-ichi Nishizawa Medal will be awardedannually to an individual or team of up to three and is

comprised of an honorarium, gold medal, bronze replica,and certificate.

The deadline for nominations is 1 July 2003. For moreinformation, visit www.ieee.org/awards. •

New Medal Honors JapaneseMicroelectrics Industry Leader

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Jun-ichi Nishizawa

FEATURE STORY

There is no doubt that manyimportant electrical engineeringdiscoveries were the eagerlyanticipated result of carefulstudy and calculation. Thomas

Edison’s light bulb, for example, was theculmination of many years of methodicalresearch. However, careful planning does-n’t rule out the possibility of spontaneousdiscovery. Some important innovations arethe result of serendipity—accidental dis-coveries that have opened up unexpectedfields of exploration. Below are six examples

of such discoveries that changed the field ofelectrical engineering, as well as the world.

Jumping frog legs In 1791 Luigi Galvani, an Italian physicianand an anatomy professor at the Universityof Bologna, was dissecting a frog in his lab-oratory, work which eventually led anacquaintance of his to build the world’s firstelectric pile, or battery. As he worked nearan electric machine that was continuouslygenerating sparks, he noticed that eachtime he touched his metal scalpel to a nervein the frog’s leg, it twitched.

Galvani deduced that his scalpel wassomehow picking up electricity from the

sparks and sending an electric pulse throughthe frog’s nerve. He decided to test his the-ory by hanging frogs’ legs on brass hooks ona gate in his garden. The legs kicked the firsttime Galvani touched the brass hooks to theiron gate, but not the second or third time.Perplexed, Galvani consulted AlessandroVolta, a professor of physics at the Universityof Pavia in Italy.

While Galvani concluded that animalscontained an electrical nerve fluid thatreacted to a completed electrical circuit, Voltasuspected that electricity was not producedby the frogs’ legs but by the hook they hungon. He replicated Galvani’s experiment inhis laboratory with the frog legs several times

using hooks made of different metals. Afterdiscovering that the largest pulse demon-strated by a kick of the frog’s leg came fromcontact between zinc and silver in a moistenvironment, he invented the Voltaic pile—the world’s first battery. To honor Volta’s andGalvani’s breakthroughs, the basic unit ofelectric potential, the volt, is named for Voltaand the tool that measures current, thegalvonometer, is named after Galvani.

Bright idea In 1883, shortly after he improved theincandescent lamp, Thomas Edison wasexperimenting with it by introducing anextra electrode into the bulb. He soon real-ized that even though that electrode wasn’tpart of the bulb’s circuit, it carried a cur-rent. Edison observed that within the vac-uum of the bulb this hot filament emittedelectrons, which could then be absorbed bythe extra electrode, and became known asthe Edison Effect.

However, there is speculation that theeffect was actually discovered by William J.Hammer, one of Edison’s engineers. Thestory goes that while Hammer wasresearching the incandescent bulb, heobserved a bluish glow surrounding thepositive pole of the light bulb and thelamp’s negative pole turned black show-ing how electrons moved from a negatively

charged filament to a positively chargedplate. In either case, the Edison Effect wasone of science’s first forays into the field ofelectronics, which led to the developmentof the first radio tubes 20 years later.

The X-files On the evening of 8 Nov. 1895, Germanphysics professor Wilhelm Conrad Rönt-gen was testing a cathode-ray tube in hisdark laboratory when he realized that whenthe gas in the tube was charged with elec-tricity and sealed in thick black cardboard,it made a piece of paper coated with a flo-rescent chemical across the room glow.

For seven weeks, Röntgen ran various

experiments trying to find out what causedthis unexpected effect and discovered thatthe new rays were produced by the impactof cathode rays on an object. One of themost well-known experiments involvedplacing his wife’s hand in the path of therays from the cathode-ray tube over a pho-tographic plate. After he developed theplate, an image of the bones in his wife’shand and her wedding ring emerged,marking the first “röntgenogram” evertaken. Because the nature of the rays wasstill unknown, Röntgen named them “X-rays.” By early 1896, his fascinating dis-covery gripped the world’s attention. Morethan a century later, Röntgen’s accidentalbreakthrough continues to be an indis-pensable part of science and medicine.

Pump up the volume By 1921, Edwin H. Armstrong, an instruc-tor and assistant in the electrical engineer-ing department at Columbia University inNew York City, had spent nearly a decadeworking on a regeneration technique thatwould amplify radio signals. While he waspreparing a regenerative circuit for use in apatent case in his laboratory one evening,Armstrong heard a signal that was muchlouder than anything he expected.

Armstrong was listening to a messagefrom the Brooklyn Navy Yard, 16 km

BY TRACY EDDY IEEE History Center

Edward H. Armstrong,

shown on a beach with one

of the radios he invented,

discovered superregenera-

tion, which amplifies radio

signals 100 000 times.

When Serendipity Accidental engineering created batteries, X-rays, microwave ovens, and more

10 THE INSTITUTE | JUNE 2003

away, but the signal disappeared withinminutes. However, he wanted to under-stand why that signal had come in sostrongly. After weeks of experimentationand study, Armstrong identified the prin-ciple of superregeneration—an extensionof the feedback principle of the regenera-tive circuit, which allowed a received sig-nal’s original strength to be amplified upto 100 000 times, much louder than hisregenerative circuit.

This unexpected discovery helped cre-ate the Identify Friend or Foe (IFF) sys-tems used by the Allies in World War II, asystem that used radio waves to trigger aresponse from friendly aircraft, and was

instrumental in developing radios forpolice and emergency medical services.

An out-of-this-world discoveryIn 1931, while Karl Jansky, a radio engineerwith Bell Telephone Laboratories, was work-ing on shortwave radio telephones, he wasasked to figure out what was causing crack-ling static that interfered with overseas tele-phone reception. He built a large direc-tional antenna at Bell’s Holmdel, N.J., USA,station, and recorded two expected forms ofstatic: one from local thunderstorms andthe other from distant storms reflected fromthe ionosphere. But he also detected a third,unexplained sound: a weaker static thatsounded like steady hissing, barely distin-guishable from internal receiver noise.

Jansky originally concluded that the radiowaves were coming from the sun, but a yearof careful study revealed that they were actu-ally coming from outside our solar system.This project at Bell Labs led to an entirelynew field of science: radio astronomy. In hishonor, astronomers named the unit of radioflux, variations in frequency, the jansky.

A sticky situationIn 1946, Percy Spencer, an engineer andinventor who held more than 120 patents,was conducting radar-related research forRaytheon Corp. While testing a new typeof vacuum tube—the magnetron—henoticed that a chocolate bar he had beencarrying in his pocket had melted.Intrigued, Spencer began conductingmore experiments. He watched popcorn“pop” and bounce around the room whenhe held a bag of uncooked kernels up to

the tube. Next, Spencer observed a rawegg placed next to the magnetron explodefrom the pressure that had built up inside.

Spencer concluded that each of theitems had “cooked” when exposed to low-density microwave energy emitted by themagnetron. Raytheon engineers quicklyadapted his discovery, and the first com-mercial microwave oven, the “Radarange,”began its move into household kitchensthe following year. •

THE INSTITUTE | JUNE 2003 11

Percy Spencer observed

microwaves’ culinary appli-

cations when a chocolate

bar in his pocket melted

during an experiment, lead-

ing to the first microwave

oven, the Radarange from

Raytheon Corp.

demonstrated here cooking

a hamburger in 1947.

Strikes

Karl Jansky was trying to

figure out the cause of crack-

ling sounds on overseas

telephone reception at Bell

Telephone Labs in Holmdel,

N.J., USA, when he realized

that the static was coming

from outside the Earth’s

atmosphere, giving rise to

the field of radio astronomy.

Thomas Edison discovered that an

extra electrode he had placed in the

vacuum of a light bulb but did not

connect to the bulb’s circuit would still

carry a current, a phenomenon later

known as the Edison Effect.

While experimenting with cathode ray

tubes, Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen

observed an object across the room

glowing. He later placed photographic

paper behind another object, in this case

his wife’s hand, to create the world’s

first “röntgenogram” or X-ray.

HomelandSecurity Advanced Research ProjectsAgency, coordinates many security andcounterterroism research and developmentprojects—from sensors that detect nuclear,biological, or chemical agents (photo, oppo-site page) to devices that scan the contentsof cargo containers at seaports.

Ralph James, an IEEE Fellow and asso-ciate laboratory director at BrookhavenNational Laboratory in Upton, N.Y., USA,divides homeland security technology intofour categories. The first he calls “knowingthe knowable,” which involves advancedsensor technologies that can detect nuclear,biological, and chemical agents quickly andremotely. Next, technologies that safeguarddangerous agents ensure that nuclearmaterials and chemical agents remainsecure in storage facilities.

Another is protecting borders, whichincludes looking for for nuclear, biological,or chemical weapons at transportationchoke points such as the AmbassadorBridge in Detroit, Mich., USA, where largenumbers of vehicles cross the borderbetween Canada and the United States.

And the fourth, protecting the infra-structure, deals with analyzing possible vul-nerabilities in the power grid, public watersystem, transportation, telecommunica-tions networks, and emergency and othercritical services, and then devising ways tocompensate for those vulnerabilities.

Meeting a needFor the last 35 years, the IEEE has spon-sored the premier conference on securitytechnology: the IEEE Carnahan Confer-ence on Security Technology. Robert Cos-griff, an electrical engineering professor atthe University of Kentucky in Lexington,USA, established the first conference in1968 in response to threats within theUnited States after President Lyndon B.Johnson declared his war on crime. Thisyear’s conference will be in Taipei, Taiwan,14 to 16 Oct., and will include papers oncounterterrorism, biometric identificationsystems, cryptology, and airport security.

The IEEE Boston Section has beenhosting conferences on homeland secu-rity technologies approximately every sixmonths since the 9/11 attacks. These con-ferences feature not just technical ses-sions, but also presentations on workingwith government agencies and major con-tractors, systems integration, policy pro-cedures, and obtaining funding.

“It’s not just a bunch of nerds present-ing review papers or giving sales pitches,”says Ted Kochanski, vice chair-elect of theBoston Section and co-organizer of theconference. “It is an opportunity for engi-neers from academia, industry, and gov-ernment to come together to producesomething greater than the parts.”

The most recent conference, held inMay, had a special track on transportation

safety featuring discussions on automatedexplosion detection systems, documentverification, and secure information sys-tems at airports and seaports.

Read all about itIEEE Security & Privacy, a magazinelaunched earlier this year, provides a dis-cussion forum and information source forengineers working on security technolo-gies. Planning for the publication began inmid-2001, before the terrorist attacks. The

idea for it emerged at an editorial boardmeeting for Pervasive Computing magazine,first published in late 2002. Board membersspeculated on what technological topic theIEEE should tackle next, recalls GeorgeCybenko, editor-in-chief of IEEE Security &Privacy. The answer was information tech-nology security and network privacy.

“The editorial board thought that secu-rity was something engineers shouldknow more about and be involved in,”Cybenko explains. Another reason theIEEE developed the magazine was becausethe fields of security and privacy span sev-eral IEEE fields of interest such as powerelectronics, networking, biomedical engi-neering, computers, and nuclear andplasma sciences.

Recently, IEEE Security & Privacy issueda call for papers about understanding pri-vacy—its technological, commercial, andsocial aspects.

Shaping public policySince the IEEE-USA’s Research and Devel-opment Policy committee was formed in1998, the IEEE has encouraged fundingresearch on national security projects.After 9/11, the committee’s focus hasbecome more intense, says Ron Hira, thecommittee’s chair. Since then, the com-mittee has stepped up efforts to get moredollars allocated to new homeland securityR&D efforts.

In April 2002, Hira testified before theU.S. Congress in support of a bill thatappropriated US$800 million for theNational Science Foundation (NSF) tomobilize U.S. science and technologyexpertise to combat terrorism and increasefunding for R&D in cybersecurity.

Many IEEE-USA members work on

12 THE INSTITUTE | JUNE 2003

WHEN YOU LOOK AT research and development funding, engineeringdoes not get the same kind of investment as other scientific disciplines.

[ HOMELAND from page 1 ]

Security personnel at Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque,

N.M., USA, observe a new explosive device designed to stun terrorists.

U.S. Secretary of

Homeland Security

Tom Ridge (standing)

technologies related to homelandsecurity. If R&D funds are notmade available, IEEE Memberscould lose their jobs or missopportunities to expand theirtechnical horizons, Hira says.

“When you look at theresearch and development num-bers, engineering does not get thesame kind of investment as otherscientific disciplines,” Hira says.

The committee also has writ-ten letters and position state-ments, which summarize theIEEE’s opinion on an issue allow IEEE-USA staff and committee members toreact quickly when a bill comes beforeCongress. One letter went out to all U.S.Senators supporting the inclusion of anUnder Secretary for Science andTechnology within the DHS, a positionlater filled by Charles E. McQueary. Toread more about these communications,visit www.ieeeusa.org/committees/RDC.

IEEE-USA’s public policy committeesmeet with members of Congress and theirstaff members in the White House to pro-mote the organization’s positions. Legis-lators often ask IEEE-USA committees toreview a draft of a bill and make sugges-tions for improvement. The committeealso monitors how much money is beinginvested by congressional appropriations

committees. For example, just becauseCongress told the NSF it has US$800 mil-lion to spend doesn’t mean it will all go tohomeland security R&D projects. If thecommittee finds fault with the appropria-tions, committee members can work withlegislators to strike a better balance.

Hira and his colleagues currently aredrafting a cybersecurity position statement.

Setting homeland security standardsAs engineers develop new security tech-nologies and discover vulnerabilities inexisting systems, IEEE Standards Activi-ties (IEEE-SA) keeps pace with standards.

Currently IEEE-SA is undertaking aninformation assurance initiative (AI).Information assurance is a new disciplinedevoted to the timely and accurate deliv-

ery of information. It attempts tomake all components of a net-work invulnerable to attack.Through this initiative, the IEEEIA Standards Committee of theComputer Society (IASC) workswith the National InformationAssurance Partnership, a collab-oration of the National Instituteof Standards and Technology andthe National Security Agency, tolook at networks as a whole anddetermine how to make the entiresystem secure, rather than just

individual components. The IEEE’s con-tributions to the initiative include stan-dards such as P1619, an encryptedshared-media standard and P1618, a structurefor exchanging digital certificates toestablish the identity of an individual ororganization.

“With the information assurance ini-tiative, the IEEE-SA is taking a leading rolein securing critical infrastructure by pro-viding a neutral platform for the publicand private sectors and academia todevelop relevant standards,” says EdwardRashba, manager for new technical pro-grams at IEEE-SA.

IEEE-SA also serves as the secretariat,or the administrative umbrella, for otheraccredited standards organizations thatare developing standards on radiation

detection devices and instrumentation forhomeland security.

The IEEE also aids homeland securitytechnology through its position on theinterim steering committee of the Ameri-can National Standards Institute’s Home-land Security Standards Panel. The panelis comprised of approximately 10 stan-dards-developing organizations that coor-dinate the accelerated identification anddevelopment of standards to enhance tech-nology that can prevent the occurrence,and mitigate the impact of terroristattacks. In addition, the IEEE has beenworking with the new Department ofHomeland Security to determine whatstandards the department requires.

IEEE-SA will host a workshop later thisyear that will look at security gaps in infor-mation technology and telecommunicationsand brainstorm how to fill in those gaps. •

For More Information

IEEE Publications

http://www.ieee.org/products/periodicals.html

IEEE-USA Research and Development

Committee

http://www.ieeeusa.org/committees/RDC

IEEE Conferences

http://www.ieee.org/conferencesearch

IEEE Standards Activities

http://standards.ieee.org

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He says he can apply systems dynam-ics processes to human problems becauseof two universal laws: Newton’s first law ofthermodynamics says that for every action,there is an equal and opposite reaction;and the Bible teaches that as you sow, soshall you reap. Still, Aggarwal says justbecause he can create a complete model toexplain September 11 doesn’t mean itneeds to be done.

“To make a complete systems dynam-ics model for the terrorist attacks, I wouldhave to cover the walls of a huge room, butthen it will become incomprehensible forthe average person,” Aggarwal says.Instead, he uses partial models to examineindividual aspects of events that led up tothe tragedy so that, as he puts it, even a12-year-old could understand.

Problem solvingSeptember 11 changed Aggarwal’s life.Before then, he was a software consultantat IBM Corp. in Raleigh, N.C., USA.

“On that day I felt that all my educa-tion, research, and experience was no goodif I was unable to apply it to solving prob-lems of the world,” Aggarwal says.

He left IBM to devote his time, he says,“to creating a peaceful world.”

“As an engineer, I have solved problems

for much of my life,” he explains. “Whenthere is a system failure, we go back andtrace it to a network fault or to an overload,crash or congestion.” Aggarwal learnedproblem-solving techniques while studyingsystems management at Punjab Engineer-ing College in Chandigarh and at the IndianInstitute of Technology-Delhi, both in India.He holds a bachelor’s in electronics andelectrical communications engineering, amaster’s in systems management, and aPh.D. in information technology.

“We cannot fix the terrorism problem bymerely tightening security at airports andbeing more vigilant,” he says. “Instead, wemust deal with the core reasons makingpeople embrace such violence.”

Aggarwal is no stranger to violent con-flicts over ideology. A Hindu, he hails fromKashmir in northern India, a hotly dis-puted area that borders Pakistan. He livedthrough two wars there between India andPakistan and watched fighter jets dog-fighting from the roof of his house.Although the conflict continues in hishomeland, Aggarwal says that “livingunder those circumstances teaches youtwo things: compassion and an ability tostruggle and survive and yet still grow.”

The IEEE as a role modelThe problem of terrorism is vast and com-plex, but a model for one solution—creat-

ing a worldwide futuristic, interdepend-ent, and united society, one based on con-necting and cooperating—is closer tohome. For a role model, look no furtherthan the IEEE, Aggarwal says.

“I have always considered the IEEE afamily of technical professionals from allover the world committed to making theworld a better place through their technicaland scientific contributions,” he says.“What’s more, the IEEE builds interde-pendence by making less privileged coun-tries more independent through education.”

Aggarwal cites the IEEE DistinguishedLecturer program as an example of howthe IEEE benefits the world at large. IEEESocieties select members, such as Aggar-wal, to travel to Section or Chapter meet-ings in cities, regions, or countriesthroughout the world to lecture on theirarea of expertise. Often the Society pays forthe lecturer’s travel expenses.

“Those who do not have access to Dis-tinguished Lecturers are being deprivedof knowledge and technology. The IEEE isa role model in the sense that it providesthose opportunities,” Aggarwal says.

Governments, political organizations,and other professional societies can look tothe IEEE as a role model because it is aninternational entity that focuses on coop-eration rather than competition, he notes.

In addition to writing September 11: A

Wake Up Call, he and some engineeringcolleagues also established the Society forUniversal Oneness in Chapel Hill, N.C.,USA, a nonprofit organization whose goalis to educate people about how technol-ogy can be used to create peace.

Aggarwal’s next book, Technology forPeace: A Vision of the Future, grew out ofhis work with IEEE-USA. Due out earlynext year, the book, based on ideas he andothers in an IEEE-USA working group onthe future of technology developed, willexamine how a dialogue for peace can becreated by using technology.

“The objective of our technologiesshould not be to kill, but to save lives,”Aggarwal says. “Engineers and scientistsshould research weapons that do away withthe need to fight and kill.” For example, hesuggests creating electronic or chemicalweapons that create an immediate laughingspell, forcing enemy soldiers to surrender.

“The objective of creating peace by aneffective use of technology has to bemorally owned by each one of us, the engi-neers of the world, the members of theIEEE,” he says.

Visit www.firstbooks.com/bookview/12572 to order a copy of September 11: AWake Up Call or go to www.sfuo.org formore information on the Society for Uni-versal Oneness. Aggarwal can be reachedat abhinav@sfuo.org. •

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THE INSTITUTE | JUNE 2003 15

As engineers, we are in the busi-ness of designing new andbetter ways to solve problems.That same thoughtfulness anddetermination should be

applied to moving engineering educationto a level on a par with doctors andlawyers. I believe this can be accomplishedwith a master’s of engineering degree—perhaps built on a two-year/three-yearframework—that can help ensure thatfuture engineers will have a better techni-cal grounding as well as a moreprofessional status.

Long before nanotechnology,computational cybernetics or spaceflight, there was a call to reformengineering education. It wasmade by C.R. Mann in a 1918 arti-cle he wrote for the CarnegieFoundation for the Advancementof Teaching. In it he urged that lan-guage, economics, and social sci-ence subjects be added to analready overcrowded curriculum.

Even though industry persist-ently calls for engineers to havemore communication and man-agement skills, a solid knowledgebase, and a practical designapproach, universities are still try-ing to cram all that content into onlyfour years. There wasn’t enoughtime to cover these in the 20th cen-tury, and four years certainly won’tbe enough time in the 21st.

I propose restructuring the U.S.undergraduate and graduatedegrees into a professionally ori-ented program based on a five-yearEuropean model such as theDiplomingeniur program in Ger-many, which includes writing amaster thesis similar to thatrequired by the current U.S. mas-ter’s of business administrationdegree. IEEE Fellow Adolf J. Schwab ofthe University Karlsruhe in Germanynoted that his university had tried the sep-arate bachelor’s and master’s degreemodel, but believes “that the classical five-year program is superior.”

We must also address the dual stressescreated by the U.S. education system onpoorly prepared students and rising tuitioncosts. The lack of pre-college preparationleads to a shocking drop-off in potential engi-neers. Less than one-half of students whoenroll as science and engineering majorscomplete a degree within five years, accord-ing to the U.S. National Science Board.

One solution is to split the five yearsinto a two-year preparatory or associate’sdegree followed by a professional three-yearstudy leading to a master’s—rather than abachelor’s—degree as the first professionaldegree. This change would create a para-

professional, two-year degree for those whowant to stop there and become technicians.

Although the first two years of studycould be done at a traditional university, itwould be more cost effective if studentstook these classes at a community or jun-ior college, saving them anywhere fromUS$1000 to US$10 000 a year.

The two-year, pre-engineering under-graduate curriculum would emphasize thefundamentals of engineering, such asmath, physics, and computing. Teachers atcommunity colleges could pay closerattention to students and assign themremedial work, if necessary.

The reduced tuition and frustrationmay lead to more students transferring toa university. Transferring engineering stu-dents—who are usually more focused andmature—have higher retention and grad-uation rates than other students.

The ensuing three years would allowstudents to take discipline-specific courses,conduct hands-on experiments, exploregrowing cross-disciplinary fields, workwith mentors, practice management skills,and carry out team-based projects.

The distinction between techniciansand engineering professionals would helpproperly define an engineer’s role and gaingreater esteem for the profession in thepublic’s eye.

Stakeholders’ challengesThe three main groups that share theresponsibility for evolving engineering

education—universities and their stu-dents, industry, and professional associa-tions—face many challenges.

The effort it would take for universitiesto change how they’ve taught engineersfor the last century cannot be minimized.Universities and accrediting bodies wouldhave to establish new evaluation proce-dures. Students would face a mandatoryextra year of studies at a time when onlythe most ambitious and focused graduateon schedule in a four-year program.Although educators face a difficult transi-tion, the need for well-educated engineersis imperative.

Companies cannot afford to hireemployees who lack proper education,and engineering graduates with bache-lor’s degrees may still have a lot to learn.In the past, industry often subsidizedadvanced degrees, and older employeesturned novices into engineers throughmentoring. But the weak economy andaccelerated pace of technology havecaused many companies to streamlinetheir operations.

“Industry is no longer willing to take onthe role of being an engineering finishingschool,” according to a report by Terry S.King, dean of engineering at Kansas StateUniversity in Manhattan, USA.

Industry may balk at the higher salariesthat more advanced professionals com-mand, but the need for more thoroughschooling before beginning an engineer-ing career has undeniable benefits.

Getting to workProfessional associations traditionallyhave been the guardians of their mem-bers’ educational requirements and pro-gram accreditation. Therefore any changein educational criteria would have to bemandated by these groups, such as theIEEE, the American Society of Mechani-cal Engineers, and others. Just as theAmerican Medical Association and Amer-ican Bar Association took the lead inchanging the parameters of undergradu-ate and graduate curricula for their pro-fessions, engineering associations willhave to do the same.

Responsibility for accreditation iscomplicated by the profusion of engi-neering disciplines, each represented bya different learned society. We need acoalition that would work for the 10 to20 years it may take to change the indi-vidual engineering disciplines.

Much work has already been done.Engineering professional societies havebrainstormed ideas, industry and govern-ment organizations have issued papers, andconferences have been convened. Already,groups such as the Industry UniversityGovernment Roundtable for EngineeringEducation, the National Science Founda-tion, the National Academy of Engineer-ing, the Engineering Deans Council, andthe Corporate Roundtable of the AmericanSociety of Engineering Education havebeen working on updating and enhancingengineering education. •

E D U C A T I O N

BY JAMES M. TIENIEEE Vice President

Educational Activities

Time to Think About

a MASTER’Sof ENGINEERING

President’s Circle (US$100 000 and above)

Axel N. Eliasen★ IEEE Power Engineering Society

Semiconductor Research Foundation★ Siemens AG

The Federation of Electric Power Companies Japan

BY KATHY KOWALENKO

Dana Star remembers herfather, Warren D. White, as aquiet, careful, shy man wholoved his family. But the engi-

neering world will remember White, anIEEE Life Fellow, for the Warren D. WhiteAward for Excellence in Radar Engineer-ing that Star and her brother establishedto honor excellence in radar engineering.

White, a radar engineer who workedon classified projects for Airborne Instru-ments Laboratory in Mineola, N.Y., USA,wrote numerous technical papers onradar and held several patents.

According to Star’s husband, Michael,White pondered solutions to everydayproblems like traffic jams. Rather than

getting upset about being stuck on theLong Island Expressway, he wrote a paperusing a mathematical formula to explainwhy traffic jams happen.

White also spent much time thinkingabout his family. He donated funds tomemorialize loved ones by among otherthings establishing a scholarship in honorof his father, and creating a park bench inhis wife’s name.

When White died in 1998, Starsearched for the perfect tribute to herfather’s achievements.

“My brother Warren and I decided thatbecause our father made all those dona-tions for others, we felt that he wouldhave wanted us to do something for him,”Star says, “although when we asked ourfather for some ideas before he died, he

never had anything specific in mind.”The siblings first considered a schol-

arship at the university where their fatherreceived his degree, the University of Mis-souri School of Mines and Metallurgy inRolla, USA, but then decided against itbecause he used to say that, “scholarshipswere always given to students who had toshow financial need,” Star says. “My fatherfelt that a student who did really goodwork should also get some kind of rewardas well.”

Star looked to the IEEE after sherecalled that her father attended IEEEconferences to upgrade his skills andlearn about the latest research in radar tospark ideas for new projects.

She fondly remembers when Whitewas elevated to an IEEE Fellow.

“My father was tremendously flatteredby that recognition,” she says.

Because neither Star nor her brotherare engineers, they weren’t familiar withthe IEEE. Dana is a teacher in Montreal,Canada, who works with students withvisual impairments, and Warren, an airpollution expert, works at the Universityof California at Davis, USA. The pairasked their father’s former co-workersabout the organization and learned thatthe IEEE could help their family fund anappropriate recognition.

“The Foundation staff talked to usabout our purpose, what we wanted todo, and what our father’s preferencewould have been,” Star notes.

The IEEE Foundation helped establishthe Warren D. White Memorial Fund thatsupports the annual award presented bythe IEEE Aerospace and Electronic Sys-tems Society. This US$2000 honorariumand a commemorative plaque recognizeoutstanding achievements for a majortechnical advance, or a series of advancesover time, in the art of radar engineering.

“My brother and I felt the award wouldhave been something both our parentswould have been very pleased with,” Starsays. “We really feel we did a good thing;it was a very satisfying experience.”

The first award was presented to Mar-shall Greenspan in May 2000 at the IEEEInternational Radar Conference held inWashington, D.C.

White’s children attended the cere-mony and met their father’s friends whohad come especially for the award’s firstpresentation.

“At the ceremony, my father’s col-leagues shared their memories of him,”Star says. “I learned that my father wasgenuinely well respected as an engineerand as a person who was willing to sitwith other engineers, listen, and help fig-ure things out.” •

Father’s Memory Honored with Radar Award

16 THE INSTITUTE | JUNE 2003

F O U N D A T I O N D O N O R L I S T

Leadership Makes the DifferenceTHE IEEE AND THE IEEE FOUNDATION thank the following individuals, families, foun-dations, corporations, and IEEE units that provided the foundation with philanthropic sup-port during 2002. These contributions helped support programs to advance technical educa-tion and to promote the beneficial use of technology.

Not all donors are listed because of space constraints. But every gift is crucial to the devel-opment and expansion of new programs, and the IEEE Foundation would not be able to growwithout the contributions of so many.

For more information about charitable-giving opportunities, contact Kristina Collmann inthe IEEE Development Office at +1 732 562 3915 or by e-mail to supportieee@ieee.org.

The White family

in the 1960s

Council of Honor ($50 000 to $99 999)

TRW Foundation

Benefactor ($25 000 to $49 999)

AT&T Labs★ Charles Edison Fund

IBM Corp.IEEE Lasers and Electro-Optics Society

★ IEEE Signal Processing Society★ United Engineering Foundation, Inc.

Leader($10 000 to $24 999)

Stephen and Karen Bernacki★ Frank A. Brand

British Telecom★ Emerson and Elizabeth Pugh Fund of

the Fidelity FundIEEE Electron Devices SocietyIEEE Solid-State Circuits SocietyIEEE Standards AssociationIntel FoundationOlga Kirchmayer

Lockheed Martin Corp.Lucent TechnologiesMotorola FoundationMotorola Inc.Nokia Corp.

★ Emerson W. PughSony Corp.Texas Instruments Inc.The Dow Chemical Co.

Patron($5000 to $9999)

ABB Switzerland AG, Power Electronics Division

Paul BaranDorsey & Whitney FoundationDorsey & Whitney LLPIEEE Circuits and Systems SocietyIEEE Industry Applications SocietyIEEE Philadelphia SectionRobert E. LarsonDr. Tsuneo NakaharaNEC Corp.

★ Jun-ichi NishizawaPaul and Evelyn Baran FundS&C Electric Co.Silicon Power Corp.The National Grid Co. PLC

Associate ($2500 to $4999)

Lawrence E. CrooksThe Elias Family in Memory of Peter

EliasIEEE Antennas and Propagation

SocietyIEEE Johnstown SectionIEEE Lehigh Valley SectionIEEE Microwave Theory and

Techniques SocietyJohn Meggitt

★ John K. MenoudakosPhilips Electronics NV Sarnoff Corp.Dr. James Tai

Sponsor ($1000 to $2499)

Armstrong Memorial ResearchFoundation Inc.

David K. BartonWallace B. Behnke, Jr.

★ Joseph F. DouglasCharles A. EldonNorris C. HekimianDr. Narain G. and Joyce Hingorani

Jean E. HoltzRobert F. HoltzIEEE Aerospace and Electronic

Systems SocietyIEEE Control Systems SocietyIEEE Electromagnetic Compatibility

SocietyIEEE Engineering in Medicine and

Biology SocietyIEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing

SocietyIEEE Santa Clara Valley EMC SocietyIEEE Southeastern Michigan Chapter

(VIII) EMCIEEE Susquehanna SectionIEEE Youngstown Section (Sharon

Section)Richard J. Jaeger Jr.Susumu KobayashiPeter A Lewis, P.E.PSE&GTheodore S. SaadDaniel J. SeneseRobert D. SmithHerbert F. SomermeyerJohn A. WoollamSakae Yamamura

★ Indicates a Multi-Year Pledge

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“IEEE is a magnet bringing engineers together.Engineering is a language that transcends bureaucracyand nationalism. It gives to us all a common languageand understanding.” Ya-Qin Zhang, IEEE Fellow

IEEE. Building relationships in a worldwide community of innovators.

IEEE Brings the World to YouMake Connections at IEEE Conferences ■ ■

Don’t miss the next IEEE conference youneed for your career. Find events in yourlocal area or technical discipline at:

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18 THE INSTITUTE | JUNE 2003

Barry Allen Bell,FormerWashingtonSection ChairBY NORMAN BELECKI IEEE Fellow

I met Barry by accident during a trip to Leeds& Northrup, the instrumentation company,north of Philadelphia, Pa., USA, in the early‘70s. Microprocessors were just then com-ing on the market and Barry was designinginstrumentation that incorporated them.

My boss and I were struck by Barry’s

work and the broad and long-term viewshe held about electronics as applied toinstrumentation in general. We thoughtthat he would be an ideal person to trans-form the Electrical Instruments Group atthe National Bureau of Standards into aviable source of measurement standardsand technology. He soon joined thebureau and, under his direction, thegroup developed phase standards, dataconverter calibration systems, ultra-high-speed sampling voltmeters, and electronicbridges for impedance measurements.

Barry took a great deal of ribbing abouthis lengthy group meetings and the levelof detail he would go into on a subject, buthis people realized that, as boring as thesemeetings might be, they always knewwhat was going on. Throughout his

career, he was an exceptionally nurturingsupervisor, and set a good balancebetween providing technical guidance andencouraging people to do their own thing.

Finally, if something had to be done,no matter how onerous it was, Barrywould volunteer to do it. At the end of hiscareer, he was promoted to deputy divi-sion chief, something he had looked for-ward to because it meant giving up rou-tine administrative responsibilities andmyriad other chores that comprise toomuch of line supervisors’ work. Not longafterward, Barry was asked to resume hisold job temporarily, but for a larger group.He willingly complied because the jobneeded to be done. When there was a con-flict, Barry always put his team’s needsahead of his personal desires. •

PASSINGS

BARRY ALLEN BELL, 65

DIED: 13 March 2003

MEMBER GRADE: Life Fellow

EDUCATION: Stanford University in

California, USA, and Yale University

in New Haven, Conn., USA

FIELD OF INTEREST: Electronics

standards

CAREER MILESTONES: Bell worked at

Leeds & Northrup before joining the

National Bureau of Standards, now the

National Institute of Standards and

Technology (NIST) in Gaithersburg, Md.,

USA. There, he was leader of the Electronic

Instrumentation and Metrology Group for

25 years, and became deputy director of

the Electricity Division in 2001. He served

as a NIST post-doctoral advisor since 1993.

IEEE VOLUNTEER ACTIVITIES:

Washington Section Chair, 1993 to 1994;

Instrumentation and Measurement Society

Technical Committee Chair, 1976 to 2003.

AWARDS: U.S. Department of Commerce

Silver Medal in 1981 for developing the

technical basis of a measurements

program to support modern electronics

systems and instrumentation.

MEMBER RECOGNITIONS

Microwave PioneerReceives AwardBY KATHY KOWALENKO

The next time you relax while listening to a favorite CDor use a phone that lights up in the dark, think of IEEEFellow BERNARD DELOACH JR. Not only did he find away to extend the life of lasers for use in such productsas CD players, but he also invented a process to incorpo-rate visible light-emitting diodes into telephones. He wasa key figure behind the millimeter wave communicationsystem for high-frequency applications.

To recognize these and other technical contributionshe made in the fields of microwaves and optics, DeLoachreceived the Eta Kappa Nu Vladimir Karapetoff Award on28 April. This annual award is given to an electrical engi-neering practitioner who has distinguished himself orherself through an invention, development, or discoveryin electrotechnology. Eta Kappa Nu is a U.S. electricaland computer engineering honor society.

DeLoach spent nearly his entire 33-year career withAT&T Bell Laboratories in Murray Hill, N.J., USA, wherehe retired in 1989. His work on microwave sources in themid-1960s culminated in the discovery of the impact ava-lanche and transit time device, known as an IMPATTdiode. This diode efficiently generates micro- and mil-limeter waves above the frequency ranges at which tran-sistors normally operate when a battery is placed acrossit. This discovery ultimately led to AT&T’s deployment ofmillimeter-wave communication systems in its coppertelephone cables. But the IMPATT diode never achievedits place in the sun, according to DeLoach.

“IMPATT’s unique place in history was bypassed bypolitical decisions that allowed MCI’s microwave routesto parallel AT&T’s heavy-duty routes,” he explains. “Thegrowth of the AT&T systems turned negative instead ofpositive, and we didn’t need a heavy-duty cable system.”

Today, IMPATT devices are used in missiles and otherhigh-frequency power applications.

DeLoach next turned his attention to researching howto create a laser chip that lasted long enough to make afiber-optics communication system possible.

“The world record for laser life in 1973 was 30 min-utes,” DeLoach says. “When we finished, the averagetime to failure was 1000 years.” Besides enabling AT&Tto get into the fiber-optics business, lasers with that sortof lifetime are today used in products like CD players.

DeLoach also is credited with inventing a process to

incorporate visible light-emitting diodes into AT&T’shome Trimline telephones to illuminate the keypad. Heholds 18 patents.

During his career, DeLoach also received the IEEEDavid Sarnoff Medal in 1975 and the IEEE Medal of Engi-neering Excellence in 1993 for the first development ofhighly reliable semiconductor lasers. He’s written numer-ous papers for IEEE publications.

DeLoach is a professor with the department of electricalengineering at the University of Central Florida in Orlando,USA, where he researches microwave technology. •

For Computer Processing ArchitectureIEEE Member MIKKO HERMAN LIPASTI was also

honored by Eta Kappa Nu with its Outstanding Young

Electrical Engineer Award for his contributions to

computer processing architecture. The award is

presented annually to computer or electrical engineers

under the age of 35 who have made outstanding

professional achievements and have been active in

service to their community.

Lipasti is an assistant professor of electrical and

computer engineering at the University of Wisconsin-

Madison, USA. He co-authored a textbook on computer

architecture and wrote a groundbreaking paper on value

locality and value prediction. Value prediction ensures

that a programming instruction will load the same value

that it did the previous time it executed.

Before joining the university, Lipasti worked for IBM

Corp. in software, advanced processors, system

performance analysis, and design guidance, as well as

in kernel implementation of operating systems. A

kernel is a software module that encapsulates an

elementary function of a system.

P R O D U C T S & S E R V I C E S

Tracking down the right tech-nical paper used to be longand tedious. You’d make atrip to your university, gov-ernment, or corporate library,

then spend hours flipping through dustyjournals or scanning microfilm reels.

Today there are dozens of electroniclibraries that you can access from youroffice or home. Choosing the one that isright for you can be frustrating. But thebest place to start could be the IEEE. Afterall, it publishes 30 percent of all theworld’s technical articles.

Seek and XploreYour first stop should be IEEE XploreTM,the IEEE’s portal to its huge repository ofonline publications. As a member, you canaccess any abstract record from IEEEtransactions, journals, magazines, or con-ference proceedings published since 1988,as well as the abstracts of all current stan-dards. (For full-text access, you’ll have tosubscribe to the IEEE Member DigitalLibrary; see below.)

If your Society offers online access topublications, you can read the full text ofthe ones you subscribe to through IEEEXplore using your IEEE Web Account. AWeb Account is a personally createdunique username and password that letsmembers access a variety of IEEE onlineproducts and services. Some collectionseven go back to 1950.

Free access to selected publicationsfrom other IEEE Societies may beincluded with your Society subscription.For example, members of the IEEE Elec-tron Devices Society receive onlineaccess to selected publications of fourother Societies: Information Theory;Reliability; Ultrasonics, Ferroelectricsand Frequency Control; and MicrowaveTheory and Techniques.

By signing up for the e-mail alert serv-ice offered on the IEEE Xplore site, you’llreceive e-mail notification of recently postedjournals and magazines. You choose thetitles that you want to know about.

Members working on multidisciplinaryprojects who need full-text articles from sev-eral IEEE publications should consider theIEEE Member Digital Library (IEEE MDL).

With this yearly subscription, individ-uals can retrieve from IEEE Xplore nearlyall articles published within the past five

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IEEE MDL features a personal onlinefiling cabinet that lets you save the articlesfor later viewing. Documents can besorted by publication name, primaryauthor, and original filing date.

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Using a credit card, single article pur-chasers will get immediate access to thearticle, which can be viewed three timeswithin 30 days and saved on a hard drive.

Special collectionsSpecific Societies—such as Computer,Engineering in Medicine and Biology,Solid States Circuits, Power Engineering,and Lasers and Electro-Optics—offer theirown digital libraries that provide onlineaccess to the individual Society’s maga-zines, transactions, and conferencepapers. Visit the Society’s Web site to sub-scribe.

The IEEE also sells online collectionsof its publications to institutional cus-tomers. If you work for a corporation, gov-ernment facility, or university that has asubscription to one of these collections,you can search and access abstracts, cita-tion records, and full-text documents thatare part of the organization’s subscription.

Earlier this year the IEEE introducedthe IEEE Biomedical Engineering Library,which has more than 40 000 full-text IEEEand IEE articles and papers on biotech-nology and biomedicine. Another new col-lection, the IEEE Information TechnologyLibrary, includes more than 1500 confer-ence proceedings and 38 periodicals incomputing, communications, signal pro-cessing, and circuits and systems.

Articles and their abstracts in these col-lections are fully searchable by index term,browsable by author, and also available inprintable PDF formats.

Articles from other publishersIf you need articles from journals the IEEEdoes not publish, turn to Ask*IEEE. The

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