The BWRC 2012 Annual Report is here!  Get information on the cutting-edge projects and research at BWRC and get some insight into the faculty, students, staff and supporting organizations that make it all happen.

BWRC Grad Student Matthew Spencer Receives EEGSA's Someone Special Award - The award recognizes students, staff, and faculty members who bring something special to the Berkeley electrical engineering community. Matt was nominated for his effectiveness and willingness to help as a GSI, in addition to his great sense of humor and positive attitude. Congratulations, Matt!

BWRC Grad Student Rikky Muller Receives Demetri Angelakos Memorial Achievement Award - The award recognizes a student who, in addition to conducting his/her research, unselfishly takes the time to help colleagues beyond the normal cooperation existing between fellow students. Congratulations, Rikky!

IEEE Spectrum highlights EECS research in article "MEMS Switches for Low-Power Logic" -  The research is a collaboration between Professor Elad Alon and Tsu-Jae King Liu from UC Berkeley, Dejan Markovic from UCLA, and Vladimir Stojanovic of MIT. Click here for the article.

After over 25 years of service at UC Berkeley, BWRC staff member Kevin Zimmerman is retiring! We wish him the best in all his future endeavors. For pictures of our retirement party, click here.

Upcoming Event: BWRC Open House - BWRC is hosting an open house on Friday, February 24, 2012 from 8:30am-3:00pm. Come meet our faculty and students, discuss current research, and see the BWRC facilities. The agenda can be viewed here.

Berkeley Research Featured in San Francisco Magazine - The article, which looks at the groundbreaking advances in brain-computer interfaces taking place at both UCSF and UC Berkeley, features BWRC Co-Director Jan Rabaey among other top researchers from both institutions. The full article can be viewed here.

Research and Faculty Group Meetings Schedule. Research groups and faculty meet on a weekly basis to review and discuss ongoing research projects at BWRC. kiosk/calendar/Weekly%20Mtgs%20calendar.htm

Professor Jan Rabaey elected to Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium for Science and the Arts - Professor Rabaey has been elected a Foreign member of the Royal Academy of Arts and Sciences in Belgium. Composed of four classes - natural sciences, humanities, arts, and technical sciences - each comprising only 50 members and 50 associated members, the Dutch-speaking Royal Academy of Belgium for Arts and Sciences is a distinguished institution. Congratulations to Prof. Rabaey on this achievement!

CASPER Project and BWRC Hardware Platforms Featured in MATLAB Digest – “Developing Radio Astronomy Instruments with Simulink Libraries” by Berkeley grad student Andrew Siemion appears in August MATLAB Digest. Click here to read article.

Professor Jan Rabaey Gives Plenary Presentation at 2011 VLSI Symposium - "The Swarm at the Edge of the Cloud - A New Perspective" presented in Kyoto, Japan on June 15, 2011. Click here for PDF.

The Voices of DAC: A Chip in Your Brain? with Professor Jan Rabaey - Professor Jan Rabaey spoke with Karen Bartleson and Yvette Huygen of Synopsys about the technology of putting microchips into people's brains. See the video interview here.

RFIC 2011 Best Paper Award, Second Place - “A 90GHz Pulsed-Transmitter with Near-Field/Far-Field Energy Cancellation using a Dual-Loop Antenna” - Amin Arbabian, Shinwon Kang, Steven Callender, Bagher Afshar, Jun-Chau Chien, and Ali Niknejad - UCB/BWRC, Broadcom.

Papers Accepted for the 2011 International Solid State Circuits Conference - “A 0.013mm, 2 5µw DC-coupled Neural Signal Acquisition IC with 0.5v Supply” - Rikky Muller, Simone Gambini, Jan M. Rabaey. "65nm CMOS 4-Element Sub-34mw/Element 60GHz Phased-Array Transceiver" - Maryam Tabesh, Cristian Marcu, Ling Kai Kong, Shinwon Kang, Elad Alon, Ali Niknejad. "A Compact 1v 18.6dBm 60GHz Power Amplifier in 65nm CMOS" - Jiashu Chen, Ali Niknejad.

2011 DAC/ISSCC Student Design Contest winner - “SRAM Dynamic Stability Characterization Using Pulsed Word-lines in 45nm CMOS” - Seng Oon Toh - UC Berkeley / BWRC

ISSCC 2010 Jack Raper Outstanding Technology Directions - “Demonstration of Integrated Micro-Electro-Mechanical Switch Circuits for VLSI Applications” - Fred Chen et al-MIT, Mathew Spencer, Rhesa Nathanael, Abhinav   Gupta, Hei Kam, Vincent Pott, Jaeseonk Jeon, Tsu-Jae King Liu, Elad Alon-UCB/BWRC, Dejan Markovic et al-UCLA.

ISSCC 2010 Jack Kilby Outstanding Student Paper Award - "A 90GHz-Carrier 30GHz-Bandwidth Hybrid Switching Transmitter with Integrated Antenna" - Amin Arbabian, Bagher Afshar, Jun-Chau Chien, Shinwon Kang, Steven Callender, Ehsan Adabi, Ali Niknejad-UCB/BWRC and STMicroelectronics, University of Padova.

Intellectual Property Strategies for New Berkeley Ventures: A Framework - Berkeley, CA — November 23, 2010 - This report identifies how successful Berkeley technology entrepreneurs have approached IP decisions and strategies. Intended primarily as a resource for graduate students and faculty within UC Berkeley, entrepreneurs in the Silicon Valley and throughout the world may also find the report's universal themes helpful in building startups. Report by Christine Ho, Beverly Alexander, Susan Broderick and Ikhlaq Sidhu >> Link to report

Connectivity Brokerage - Enabling Seamless Cooperation in Wireless Networks (A White Paper) - BWRC publication — October 22, 2010 - The explosive growth in the density of wirelessly connected devices and their traffic load is raising the interference level and gradually leading to a severe spectrum shortage. Traditional approaches to address this challenge (such as spectrum regulation, improvements in spectral efficiency, and reducing cell sizes) are running out of steam or are facing operational roadblocks. Fortunately, a number of approaches have been emerging from the research community that may help to address the looming spectrum crisis.... >> Link to publication

5 Reasons Super Wi-Fi Might Not Be So Super - Discover Magazine article — October 6, 2010 - Andrew Moseman spoke this afternoon to Mubaraq Mishra from UC-Berkeley, who studies all kinds of angles about how the white spaces will be used. The first problem, he says, is that while these newly opened areas could greatly improve Internet speeds in rural areas, people packed into cities won’t see as much benefit... >> Full Story

World-renowned astronomer Donald C. Backer dies at age 66 - Berkeley — July 30, 2010 - Don Backer, a professor in the Department of Astronomy at the University of California, Berkeley, and a world leader in the field of radio astronomy, died on Sunday, July 25, after collapsing outside his home. He was 66. Don Backer was a wonderful collaborator of BWRC, and all of us here are truly saddened by his loss. >> Full Story

Upcoming BWRC Seminars - See the BWRC Seminars page for information on upcoming seminars: http://bwrc.eecs.berkeley.edu/seminars/. 

BWRC photo album - Check out photos of our retreats, seminars and more!  >>More...