Young Professionals Panel
Date/Time: Sunday, 19 January 2025, 8:15pm – 9:15pm
Organizer: Davi Rodrigues, The University of Texas at El Paso
This interactive panel will offer a rare opportunity to tap into the minds of accomplished professionals who have navigated the complexities of either industry or academia. The panelists will provide guidance to young professionals and answer questions from the audience. Join us at the Young Professionals Panel for a chance to connect, learn, and ignite your career!
Panelists
Dr. Kevin Chuang is a Technology Leader at Analog Devices, Inc. (ADI), Wilmington, MA, USA, where he focuses on accelerating radio technology innovations for next-generation wireless communications at the intersection of RF systems and signal processing. Kevin is well-versed in startup, federally funded R&D laboratories, and publicly traded companies with a broad experience in developing wireless technologies from systems to circuits. Prior to joining ADI, he has co-founded NanoSemi, a spin-off from the MIT and MIT Lincoln Laboratory, where he contributed to the development of wideband linearization systems from concept to product launch, which was subsequently acquired by MaxLinear. Previously, he held wireless systems design and RF/mixed-signal integrated circuits and systems design positions at Wafer LLC, MIT Lincoln Laboratory and Samsung Electro-Mechanics in Beverly MA, Lexington MA, and Atlanta GA, respectively. He received the B.S. degree in electrical engineering from the University of California at Santa Barbara (UCSB), and the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical and computer engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology. He is a senior member of IEEE and holds more than 25 IEEE publications and 20 U.S. patents.
Dr. Bernadette Smith as a BS in Physics from the California Institute of Technology and a PhD in Physics from the University of Colorado at Boulder. Her PhD research concentrated on searches for supersymmetry at the Large Hadron Collider at The European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN). Finding a new passion for instrumentation and measurement science, she pivoted careers and is now a Senior R&D Software Engineer at Keysight Technologies. She has been with Keysight Technologies since 2011, working primarily with vector network analyzers. She currently specializes in microwave and RF noise figure measurements, calibration and correction (including fixturing), and uncertainty analysis, and has one patent in this area.
Dr. Miguel Velez-Reyes is the George W. Edwards/El Paso Electric Distinguished Professor in Engineering and Chair of the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department at the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP). He also holds a joint appointment with Pacific Northwest National Laborary as a Senior Scientist.
Dr. Velez-Reyes is an accomplished educator, researcher and mentor. He is an experienced researcher in exploitation of remote sensing data for earth system science, defense and security, and space situational awareness. His research focuses on integrating physical, statistical, and machine-learning approaches for remote sensing signal analytics. His work is presented in over 180 publications in journals, book chapters, and conference proceedings, and has supervised over 60 post-doctoral, doctoral and master students. Dr. Velez-Reyes is a first generation in college student who received the BSEE degree from the University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez (UPRM), in 1985, and the MSEE, the Electrical Eng. D., and the PhD degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1988, 1988, and 1992 respectively. He chairs the SPIE Conference on Algorithms, Technologies and Applications for Multispectral and Hyperspectral Imaging. His technical achievements and service to the community have been recognized with the distinction of Fellow of SPIE (The International Society for Optics and Photonics) for his contributions to hyperspectral image processing, and Fellow of the Academy of Arts and Sciences of Puerto Rico. In 1997, he was one of 60 recipients from across the United States and its territories of the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE) from the White House. He received the IEEE Walter Fee Outstanding Young Engineer Award in 1999. He is a board member of the Inclusive Engineering Consortium and an advocate to provide access to excellent education to students from underserved populations and foster social mobility of students from economically disadvantaged backgrounds. He is a life member of SHPE and SACNAS, and Senior Member of IEEE. He is also a member of ASEE, and AGU.
Dr. Sandra Cruz-Pol was born and raised in Puerto Rico. She received a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Penn State University working with passive and active satellite and ground-based sensors studying atmospheric gases and the sea surface emissivity. She worked in active remote sensing at UMass for her MS degree. Her BS degree is from University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez (UPRM). All three degrees were obtained with the Suma Cum Laude distinction.
Before joining the NSF Engineering Division as a Program Director for the Engineering Research Centers (ERC) in 2018, she was a professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department at UPRM since 1991. Her interests include microwave sensors, weather radars and climate monitoring. She was a member of the U.S. National Academies (NAS) Committee on Radio Frequencies (CORF) from 2010-2019. She was also an appointed member of the NAS Active Spectrum Study. Prior to coming at NSF as a permanent PD, she was an NSF rotator as a Spectrum Manager and as the Program Director for the NSF EARS (Enhancing Access to the Radio Spectrum) program in 2014. She was appointed by NSF as member of the U.S. Delegation for Spectrum Management to the U.N. International Telecommunications Union (ITU) in Geneva and was the NSF Representative for the Interdepartment Radio Advisory Committee (IRAC) at the U.S. National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) and for several subcommittees. She received the NASA Faculty Award for Research in 2002. Dr. Cruz-Pol is a Senior member of the IEEE. She was the Associate Editor for University Affairs for the IEEE GRSS Newsletter for 5 years.
