2015-09-09 Meeting Notes

Date

Sep 09, 2015

Attendees

AY 2015-2016 Members: Jont Allen, Can Bayram, Mohamed Ali Belabbas, John Dallesasse, Arne Fliflet, Patricia Franke, Pavan Kumar Hanumolu, Kiruba Haran, Yih-Chun Hu, Nam Sung Kim, Erhan Kudeki (Ex-Officio), Rakesh Kumar, Stephen Levinson, Yi Lu, Jonathan Makela (Chair), Serge Minin, Chandrasekhar Radhakrishnan, Maxim Raginsky, William Sanders (Ex-Officio), Christopher Schmitz, Jose Schutt-Aine, Paris Smaragdis, Lav Varshney, Shobha Vasudevan, Venugopal Veeravalli, Lara Waldrop, Hao Zhu

Discussion Items

Minutes

• The meeting was called to order at 2:05pm.
• Minutes from September 2, 2015 were approved with a minor correction.
• Raginsky gave an overview of his proposed ECE498MR: Introduction to Stochastic Systems course
  • The need for the course was identified in discussions of the curriculum committee a year or two ago as well as discussion with alumni who mentioned it would have been good to be better prepared to handle stochastics.
  • The expectation is that the 498MR course would enroll around 30 students at the junior/senior level but that this might also serve as a random-process type course for graduate students not prepared for, or interested in, ECE 534.  This course would sit in the progression of 313->498MR->534->561.  Long-term goal would be to serve 60+ students and be a M-of-N course in the permanent curriculum.
  • Minin asked if the course would cover topics of parameter estimation and phase noise.  Raginsky replied that, to some extent, these could be covered at some level in topics #9 (Feedback and control) and #7 (Noise) of the proposed syllabus.
  • Levinson asked if this would satisfy the probability requirement for students transferring in to the curriculum at later stages in their career. Raginsky replied that this was not the intent.
  • Raginsky requested that the course time be changed to 2:00-3:20.
  • It was suggested that the prerequisite be changed from ECE 210 to ECE 310 (in addition to ECE 313).  This would ensure that enrolled students would have familiarity with some of the topics (e.g., z-transforms) needed in this course.  For the purpose of the 498MR course, this would also ensure a higher level of student maturity.  Raginsky agreed, and will evaluate whether 310 or 210 is the correct prerequisite for future iterations of the course.
  • The course was approved pending the two changes (course time and prerequisite).
• There was a general discussion about how to better advertise x98 courses to our students
  • The x98 course instructor should look into advertising their course in lower-level courses that would naturally feed into theirs.
  • A link could be placed in the curriculum map to the current and future x98 offerings.
  • A listing of the x98 courses could be included in the mentoring email sent out to faculty before the semesterly mentoring sessions begin.  This would notify faculty of the specific offerings for the next semester, which they could encourage the appropriate students to take.
  • Advertisements can be put on the screens throughout ECEB, although it was pointed out that these rotate rather rapidly and may not be the best venue for such an advertisement.
• Bayram gave an overview of his proposed ECE498CB: Energy Conversion Devices course
  • The course would focus on two specific device types (LEDs and solar cells), how they work and how they are designed.  Students would perform a final project designing and simulating the design using a freeware 1D simulation tool.  They will learn how to use the design tool through homework assignments.
    
  • Waldrop asked about the formats of the final project presentations.  Bayram replied the students would write a four-page paper formatted per Applied Physics Letters guidelines and give a 10-minute presentation.
  • Makela asked about prerequisites. Bayram replied that he envisioned students from different disciplines (i.e., Chemistry, Material Sciences, etc) successfully taking the course. Dallesasse mentioned that there was a sizable number of students from Material Sciences currently enrolled in ECE 340. A discussion ensued in which it was decided that having a prerequisite of Phys 214 (which would set the appropriate requirement for some knowledge of quantum) and co-requisite of ECE 340 (or permission of instructor) would suffice.  
  • Haran mentioned that the title was a bit vague and could be seen by students to imply that the course would cover motors or other power-system type devices.  Allen concurred that there are many types of energy conversion devices not included in the course's scope.  After lengthy discussion, it was decided that the title would be changed to "LEDs and Solar Cells".
  • The course was approved pending the two changes (prerequisites and title).
• The committee briefly considered the 498RS proposal, but ran out of time.  Makela will request additional details from Srikant and extend an invitation for him to attend the next committee meeting.
• The meeting was adjourned at 2:55pm.

Action Items