Annual ESL Awards

Every year we recognize the accomplishments of the ESL community through the award categories described below during the Annual Awards Ceremony held in December.

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Award Categories

  1. Best PhD Dissertation: Awarded annually, the award is given to the ESL Ph.D. student who completed and wrote the best Ph.D. dissertation between November 1st of the previous year and October 31st of the current year. Nominations are judged based on the technical quality, documentation quality, and the recognition/understanding of existing body of knowledge in the field. The award recipient receives a $300 monetary award and a framed certificate. 
     
  2. Best Journal Paper: Awarded annually, the award is given to the members of the ESL community who published the best paper between November 1st of the previous year and October 31st of the current year. Nominations are judged based on the technical quality, documentation quality, the recognition/understanding of existing body of knowledge in the field, and the technical impact of the journal. The award recipient receives a $300 monetary award and a framed certificate.
     
  3. Test of Time Award: Established in 2019, this annual award recognizes researchers who have published widely referenced in peer reviewed literature. The winning paper is based on statistics from Google Scholar for any ESL paper published in the calendar year five years prior to the current calendar year. The award recipient receives a $300 monetary award and a framed certificate.
     
  4. Above and Beyond Staff Award: Established in 2016, this annual award recognizes an ESL operations staff member, who has been employed at ESL since November 1st of the previous year, for his/her excellent service to the ESL community between November 1st of the previous year and October 31st of the current year. The nominations are judged based on how nominee exceeds beyond the normal expectations for his/her job, his/her demonstration of noteworthy service, and his/her contributions to the development and growth of the ESL community. The award recipient receives a $300 monetary award and a framed certificate.
     
  5. Above and Beyond Researcher Award: Established in 2016, this annual award recognizes an ESL researcher/faculty member for his/her non-scholarly activities that lead to increased ESL visibility, better social and technical atmosphere at ESL, and service on professional societies and organizations. Current ESL researchers or faculty members who have been employed at ESL since November 1 of the previous year are eligible for this award. The award recipient receives a $300 monetary award and a framed certificate.
     
  6. Above and Beyond Student Award: Established in 2016, this annual award recognizes an ESL student for his/her overall excellent performance based on his/her scholarly achievements, awards/recognition, involvement in the professional organizations/societies, contributions to the ESL community, and non-religious volunteer activities between November 1st of the previous year and October 31st of the current year. The award recipient receives a $300 monetary award and a framed certificate.
     
  7. Best Master’s Thesis: Awarded until 2016, the award was given to the ESL Masters student who completed and wrote the best Masters thesis between November 1st of the previous year and October 31st of the current year. 
     
  8. Best Technical Report: Awarded until 2016, the award was given to the members of the ESL community who wrote the best research technical report. 

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Nomination Particulars and Deadline

Any member of the ESL community can nominate a student, staff, researcher or faculty for the appropriate category. A call for nominations is sent in October annually to all ESL members. For the current year, the deadline for submitting nominations is Monday, November 13, 2023 at noon. A nomination could be anonymous (give a hard copy of the nomination package to the designated person) as long as it is complete. A committee consisting of faculty and researchers reviews and selects the best submission in each category. Awards Committee members are ineligible for the awards in the year they will be serving; however, they may submit the materials that were ineligible for consideration in the current award year to the new award selection committee in the next award cycle. If you have any questions about the award submission process or award categories, please contact Michelle Diefenbach.

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2023 Annual ESL Awards Selection Committee

  • CC Mao
  • Caglar Yardim
  • Mohammad Al-Khaldi
  • Mark Andrews
  • Justin Kuric

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2023 Annual ESL Award Recipients

Dr. Robert Dybdal ElectroScience Laboratory Award - Best Dissertation:

Mohammad Neinavaie, "Cognitive sensing and navigation with unknown terrestrial and LEO satellite signals"
Advisor: Professor Zak Kassas

Dr. Robert Dybdal ElectroScience Laboratory Award Best Dissertation - Runner Up:

Justin Kuric, "Use of Spherical Mode Expansions for In-Situ Calibration of Antenna Arrays"
Advisor: Professor Jiti Gupta

Dr. Robert Dybdal ElectroScience Laboratory Award - Best Paper

Brandi Downs, "Assessing the Relative Performance of GNSS-R Flood Extent Observations: Case Study in South Sudan"
Advisors: Andrew O'Brien and Professor Joel Johnson

Dr. Robert Dybdal ElectroScience Laboratory Award - Best Paper – Runner Up

Sharbel Kozhaya, "Multi-constellation blind beacon estimation, Doppler tracking, and opportunistic positioning with OneWeb, Starlink, Iridium NEXT, and Orbcomm LEO Satellites"
Advisor: Professor Zak Kassas

Above and Beyond Staff Award:

Jeff Blankenship, Laboratory Supervisor 

Above and Beyond Student Award:

Krutant Mehta
Advisor: Professor Jiti Gupta

Above and Beyond Researcher Award:

Professor Asimina Kiourti

Test of Time Award:

Shane Smith, S. Smith et al., “Production and integration of the ATLAS Insertable B-Layer,” Journal of instrumentation, vol. 13, issue 5, May 2018, soi: 10.1088/1748-0221/13105/T05008.

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ESL Award Submission Process

If you have any questions about the award submission process or award categories, please contact Michelle Diefenbach.

Past Award Recipients

2022

Best Dissertation Award: Vigyanshu Mishra, "Wearable Electrically Small Resonant Loops for Seamless Motion Capture and Wireless Body Area Networks (WBANs)"

Best Paper Award: Aaron Brandewie, "Passive radar downrange imaging with multiple transmitters and one receiver"

Best Paper Award – Runner Up: Ally Rice, "High-Contrast Low-Loss Antenna: A Novel Antenna for Efficient Into-Body Radiation"

Above and Beyond Staff Award: Susan Funk, Program Coordinator

Above and Beyond Student Award: Ally Rice

Above and Beyond Researcher Award: Professor Ron Reano

Test of Time Award: Asimina Kiourti, A. Kiourti and K. S. Nikita, "A Review of In-Body Biotelemetry Devices: Implantables, Ingestibles, and Injectables," in IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering, vol. 64, no. 7, pp. 1422-1430, July 2017, doi: 10.1109/TBME.2017.2668612.
1,703 citations; 135 Publications

2021

Best Dissertation Award: Shah Chowdhury“Electrical Capacitance Volume Tomography (ECVT) Based Imaging and Velocimetry for Two-phase Flow Measurements”

Robert Dybdal Best Paper Award – Student: Keren Zhu, “Miniature Coil Array for Passive Magnetocardiography in Non-Shielded Environments”

Robert Dybdal Best Paper Award – Faculty: Caglar Yardim, “Greenland Ice Sheet Subsurface Temperature Estimation Using Ultrawideband Microwave Radiometry”

Above and Beyond Staff Award: Cindy Garman, Fiscal Associate

Above and Beyond Student Award: Vigyanshu Mishra

Above and Beyond Researcher Award: Shane Smith , Research Scientist

Test of Time Award: Andrew O’Brien and Joel Johnson, “New Ocean Winds Satellite Mission to Probe Hurricanes and Tropical Convection” 

2020

Best Paper Award: Ken Henderson and Nima Ghalichechian; “Circular-Polarized Metal-Only Reflectarray With Multi-Slot Elements,” Henderson is advised by ECE Professor Nima Ghalichechian.

Best Paper Award - Runner Up: Behnam Ghassemiparvin and Nima Ghalichechian; “Paraffin-Based Reconfigurable Antenna Operating at 100 GHz," Ghassempiparvin was advised by ECE Professor Nima Ghalichechian.

Best Dissertation Award: Peter John-Baptiste, “Advancing fully adaptive radar concepts for real-time parameter adaptation and decision making” John-Baptiste was advised by ECE Professor Joel Johnson.

Test of Time Award: Joel T. Johnson; "Cognitive Radar Framework for Target Detection and Tracking"

Above and Beyond Researcher Award: Asimina Kiourti, ECE Assistant Professor

Above and Beyond Staff Award: Spencer Smith, Facilities Coordinator at ESL

Above and Beyond Student Award: Katrina GuidoESL Graduate Research Associate

Read a full list of award winners since 2011