Three Engineering Professors Become IEEE Fellows
Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering Lin Cai, Professor and Frank Gunsaulus Faculty Fellow in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Boris S. Pervan, and Professor Emeritus of Electrical and Computer Engineering Thomas Wong, all faculty members at Illinois Tech, have all been selected as fellows of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers.
This distinction, reflecting their extraordinary accomplishments, is given to less than 0.1 percent of IEEE voting members annually.
Cai was recognized “for contributions to sustainable wireless communication and networking.” Her research focuses on the design and optimization of energy-efficient and environmentally sustainable wireless systems, including resilient wireless networks, large-scale Internet of Things (IoT) networks, edge-enabled 5G/6G communications, and machine learning–driven network optimization and resource management.
Cai is a recipient of the National Science Foundation CAREER Award, through which she has advanced the design and deployment of sustainable communication networks powered by variable renewable energy sources, such as solar and wind. Her research addresses the efficiency, resilience, and environmental impact of large-scale wireless and IoT networks, helping to shape next-generation sustainable communication systems.
Pervan was recognized “for contributions to satellite navigation integrity.” His career focus has been finding ways for navigation systems to have high accuracy and high integrity simultaneously, a necessity for anything GPS-driven where these factors become critical to safety.
He is also the director of the Center for Assured and Resilient Navigation in Advanced Transportation Systems (CARNATIONS) at Illinois Tech, a $10 million United States Department of Transportation-funded project that brings together university and industry collaborators to work on safe, scalable, and seamless surface navigation for uncrewed aircraft systems.
Pervan is also a fellow of the Institute of Navigation (ION) and an associate fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. He received the prestigious Johannes Kepler Award from the ION in 2022 for his “contributions to high-integrity GNSS-based aviation navigation and his dedication to education.”
Wong was recognized “for contributions to high-frequency electronics and materials characterization.” He joined the Illinois Tech faculty as an assistant professor in 1981.
He has conducted research in material measurements, charge transport in ionic and electronic conductors, transient electromagnetics, millimeter-wave communication systems, and propagation effects in high-speed semiconductor devices and integrated circuits. In collaboration with Argonne National Laboratory and Fermilab, he has contributed to research in dielectric loaded accelerators, coupler design for superconducting multicell cavity resonators, and nanoscale position sensors. His recent activities have been on space-charge interactions in semiconductor nanostructures. He wrote the first book devoted to the subject of distributed amplifiers in 1993.
He is also a fellow of the International Association of Advanced Materials.
Image (from left to right): Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering Lin Cai, Frank Gunsaulus Faculty Fellow in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Boris S. Pervan, and Professor Emeritus of Electrical and Computer Engineering Thomas Wong
