Wireless & Networking | News

New Academic Wireless Research Center to Open at NYU-Poly

• By Leila Meyer
• 08/09/12

Twenty-five engineering, computer science, and medical professors, as well as more than 100 graduate students, and post-doctoral researchers from three New York University (NYU) schools--Polytechnic Institute of NYU (NYU-Poly), NYU School of Medicine, and NYU Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences--are part of a new academic research center for the exploration of advanced wireless technologies, computing, and medical applications.

The center, called NYU Wireless, will open on the downtown Brooklyn campus of NYU-Poly this winter. Researchers at the center will investigate advanced communications and antenna technologies, compressed sensing for spectrum efficiency in massively broadband wireless communications and medical imaging, and the creation of optimized cellular networks and wireless devices that cooperate rather than compete for the wireless spectrum. The center will also advance research on millimeter-wave and sub-terahertz communications.

National Instruments (NI) is a founding industrial sponsor for the center. NI researchers will work with the professors, graduate students, and post-doctoral researchers at NYU Wireless. NI will also supply hardware and software to serve as a test bed for some of the research projects. Other major funding sources for the center include the National Science Foundation (NSF), the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and other industry partners.

The founder and director of NYU Wireless is Professor Theodore (Ted) Rappaport, a new faculty member of the Computer and Electrical Engineering Department at NYU-Poly, the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, and the Department of Radiology at NYU Langone Medical Center. He previously founded academic wireless centers at Virginia Tech and University of Texas and two cellular technology companies.

"By working with some of the world's best doctors and surgeons, we can solve real problems in the medical field while bringing our industry sponsors in direct contact with engineering problems and market opportunities in health care," said Rappaport in a prepared statement. "And by moving up the spectrum, a new frontier opens to wireless innovation. The millimeter-wave spectrum is uncrowded--with enough capacity to accommodate breakthroughs in cellular and personal wireless communication networks."

Researchers at NYU Wireless have already begun investigating the behavior of millimeter-length radio waves, which offer faster data rates, in an attempt to overcome the challenge of signal propagation in dense urban environments.

Polytechnic Institute of NYU is located in Brooklyn, NY and offers programs in science and engineering from the undergraduate through doctoral levels.