By David Porreca
Sung-Mo (Steve) Kang, head of the electrical and computer engineering department
at the UI, has received a Humboldt Research Award for Senior U.S. Scientists
from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, Bonn, Germany.
The award, worth 75,000 deutsche marks (about $50,000 at current U.S.-German
exchange rates), entitles Kang to spend up to seven months at a research
institute of his choice in Germany.
Kang said he will spend the summer of 1997 at the University of Karlsruhe,
followed by a stay at the Technical University of Munich during the summer
of 1998. He will conduct research on ultra large-scale integrated (ULSI)
circuit design issues and optical interconnection issues.
Each year the Humboldt Foundation grants 80 research awards to senior and
junior scientists in the United States. The awards range in value from 20,000
deutsche marks to 120,000 deutsche marks. More than 2,000 awards have been
granted since 1972.
Humboldt awards are considered among the highest honors given to internationally
recognized scholars. The winners must be nominated by eminent German scholars;
direct applications are not accepted. Former recipients include George Olah
of the University of Southern California, who won the 1994 Nobel Prize for
chemistry.
Kang joined the UI faculty in 1985 after spending almost 10 years as a scientist
at AT&T Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill, N.J., where he worked on very
large-scale integrated (VLSI) microprocessors and network planning.
He earned a bachelor's degree from Fairleigh Dickinson University in 1970,
a master's degree from the State University of New York at Buffalo in 1972,
and a doctorate from the University of California at Berkeley in 1975, all
in electrical engineering.
Kang began his career at Rutgers University in 1975, where he taught electrical
engineering. Two years later he joined Bell Laboratories, holding positions
as a member of the technical staff and technical supervisor.
Since arriving at the UI, Kang has been a leader in fostering interdisciplinary
research, serving on the faculty of the Coordinated Science Laboratory,
the Center for Compound Semiconductor Microelectronics and the Beckman Institute
for Advanced Science and Technology. He was appointed head of the electrical
and computer engineering department in July 1995.
Kang holds five patents and has co-written six books, including a leading
textbook on integrated circuits. He recently won the 1996 IEEE Graduate
Teaching award from the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers
Inc.
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