Past Events

The event will present the highlights from this year’s IEEE International Conference on Communications (ICC) and the IEEE International Conference on Acoustics, Speech and Signal Processing (ICASSP). Held respectively in Budapest and Vancouver earlier this year, these conferences represent the flagship events of the IEEE Communications and Signal Processing Societies. Attendees and participants from local industry and academia will present their reflections on the conferences as well as recent trends in the areas of wireless communications and signal processing. The event will include a panel discussion by:

• Prof. Bastiaan Kleijn, Victoria University of Wellington

• Dr Murray Milner, Principal Consultant, Milner Consulting Limited

• Dr Mansoor Shafi, Telecom Fellow, Telecom NZ

• Dr Paul Teal, Victoria University of Wellington

In addition, local PhD students will present the following research papers published at ICC 2013 and ICASSP 2013:

• Wenyu Jin - Multizone soundfield reproduction using orthogonal basis expansion, ICASSP 2013, co-authors: David Virette, W. Bastiaan Kleijn

• Praveen Choppala - Soft resampling for improved information retention in particle filtering, ICASSP 2013, co-authors: Paul D. Teal and Marcus Frean

• Refik Ustok - Aligned interference neutralisation for 2x2x2 interference channel with imperfect CSI, ICC 2013, co-authors: Pawel A. Dmochowski, Peter J. Smith, Mansoor Shafi

• Jawad Mirza - Limited feedback multiuser MISO systems with differential codebooks in correlated channels, ICC 2013, co-authors: Pawel A. Dmochowski, Peter J. Smith, Mansoor Shafi

• Sudhir Singh - Statistically robust cooperative beamforming for cognitive radio networks, ICC 2013, co-authors: Paul D. Teal, Pawel A. Dmochowski, Alan Coulson

Refreshments will be served.

Abstract:
With the emerging innovations to the electricity infrastructure (referred to as the  smart grid), high levels of penetration of renewable energy, and an emphasis on  competitive pricing, it will become necessary to optimize the safety margins  presently allowed, and use existing equipment as optimally as possible. Maintaining  reliable service and implementing emergency defense plans during major  unintended disturbances and intended attacks is critical with the growth of the  electric power network and its information infrastructure. The development of  reliable and scalable intelligent monitoring and control algorithms, and situational  intelligence (beyond situational awareness (SA)) technologies are needed as  synchrophasor measurement devices are deployed for operation sense-making,  decision-making and implementing actionable control. 
The optimization and control systems for a modern power system will require  dynamic information and computational capabilities to handle the uncertainties and  variability that exist especially with renewable energy integration. Intelligent  technologies needed for sense-making, situational awareness/intelligence, decision-  making, control and optimization in power system control centers will be presented  in this talk.

Speaker Bio:
Ganesh Kumar Venayagamoorthy received his Ph.D.  degree in electrical engineering from the University of Natal,  Durban, South Africa, in 2002. He is the Duke Energy  Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer  Engineering at Clemson University, Clemson, USA. Prior to  that, he was a Professor of Electrical and Computer  Engineering at the Missouri University of Science and  Technology (Missouri S&T), Rolla, USA. He was a Visiting  Researcher with ABB Corporate Research, Sweden, in 2007.  Dr. Venayagamoorthy is the Founder and Director of the  Real-Time Power and Intelligent Systems Laboratory (https://rtpis.org). His research  interests are in the development and applications of advanced computational  algorithms for smart grid applications, including power system stability and control,  optimization, operations, intelligent sensing and monitoring and signal processing. 
He has published 2 edited books, 8 book chapters, and over 400 refereed journal and  conference proceeding papers. 
Dr. Venayagamoorthy is a recipient of several awards including a 2008 US  National Science Foundation (NSF) Emerging Frontiers in Research and Innovation  Award, a 2007 US Office of Naval Research Young Investigator Program Award, a  2004 NSF CAREER Award, the 2010 Innovation Award from St. Louis Academy of  Science, the 2010 IEEE Region 5 Outstanding Member Award, and the 2005 SAIEE  Young Achievers Award. He is the recipient of the 2012 Institution of Engineering  and Technology (IET) Generation, Transmission and Distribution Premier Award for  the best research paper published in 2010/2011 for the paper “Wide area control for
improving stability of a power system with plug-in electric vehicles”.
Dr. Venayagamoorthy is involved in the leadership and organization of many  conferences including the Chair of the 2014 Power System Conference (Clemson, SC,  USA), IEEE Symposium of Computational Intelligence Applications in Smart Grid  (CIASG). He is currently the Chair of the IEEE PES Working Group on Intelligent  Control Systems, and the Founder and Chair of IEEE Computational Intelligence  Society (CIS) Task Force on Smart Grid. He is currently an Editor of the IEEE  Transactions on Smart Grid.
Dr. Venayagamoorthy is a Senior Member of the IEEE, and a Fellow of the IET,
UK, and the SAIEE.

Abstract:
With the rapid development of wireless technology, 4G wireless communication networks, particularly LTE/LTE-advance, has emerged as the major candidate for the broadband wireless communication services. It is expected that LTE/LTE-A technology could provide much higher data transmission rate beyond 100 Mbps over a long distance. The support for diverse applications with QoS requirements is one of the main research areas in the LTE/LTE-A networks. In this speech, an overview of LTE/LTE-A networks will be the presented followed by a detailed review on the research issues and solutions on QoS provisioning in the LTE/LTE-A networks. The technique overview on the LTE/LTE-A networks and fundamental functionality of the medium access control layer will be introduced. At last, a piece of recent research work on the QoS provisioning in the LTE/LTE-A wireless networks will be presented as an example to show the significance of the research in this area.

Speaker Bio:
Dr. Maode Ma received his Ph.D. degree in computer science from Hong Kong University of Science and Technology in 1999. Now, Dr. Ma is an Associate Professor in the School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He has extensive research interests including wireless networking and network security. He has led and/or participated in 17 research projects funded by government, industry, military and universities in various countries. He has been a member of the technical program committees for more than 150 international conferences. He has been a general chair, technical symposium chair, tutorial chair, publication chair, publicity chair and session chair for more than 50 international conferences. Dr. Ma has more than 250 international academic publications including more than 100 journal papers and more than 130 conference papers. He currently serves as the Editor-in-Chief of International Journal of Electronic Transport. He also serves as a Senior Editor for IEEE Communications Surveys and Tutorials, and an Associate Editor for International Journal of Network and Computer Applications, International Journal of Security and Communication Networks, International Journal of Wireless Communications and Mobile Computing and International Journal of Communication Systems. He had been an Associate Editor for IEEE Communications Letters from 2003 to 2011. Dr. Ma is a Fellow of IET and a senior member of IEEE Communication Society and IEEE Education Society. He is the vice Chair of the IEEE Education Society, Singapore Chapter. He has been elected as an IEEE Communication Society Distinguished Lecturer for 2013 to 2014.

Abstract:
Somewhere between "Final Fantasy" in 2001 and "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" in 2008, digital actors crossed the "Uncanny Valley" from looking strangely synthetic to believably real. This talk describes how the Light Stage scanning systems and HDRI lighting techniques developed at the USC Institute for Creative Technologies have helped create digital actors in a wide range of recent films.  For in-depth examples, the talk describes how high-resolution face scanning, advanced character rigging, and performance-driven facial animation were combined to create "Digital Emily", a collaboration with Image Metrics (now Faceware) yielding one of the first photoreal digital actors, and 2013's "Digital Ira", a collaboration with Activision Inc., yielding the most realistic real-time digital actor to date. The talk includes recent developments in HDRI lighting, polarization difference imaging, and skin reflectance measurement, 3D object scanning, and concludes with advances in autostereoscopic 3D displays enabling 3D teleconferencing, holographic characters, and cultural preservation.

Speaker Bio:
Paul Debevec is a Research Professor at the University of Southern California and the Associate Director of Graphics Research at USC's Institute for Creative Technologies where he leads the ICT Graphics Laboratory. His work has focused on image-based modelling and rendering techniques beginning with his 1996 Ph.D. thesis at UC Berkeley, with specializations in high dynamic range imaging, reflectance measurement, facial animation, and image-based lighting. He serves as the Vice President of ACM SIGGRAPH and received a Scientific and Engineering Academy Award(r) in 2010 for his work on the Light Stage facial capture systems, used in movies including Spider-Man 2, Superman Returns, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Avatar, Tron: Legacy, and The Avengers.

Abstract:
Simon Moutter will talk about his own career in engineering and technology, about the global technology revolution that is underway, a little bit about where Telecom is heading, and how all this might apply to the potential career decisions and opportunities for young technical professionals. The key point is that the world is changing incredibly fast, and this change is going to generate a huge amount of challenge and opportunity for NZ and individually for young professionals embarking on a career in engineering or technology.

Speaker Bio:
Simon Moutter returned to Telecom in August 2012 to take over as Chief Executive. As CEO he’s responsible for the overall leadership and strategic direction of the company that provides mobile, broadband and IT services to more than two million New Zealanders every day, as well as in Australia. Simon spent nearly 15 years in the energy sector where he worked in various senior positions, including CEO of Powerco Ltd and Station Manager at the New Plymouth Power Station.  He also ran his own engineering consultancy and contracting company before first joining Telecom as General Manager of Network Delivery in 1999.  After nine years’ service, including several years as Chief Operating Officer, Simon left in 2008 to lead the successful transformation of Auckland International Airport Ltd as Chief Executive before returning to Telecom in 2012. Simon grew up in Palmerston North.  He was awarded a Bachelor of Science, majoring in Physics, from Massey University, followed by a Masters in Electrical Engineering at Canterbury University.

Abstract:
Nanotechnologies offer a variety of materials options for reliability improvements in microelectronics packaging, primarily in the applications of nanoparticle nanocomposites, or in the exploitation of the superior properties of carbon nanotubes and graphene. Nanocomposite materials are studied for resistors, high-k dielectrics, electrically conductive adhesives, conductive "inks,"  underfill fillers, and solder enhancements, while CNTs and graphene may also find thermal, interconnect, and shielding applications. The talk will focus on these materials technologies, with some discussion of nanoparticle and CNT properties, a brief "Introduction to Electronics Packaging,"  and some cautionary remarks on EHS issues in nanotechnologies manufacturing.


Speaker Bio:
Jim is a Professor of Electrical & Computer Engineering at Portland State University, Oregon, USA, with B.Sc. and M.Sc. degrees in Physics from the University of Auckland, New Zealand, and a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Saskatchewan, Canada.  He has served as Department Chair at both SUNY-Binghamton and PSU, and was the founding Director of Binghamton's Institute for Research in Electronics Packaging. Jim has held multiple visiting faculty positions around the world, notably as a Royal Academy of Engineering Distinguished Visiting Fellow at Loughborough University (UK) and as a Nokia-Fulbright Fellow at the Helsinki University of Technology. Other positions have included periods as a Senior Technician and at Delphi Engineering (NZ) and IBM-Endicott (NY), and industrial consulting.
Jim is an IEEE Fellow and an IEEE Components, Packaging, & Manufacturing (CPMT) Society Distinguished Lecturer. He has served as CPMT Treasurer (1991-1997) and Vice-President for Conferences (1998-2003), and currently sits on the CPMT Board of Governors (1996-1998, 2011-2013) and chairs the CPMT Nanotechnology technical committee. He was awarded the IEEE Millennium Medal and won the 2005 CPMT David Feldman Outstanding Contribution Award. He is an Associate-Editor of the IEEE CPMT Transactions and has been General Chair of three CPMT-sponsored conferences, Treasurer or Technical Chair of others, and serves on several CPMT conference committees. As the CPMT Society representative on the IEEE Nanotechnology Council (NTC), he has instituted a regular Nanopackaging series of articles in the IEEE Nanotechnology Magazine, established the NTC Nanopackaging technical committee, was the 2010-2013 NTC Awards Chair, chaired the IEEE NANO 2011 conference in Portland, and serves as NTC Vic
e-President for Conferences (2013-2014.)  He also co-founded the Oregon Chapter of the IEEE Education Society in 2005 and sits on its executive committee, and is Program Chair for the 1st IEEE Conference on Technology for Sustainability (Portland, 2013).
His research activities are focused on electrically conductive adhesives, the electrical conduction mechanisms in discontinuous nanoparticle thin metal films, with applications to nanopackaging and single-electron transistor nanoelectronics, and on an NSF-funded project in undergraduate nanotechnology education. He has edited or co-authored five books on electronics packaging and two on nanodevices, and lectures internationally on nanopackaging and electrically conductive adhesives. His "Nanopackaging" book has just been published in Chinese.

Abstract:
Energy underwrites all human endeavors. Where energy is abundant, we find prosperous societies; where energy is scarce, we find lowered standards of living.  Electricity is one of the most convenient carriers of energy, yet approximately 1.6 billion people do not have access to the electric grid. This form of energy poverty disproportionately afflicts the world’s most impoverished. As engineers, we must ask what our role is—if any—in increasing access to electricity. This presentation discusses the broad challenge of energy poverty, the potential for engineers to increase energy accessibility, and experiences in installing renewable systems in Zambia and Haiti.
 
Biographical Notes:
Dr. Henry Louie received the B.S.E.E. degree from Kettering University in 2002, the M.S. degree from the University of Illinois in 2004, and a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Washington in 2008. He is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Seattle University in the United States, where he received the Outstanding Teacher award in 2012. His past industry experience includes working with Emerson Process Management, Power Engineers and 3TIER Environmental Forecast Group.  Dr. Louie has been the Vice President for Membership & Image of the IEEE Power & Energy Society (PES) since 2011, and is the youngest person ever to serve on the PES Executive Committee. His current and past positions include: Governing Board Member-At-Large, member of the IEEE Smart Grid Steering Committee, Long-Range Planning Committee, liaison to the IEEE Industry Applications Society and the IEEE PES Scholarship Plus Committee. He is a Senior Member of the IEEE. Dr. Louie has served as Technical Program Co-Chair of the 2012 IEEE Global Humanitarian Technology Conference and as Secretary of the IEEE PES Working Group on Sustainable Energy Systems for Developing Communities. His research includes renewable energy modeling, electric vehicle infrastructure impact analysis and humanitarian engineering.

Abstract:
Cellular offloading is increasingly being used to move traffic from cellular networks to other networks such as Wi-Fi to reduce the traffic load on cellular networks due to the rapid increase in mobile data consumption. Multi-connection and IP Flow Mobility represent an area of research and standardization by bodies like ITU-T and 3GPP. The capability allows devices to seamlessly move between any access network, while anchored in the LTE packet core referred to as the Evolved Packet Core. These mechanisms are being used in some mobile networks for offloading data traffic to Wi-Fi. However, the capability extends to much more use cases.
 
Through protocol derivatives of Mobile IP, devices are able to acquire and utilize the access network of best fit, and furthermore, use multiple access networks simultaneously, moving traffic flows among these connections as required. This presentation will cover the latest developments in mobility protocols for multi connection and flow mobility that enable cellular offloading.
 
Biography:
Prasan de Silva graduated with a BE(Hons) and ME, both in Electrical Engineering, from the University of Canterbury in 1994 and 2001 respectively. He has been involved in post-graduate research supervision at Canterbury and Victoria University of Wellington and has been guest lecturing at Canterbury, Victoria and the University of Otago in New Zealand over the last 10 years. His research interests are in IP based mobility management protocols and the application of software-define networking in base station cooperation. Prasan has worked for Telecom NZ since 1996 and has worked on mobile systems covering D-AMPS, CDMA2000, UMTS, LTE and voice networks covering the PSTN to IMS. Prasan has represented Telecom on several international forums and standards bodies, including Fixed-Mobile Convergence Alliance, IEEE and ITU-T organisations. Prasan has been a keynote speaker at IEEE ATNAC 2010 and 2013 and has run tutorial sessions for industry professionals at Massey University. He is currently a Consulting Network Architect in the Network Architecture Group at Telecom in Wellington, New Zealand.