IEEE CAS Society

Analog Signal Processing Technical Committee Meeting

June 1^st 1998

Present:

Agenda:

1. ISCAS 1998
2. ISCAS 1999
3. Web Page
4. Nominations for new members
5. Future chairman
6. Encouraging students to enter the mixed-signal field

1) ISCAS 1998

Around 25-30% of the papers submitted to ISCAS 98 were in the analog signal processing field. The reviewing of papers in this track was co-ordinated by Randy Geiger. The papers were divided into sub-topics (amplifiers, filters etc.) which were then allocated to other members of the ASP committee, who in turn selected 3 reviewers in each case. This system seems to work well and is seen as one of the roles of the ASP committee.

The acceptance rate within the analog track was around 60%; this is very close to the overall acceptance rate, and the acceptance rate within most other tracks.

The high percentage of analog papers within ISCAS shows that the profile of ASP is currently high within the CAS society. This is further borne out by the IEEE CAS Society Advanced Continuing Education (ACE) Courses, which are being organised by Chris Toumazou and will run for the first time in December 1998. Around half of these courses are in the ASP field.

Selected papers from this year’s ISCAS will be published in a Special Issue of IEEE Transactions CAS. The Special Issue will be edited by Franco Maloberti and Andreas Baschirotto. ASP Committee members are asked to propose papers for possible inclusion in this Special Issue (email suggestions to a.baschirotto@ele.unipv.it)

ACTION : All committee members

It was felt that the current page allocation was inadequate to include a wide selection of ISCAS contributions. The ASP committee will request an increase in page length of 100 pages. It was also suggested that the database of original reviews could be accessed to find papers which had received a high ranking, for possible inclusion in the Special Issue.

ACTION : T. Fiez

2) ISCAS 1999

A further role of the ASP committee is to propose Panel Sessions and Special Sessions for next year’s ISACS. Suggestions for Panel sessions should be controversial to generate interesting discussion. Chris Toumazou reported that he has already proposed a Panel Discussion titled ‘Creeping Towards The Antenna - Analog or Digital?’. Further suggestions included ‘Reminiscences - Pioneers Look Back’ (update from ISCAS 94), ‘Visions of the Future - Looking Forward’, ‘What is the Future of EE Education?’.

Special Sessions should concentrate on unique, unusual, new and hot topics! Suggestions at the meeting included Applications of Floating Gate Technology (Tor Lande), Hybrid Analog-Digital Feedforward Equalisers (Ken Martin), RF Power Amplifiers in a Low Power Environment (I. Filanovsky), Productivity Enhancement Through CAD Tool Integration for Mixed Signal Design (R. Geiger).

Panel Sessions and Special Sessions are being oveseen by Phil Allen/John Choma. Alison Payne will collect further suggestions from the committee and co-ordinate proposals from the ASP committee to Phil Allen.

ACTION : A. Payne

3) Web Page

The CAS Society Web Page currently has a link to the ASP committee Web Page. This Web page should be transferred to the CAS server to allow it to be updated as the committee membership changes.

Each committee member will be listed on the web page, and may implement a link to their own home page on their local server.

4) Nominations for New Members

Members are deleted from the membership list if they fail to attend three consecutive committee meetings

ACTION : T. Fiez

It was felt that there was no need to restrict the number of members at present. Four new members were voted in at the meeting, as they had been previously consulted:

Bill Black (Iowa State University, USA)

Paul Hassler (Georgia Tech., USA)

Andreas Baschirotto (University of Pavia, Italy)

Jitkasame Ngarmil (Mahanakorn University, Thailand)

Terri Fiez will officially invite these four to become committee members by email

ACTION : T. Fiez

Further suggestions were proposed:

Tim Holman (University of Arizona, USA)

Bradley Minch (Cornell, USA)

Ben Blalock (University of Mississsippi, USA)

Harry Li (University of Idaho, USA)

Larry Huelsmann

Chris Abel (Lucent Technologies)

Geert de Veirman (SSI)

The proposers of these new members should contact them and ascertain whether they are willing to join the committee. If the answer is positive then Terri Fiez should be informed, and she will officially invite then via email.

ACTION : All proposers

5) Future Chairman

Alison Payne is the chairman for 1999

Ramesh Harjani was elected as Vice Chair (nominated by Terri Fiez, seconded by Edgar Sanchez).

6) Encouraging Graduate Students to Study Mixed Signal Topics

There is currently a shortage of graduate students wanting to study for a Ph.D. in the mixed-signal field. This leads to further problems when trying to recruit faculty members, as many institutions require that students must have studied for a period away from that institution. The ASP committee could form a network of contacts which encourage students to travel between institutions and continue studying within the mixed signal field.

One suggestion is to implement a postgraduate brochure on the web page, which would briefly list the interests and research opportunities of each committee member. The student could then link to the web page of that particular member to obtain more details.