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Electrical and Computer Engineering

SIGNALS & SYSTEMS

Signals & Systems is the study of how to effectively send and process information. Information can be sent as 0s and 1s on an electrical device, or it can be send through the air as an electromagnetic wave, like radiowaves or microwaves. Signal & systems engineers design communication protocols for everything from cell phones to satellites in space. The electrical signal being sent can represent many different types of information, like a human voice, written text, or an image. Signals & systems engineers also have to find effective ways to interpret signals from sensors, like a heart rate monitor or air quality sensor. One exciting, but difficult, problem our faculty are working on is computer vision, which is the study of how to enable computers to “see” and process information from pictures like humans do. As the world becomes more and more interconnected with wireless devices and sensors, it will become increasingly important to have effective and efficient ways to exchange, collect and store data in our technology-driven world.
Signals Faculty and Research

Suggested Coursework

MS Degree Requirements

The following are suggested Programs of Study for a graduate student pursuing an MS degree with an emphasis in Signals. It is not required that students follow any of these course schedules, but for students to use these as a guide. So long as degree requirements are met, any ECE or allied graduate coursework (5000- level or above) may be substituted.

Traditional MS

3 Semesters   |   1-1.5 Years

These Programs of Study meet Coursework option requirements for a full-time student and can easily be adapted to the Project option. Students completing the Thesis option must meet with the Graduate Student Coordinator to create their academic plan.

Part-Time MS

*Graduate seminar credits may be completed in any order within a student’s first academic year in the program.

5 Semesters   |   2-2.5 Years

A schedule like this is for students who are currently working and don’t have the capacity to be full-time students but feel capable of managing a steady pace of courses (2 per semester).

Coursework

Semester Courses Credits
1 3 7.0*
2 3 7.0*
3 2 6.0
4 2 6.0
5 2 6.0
TOTAL 12 32.0

Summer Project

Semester Courses Credits
1 3 7.0*
2 3 7.0*
3 2 6.0
4 2 6.0
Summer Project 4.0
TOTAL 10 30.0

9 Semesters   |   4 Years

A reduced and extended part-time schedule of 8 semesters of coursework, with 1 course per term, and a summer project.

Year 1

Semester Credits
Fall
 4.0*
Spring
 4.0*

Year 2

Semester Credits
Fall
 3.0
Spring
 3.0

Year 3

Semester Credits
Fall
 3.0
Spring
 3.0
Summer
 4.0 – Project

Year 4

Semester Credits
Fall
 3.0
Spring
 3.0
TOTAL
 30.0

Default Supervisory Committee

For students completing the coursework or project options

Rong Rong Chen

Associate Professor

Signal processing and communication systems: efficient utilization of multiple antennas for high-rate communications in wireless networks, statistical detection methods for underwater acoustic communications, and other fields related to communication systems and statistical signal processing.

Neda Nategh

Associate Professor

Visual computation and computational vision: Research in our lab employs an interdisciplinary approach to understand the real-time, robust, and efficient visual computations performed by our natural vision and to translate this knowledge into computational vision frameworks for machine vision applications, artificial vision solutions, and imaging systems.

Yu Xiang

Assistant Professor

Statistical signal processing, information theory, and machine learning: learning under distribution shifts, representation learning, recourse-constrained distributed signal processing