September 26, 2007 — Alan Willner and Giuseppe Caire are the new co-directors of the Communication Sciences Institute (CSI) and leaders of the communications group within the USC Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical Engineering, effective immediately.

Willner

"Our department joins me in welcoming Alan Willner and Giuseppe Caire to this new role," said Sandy Sawchuk, Ming Hiseh Department Systems Chair, in making the announcement. "I thank Ubli Mitra and Keith Chugg for their outstanding service and leadership in this position for the last several years, and look forward to their continuing guidance and involvement with CSI and our department."

Alan Willner is a professor of electrical engineering at the Viterbi School, director of the USC Center for Photonics Technology. He is a Fellow of the IEEE and the Optical Society of America (OSA), and he was a Fellow of the Semiconductor Research Corporation, has received numerous awards and has authored more than 400 papers.

Giuseppe Caire,  joined the Hsieh department in 2005 as a professor of electrical engineering. His research is in the area of wireless communications and information theory.

Caire

Caire received his Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering in 1994 from Politencnico di Torino, Italy. His previous position was with the Eurecom Institute, Sophia-Antipolis, France.

The CSI was formed in 1982 as an organized research unit within the Electrical Engineering Department.  It  provides an environment for faculty, students, research sponsors, and practicing engineers to interact. The primary goal of CSI is to impact engineering practice through basic research and education.  The CSI works closely with the EE communications group,  made up of faculty who regularly teach classes and supervise research in the communications area.