Profiles

Atif Shamim received his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from Carleton University, Canada, in 2004 and 2009, respectively. He was an NSERC Alexander Graham Bell Graduate Scholar at Carleton University from 2007 to 2009 and an NSERC Postdoctoral Fellow from 2009 to 2010 at the Royal Military College Canada and KAUST.

In 2006, he joined the VTT Micro-Modules Research Center (Oulu, Finland) as an invited researcher. In August 2010, he joined the Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) Program at KAUST, where he is currently a full professor, chair of the ECE Program, and principal investigator of the IMPACTS Lab.

His research work has earned numerous awards, including Best Paper Awards at IEEE ICMAC 2021, IEEE IMS 2016, IEEE MECAP 2016, and IEEE EuWiT 2008. He also received first prize in the IEEE IMS 2019 3MT Competition, the IEEE AP-S Design Competition 2022, and second prize in the IEEE IMS Design Competition 2024. Additionally, he was recognized with finalist or honorable mention awards in several prestigious competitions, including the IEEE AP-S Design Competition 2020 and the R.W.P. King Prize for journal papers in IEEE TAP 2017 and 2020. He has been selected as a Distinguished Lecturer for IEEE AP-S (2022–2024).

In addition to his research accolades, Professor Shamim’s work has been recognized for its broader impact across innovation, industry and entrepreneurship. He received the King’s Prize for the Best Innovation of the Year (2018) for his work on sensors for the oil industry. In 2008, he was honored with the Ottawa Centre of Research Innovation (OCRI) Researcher of the Year Award in Canada. His innovative Wireless Dosimeter earned the ITAC SMC Award at the Canadian Microelectronics Corporation TEXPO in 2007. He has also won several business-related honors, including first prize in Canada’s National Business Plan Competition and the OCRI Entrepreneur of the Year Award in 2010.

Professor Shamim has been actively involved in contributing to the IEEE community through various technical, editorial, and leadership roles. He is a Fellow of IEEE and founded the first IEEE AP/MTT chapter in Saudi Arabia (2013). He served on the editorial board of IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation (2013–2019), as a Guest Editor for an IEEE AWPL Special Issue (2019), and as an Associate Editor for the IEEE Journal of Electromagnetics, RF and Microwaves in Medicine and Biology (2020–2024). He has also participated in several IEEE Technical Committees, including those on Antenna Measurements (AP-S), Microwave Controls (MTT-S 13), and Additive Manufacturing (CRFID). 

He currently chairs the IEEE AP-S Technical Committee on Wireless Communication and serves as Vice Chair of the IEEE AP-S MGA Committee.

Professor Shamim's research focuses on innovative antenna designs and their integration strategies with circuits and sensors for flexible and wearable wireless sensing systems through a combination of CMOS and additive manufacturing technologies. Shamim is particularly interested in developing wearable wireless sensor systems to measure physiological parameters in real time.

Specific research interests include:

• Antenna-on-Chip (AoC) design, integration and efficiency enhancement strategies
• Reconfigurable Intelligent Surfaces (RIS)
  Additive manufacturing (Inkjet, Screen, and 3D printing)
• Wearable and disposable wireless sensors realized through printing technologies
• Mechanically flexible RF electronics and sensing systems
• Reconfigurable microwave components (magnetically controlled)
• Phase Change Materials (PCM) for low cost RF and mm-Wave switching applications
• Terahertz plasmonics antennas and their characterization techniques
   

Ahmed M. Eltawil is a professor of the Electrical and Computer Engineering Program at KAUST. He joined the Computer, Electrical and Mathematical Science and Engineering (CEMSE) Division in 2019. At KAUST, he founded and directs the Communication and Computing Systems Laboratory (CCSL). Previously, he was a faculty member in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Department at the University of California, Irvine (UCI), U.S., from 2005 to 2019.

His research at the CCSL at KAUST focuses on efficient architectures for computing and communications systems, with an emphasis on wireless systems. This research spans several application domains, including low-power mobile systems, machine learning platforms, sensor networks, body area networks, and critical infrastructure networks.

An active participant in the academic community, Eltawil has served on the technical program and steering committees for numerous workshops, symposia and conferences focused on low-power computing and wireless communication system design. He is a recipient of several prestigious awards and grants, including the NSF CAREER grant for his research in low-power computing and communication systems.

He is a Senior Member, Distinguished Lecturer (2023/24) of the IEEE, and a Senior Member of the National Academy of Inventors. In 2021, he was recognized as "Innovator of the Year" by the Henry Samueli School of Engineering at UCI and received two US Congressional Recognition Awards for his pioneering work in wireless systems. Committed to a collaborative, multidisciplinary approach, Professor Eltawil is passionate about translational research, aiming to move practical innovations from the lab to societal applications.

Professor Eltawil’s current research focuses on efficient architectures for computing and communications systems and wireless networks, encompassing low-power mobile systems, sensor networks, body-area networks, cyber-physical systems and critical infrastructure networks.

His research examines the larger context of smart and connected systems where devices seamlessly integrate into our daily lives. His approach to research combines rigorous analysis with a robust experimental background that leverages insights obtained through simulations and corroborated by experiments. By finding innovative solutions to research problems, he aspires to offer practical approaches that can be readily adopted, resulting in significant societal benefits.

Andrea Fratalocchi is a full professor in the Computer, Electrical and Mathematical Sciences and Engineering (CEMSE) Division at KAUST. He joined the University in January 2011 as an assistant professor and was promoted to associate professor in 2016. He is one of the founders of the CEMSE Division and the principal investigator of the Primalight Lab.

Before joining KAUST, Fratalocchi was a research fellow at Sapienza University of Rome under a KAUST Fellowship Award. From 2007 to 2009, he was a postdoctoral researcher at Sapienza University under a “New Talent” Award from the Enrico Fermi Research Center. He obtained a Master of Science in Electrical Engineering in 2003 and a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering in 2007 from the University of Roma Tre, Italy.

Fratalocchi’s career is marked by numerous accolades, including the GCC Enterprise Awards for Best Electrical Engineer of the Year in 2017, the Journal of Optics Outstanding Referee Award in 2017, the Nature Exceptional Referee Award in 2015, and an entry into the Guinness World Records for developing the “Darkest Material Made by Mankind” in 2015.

In 2019, he became a Fellow of the Institute of Physics (IOP), a Senior Member of the IEEE, and a Fellow of the Optical Society of America (OSA).

Fratalocchi has authored over 200 publications, including three books and six patents. He ranks in the top 2% of optics researchers worldwide, based on the standardized citation index compiled by PLOS.

Professor Fratalocchi is dedicated to advancing the field of physics and engineering. His research approach harnesses the potential of complex physical systems, characterized by many degrees of freedom, turning them from theoretical challenges into real-world technological solutions with diverse applications.

His research embraces a nonlinear paradigm, departing from traditional "cause and effect" or linear thinking. This approach finds applications in diverse areas such as chaos theory, rare events, brain functions, natural mimicry and camouflage, swarm's cooperative dynamics and intelligence.

Using disorder as a building block, he proposes novel, low-cost, scalable technologies that outperform current systems by several orders of magnitude.

As part of his engineering research, he has developed world-record-performing nanomaterials for concentrating solar power, steam generation, desalination, solar water splitting, solar and chemical fuel production for carbon-negative technologies, artificial intelligence optical neural networks for hyperspectral imaging and sensing, and machine-learning nanomaterials for wave control and bioimaging, including early disease detection of cancer and diabetes.

Atif Shamim received his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from Carleton University, Canada, in 2004 and 2009, respectively. He was an NSERC Alexander Graham Bell Graduate Scholar at Carleton University from 2007 to 2009 and an NSERC Postdoctoral Fellow from 2009 to 2010 at the Royal Military College Canada and KAUST.

In 2006, he joined the VTT Micro-Modules Research Center (Oulu, Finland) as an invited researcher. In August 2010, he joined the Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) Program at KAUST, where he is currently a full professor, chair of the ECE Program, and principal investigator of the IMPACTS Lab.

His research work has earned numerous awards, including Best Paper Awards at IEEE ICMAC 2021, IEEE IMS 2016, IEEE MECAP 2016, and IEEE EuWiT 2008. He also received first prize in the IEEE IMS 2019 3MT Competition, the IEEE AP-S Design Competition 2022, and second prize in the IEEE IMS Design Competition 2024. Additionally, he was recognized with finalist or honorable mention awards in several prestigious competitions, including the IEEE AP-S Design Competition 2020 and the R.W.P. King Prize for journal papers in IEEE TAP 2017 and 2020. He has been selected as a Distinguished Lecturer for IEEE AP-S (2022–2024).

In addition to his research accolades, Professor Shamim’s work has been recognized for its broader impact across innovation, industry and entrepreneurship. He received the King’s Prize for the Best Innovation of the Year (2018) for his work on sensors for the oil industry. In 2008, he was honored with the Ottawa Centre of Research Innovation (OCRI) Researcher of the Year Award in Canada. His innovative Wireless Dosimeter earned the ITAC SMC Award at the Canadian Microelectronics Corporation TEXPO in 2007. He has also won several business-related honors, including first prize in Canada’s National Business Plan Competition and the OCRI Entrepreneur of the Year Award in 2010.

Professor Shamim has been actively involved in contributing to the IEEE community through various technical, editorial, and leadership roles. He is a Fellow of IEEE and founded the first IEEE AP/MTT chapter in Saudi Arabia (2013). He served on the editorial board of IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation (2013–2019), as a Guest Editor for an IEEE AWPL Special Issue (2019), and as an Associate Editor for the IEEE Journal of Electromagnetics, RF and Microwaves in Medicine and Biology (2020–2024). He has also participated in several IEEE Technical Committees, including those on Antenna Measurements (AP-S), Microwave Controls (MTT-S 13), and Additive Manufacturing (CRFID). 

He currently chairs the IEEE AP-S Technical Committee on Wireless Communication and serves as Vice Chair of the IEEE AP-S MGA Committee.

Professor Shamim's research focuses on innovative antenna designs and their integration strategies with circuits and sensors for flexible and wearable wireless sensing systems through a combination of CMOS and additive manufacturing technologies. Shamim is particularly interested in developing wearable wireless sensor systems to measure physiological parameters in real time.

Specific research interests include:

• Antenna-on-Chip (AoC) design, integration and efficiency enhancement strategies
• Reconfigurable Intelligent Surfaces (RIS)
  Additive manufacturing (Inkjet, Screen, and 3D printing)
• Wearable and disposable wireless sensors realized through printing technologies
• Mechanically flexible RF electronics and sensing systems
• Reconfigurable microwave components (magnetically controlled)
• Phase Change Materials (PCM) for low cost RF and mm-Wave switching applications
• Terahertz plasmonics antennas and their characterization techniques
   

Professor Bernard Ghanem is the Chair of the KAUST Center of Excellence for Generative AI (GenAI) and a leading expert in computer vision and machine learning. He is a professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) and the principal investigator of the Image and Video Understanding Lab (IVUL).

Ghanem's research focuses on computer vision and machine learning, particularly on large-scale video understanding, 3D scene comprehension and the foundation of machine learning.

At KAUST, Professor Ghanem's work bridges academic innovation and industry needs, advancing AI technologies through interdisciplinary collaborations. As Chair of the KAUST Center of Excellence for Generative AI, he leads efforts to establish world-leading excellence in GenAI research by developing the next generation of models that are efficient, trustworthy and tailored for widespread deployment.

His work supports solutions for the Kingdom's national Research, Development, and Innovation (RDI) priorities—Health and Wellness, Sustainability and Essential Needs, Energy and Industrial Leadership, and Economies of the Future—while accelerating the adoption of GenAI through translational research and talent development in collaboration with industry partners.

Professor Ghanem earned his Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering in 2010 and his M.Sc. in 2008, both from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC), U.S. He served as a graduate research assistant at the Computer Vision and Robotics Lab (CVRL) at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology at UIUC.

Professor Ghanem’s research interests and expertise lie in:

1. Robust, large-scale video understanding, including object tracking, activity recognition/detection, and retrieval.
2. Visual computing for automation, including 3D object detection, 3D tracking, 3D indoor and outdoor navigation, and Sim2Real transfer learning.
3. Development and analysis of foundational tools in computer vision and machine learning, including deep graph neural networks, neural network robustness and certification (Trustworthy AI), continual learning, and foundational models in vision and language.

Boon S. Ooi (FNAI, FIEEE, FAPS, FOSA, FSPIE, FInstP) is a Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at KAUST. He previously held faculty positions at Nanyang Technological University (Singapore) from 1996 to 2000 and Lehigh University (Pennsylvania, USA) from 2003 to 2009. From 2012 to 2020, he served as the Director of the KACST-Technology Innovation Center at KAUST.

Professor Ooi has trained more than 40 Ph.D. students and 17 postdoctoral fellows, many of whom have secured prestigious fellowships and awards from organizations like the UK Royal Academy, Marie Curie, Humboldt, IEEE, OSA, and SPIE. He holds 45 issued US patents and 21 international patents, many of which have been licensed to leading optics and photonics companies, driving commercialization success.

He has received numerous accolades, including the 2024 Sang Soo Lee Award (Optica/OSA and OSK), the 2023 Khalifa International Award (UAE), and multiple paper awards. Professor Ooi is currently serving as the Editor-in-Chief of IEEE Photonics Technology Letters and has previously held editorial roles with Optics Express and IEEE Photonics Journal.

Beyond his academic achievements, Professor Ooi is actively engaged in professional service, having served on key committees such as the IEEE Fellow Committee and the SPIE Fellow Selection Committee. He chaired the IEEE Photonics Society Distinguished Lecture Selection Committee in 2024.

Professor Ooi’s research focuses on high-speed optoelectronics, optical wireless communications, and distributed fiber optic sensors.

Charalambos Konstantinou is an Associate Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) and Affiliate Professor of Computer Science at KAUST. He is also the principal investigator of the Secure Next Generation Resilient Systems (SENTRY) Lab.

Professor Konstantinou received a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from New York University (NYU), U.S., and a Dipl. Ing. M.Eng. Degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the National Technical University of Athens (NTUA), Greece. Before joining KAUST, he was an Assistant Professor with the Center for Advanced Power Systems (CAPS) at Florida State University, U.S.

His research interests include critical infrastructure security and resilience, with a special focus on smart grid technologies, renewable energy integration and real-time simulation.

He co-chairs the IEEE Task Force on Cyber-Physical Interdependence for Power System Operation and Control and previously chaired the IEEE Task Force on Resilient and Secure Large-Scale Energy Internet Systems. He is also an associate editor of the IEEE Transactions on Industrial Informatics.

Konstantinou is a senior member of the IEEE, a member of the ACM and an ACM Distinguished Speaker (2021-2024).

Professor Konstantinou's research focuses on critical infrastructure security and resilience, with a specialization in smart grid technologies, renewable energy integration and real-time simulations. His SENTRY Lab investigates the cybersecurity and resilience of industrial control systems, critical power grid infrastructure and embedded systems.

The lab employs a "red team/blue team" approach, where researchers act as attackers ("red team") to test the defenses developed and deployed by the "blue team," who respond to the simulated intrusions.

Using this concept, SENTRY researchers design adaptive modeling methods, monitoring schemes and control algorithms to detect, prevent and mitigate the risk of cyberattacks, especially in critical grid infrastructures.

The group's research aims to create secure and resilient computing systems by employing computer security fundamentals and cyber-physical engineering applications.

Eric Feron is an Electrical and Computer Engineering Program professor,  an affiliate of the Mechanical Engineering Program, and the Principal Investigator of the Aerospace and Transportation Systems (ATS) Research Group at KAUST.

His research focuses on the development of advanced control and optimization techniques for autonomous systems with applications in aerospace, robotics and transportation. At KAUST, he leads efforts in exploring innovative solutions for complex challenges in these fields, emphasizing safety, reliability and efficiency in autonomous systems' design and operation.

His academic journey began in Paris, where he earned a B.S. from École Polytechnique in 1989 and an M.S. from École Normale Supérieure in 1990. He completed his Ph.D. in Aerospace Engineering at Stanford University in 1994. Before joining KAUST in October 2021, he served as a faculty member at the Georgia Institute of Technology and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Aeronautics and Astronautics Department.

Throughout his career, he has taught a wide range of courses, including cyber-physical systems, control systems, and flight mechanics, and is a strong advocate for quality online education resources.

Professor Feron has contributed significantly to both theoretical advancements and practical implementations in control systems, fostering collaborations across disciplines to drive progress in aerospace engineering.

With 31 years of experience in teaching and research, Professor Feron focuses on applying fundamental concepts of control systems, optimization, and computer science to modern aerospace engineering and robotics. His specific research interests include aerobatic control of uncrewed aerial vehicles, multi-agent operations, air traffic control systems and aerospace software system certification. He is also interested in geometric control systems and control theory in general.

Dr. Feron’s ATS research group has made significant technical contributions across a variety of fields, including aerospace engineering, automotive engineering, ocean engineering, biological engineering, electrical engineering, mechanical engineering and robotics, as well as human-machine interaction. These contributions are grounded in a strong foundation of mathematics, computer science and operations research.

Professor Gianluca Setti joined KAUST in 2022 from the Politecnico di Torino, Italy, where he served as a Professor of Electronics for Signal and Data Processing in the Department of Electronics and Telecommunications (DET). He also served as the Rector’s Delegate on Research Quality Evaluation.

He received his Ph.D. in Electronic Engineering and Computer Science ('97) from the University of Bologna, Italy. From 1997 to 2017, he was an assistant, associate and full professor of Circuit Theory and Analog Electronics at the University of Ferrara, Italy. Dr. Setti is the first serving non-US Editor-in-Chief of the Proceedings of the IEEE, the flagship journal of the Institute, a role he has held since 2019. He has also held the IEEE Vice Presidency for Publication Services and Products for two terms. During this period, he ensured ethics in using bibliometric indicators for evaluating the impact of individual scientists' research. Additionally, he served on IEEE's board of directors, where he addressed the impact of open access mandates on IEEE members.

He received the 1998 Caianiello Prize for the best Italian Ph.D. thesis on neural networks. He also received the 2013 IEEE Circuits and Systems Society (CASS) Meritorious Service Award and was an IEEE CASS Distinguished Lecturer in 2004–2005 and 2015–2016. In addition to publishing circa 320 scientific articles in journals and conference proceedings, as well as four books, he has received best paper awards in three different IEEE Transactions and six best paper awards or nominations at major conferences, including the IEEE International Symposium on Circuits and Systems and the Design, Automation and Test in Europe.

The nature of Setti's research interests and approaches is multidisciplinary: they include nonlinear circuits, statistical signal processing, electromagnetic compatibility, compressive sensing, biomedical circuits and systems, power electronics, design and implementation of IoT nodes, as well as machine learning techniques for anomaly detection and predictive maintenance.

Professor Hakan Bagci is a faculty member in the Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) program at KAUST. He specializes in computational electromagnetics, focusing on time-domain integral equations, hybrid methods, and numerical solvers for complex electromagnetic interactions, with applications in photonic, optical, and electronic systems.

Professor Hakan Bagci received his Bachelor's in Electrical and Electronics Engineering ('01) from Bilkent University, Turkey. He obtained his Master's and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC), U.S., in 2003 and 2007, respectively.

From 2001 to 2006, Bagci was a research assistant with the UIUC Center for Computational Electromagnetics and Electromagnetics Laboratory, U.S. From 2007 to 2009, he was a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Michigan's Radiation Laboratory, U.S.
Bagci arrived at KAUST in August 2009 as an Assistant Professor of Electrical Engineering. He was promoted to Associate Professor in the same program six years later.

In 2021, he was elevated as an Applied Computational Electromagnetics Society (ACES) Fellow for his "exceptional achievements in computational electromagnetics, including ACES publications, and extensive service to ACES." He is a Senior Member of the International Union of Radio Science (URSI) for his research achievements in the field of computational electromagnetics.

He is an Associate Editor for IEEE Antennas and Propagation Magazine (2019 to present), Associate Editor for IEEE Journal of Multiscale and Multiphysics Computational Techniques (2018 to present), and Associate Editor for IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation (2017 to present).

Professor Bagci’s research focuses on theoretical and applied aspects of the interdisciplinary field of computational electromagnetics (CEM). CEM fuses elements of electrical engineering, physics, applied mathematics and computational sciences to enable the numerical design and characterization of real-life electromagnetic, optical and photonic devices and systems.

The field of CEM complements and facilitates advances in other fields of electromagnetics, optics and photonics.

Bagci’s CEM research group is developing novel, efficient, accurate algorithms and numerical schemes for solving integral/differential forms of Maxwell equations—a set of four complicated equations that describe the world of electromagnetics.

Kazuhiro Ohkawa is a professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) Program and the principal investigator of the Energy Conversion Devices and Materials (ECO Devices) Laboratory at KAUST.

Before joining the University, he was a senior research member at Panasonic Ltd, a professor of Physics at the University of Bremen, Germany and a professor of Applied Physics at Tokyo University of Science, Japan.

Professor Ohkawa invented nitrogen-plasma doping for ZnSe and their blue-green lasers and LEDs. The nitrogen-plasma source is now a standard nitride molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) technology. He later became involved in the metalorganic vapor-phase epitaxy (MOVPE) growth of GaN, where he developed world-record deep-red indium gallium nitride (InGaN) LEDs based on the original MOVPE technique. His nitride MOVPE simulations have contributed to industries worldwide that produce InGaN LEDs, lasers and AlGaN electronics. Additionally, he invented nitride photocatalysts, which are instrumental in solar hydrogen production and artificial photosynthesis.

He has received numerous honors and recognitions for his contributions to optoelectronics, including being named an honorary professor (lifelong) at the University of Bremen, Germany; visiting professor at Mie University, Japan; guest professor at Xiamen University, China; and visiting professor (lifelong) at Tianjin University of Technology and Education, China. He is a fellow of the Japan Society of Applied Physics. Approximately 20 companies have sought his consulting expertise in these research areas.

His research has led to over 200 scientific publications, 28 granted US and Japanese patents and more than 70 invited talks.

Professor Ohkawa’s research at KAUST focuses on applying energy-conversion phenomena towards a more sustainable future. The highly regarded researcher’s contributions to applied physics and optoelectronics have resulted in his technologies being adopted by many companies and institutions worldwide.

Three notable contributions include the first doping technologies for II-VI compounds to realize n- and p-types. Notably, the nitrogen plasma source for the p-type has become the standard technology for molecular-beam epitaxy growth of nitride semiconductors. The second is MOCVD technology for nitride semiconductors. The technology has developed InGaN-based RGB full-color LEDs and made it possible to study MOCVD reactors scientifically. The third is the invention of a nitride photocatalyst for water splitting and artificial photosynthesis.

Ohkawa is also the principal investigator of the ECO Devices Laboratory. The lab’s research topics are not only monolithic RGB micro-LEDs but also applications of those micro-LEDs for high-speed visible light communications (so-called "Li-Fi") and vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs). RGB VCSELs will enable ultimate laser-based head-mounted displays.

Professor Salama received his B.S. (Hons.) degree from Cairo University, Egypt, in 1997. He obtained his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from Stanford University, U.S., in 2000 and 2005, respectively.

The principal investigator of the KAUST Sensors Lab, Salama joined the University in 2009. From 2009 to 2011, he served as the founding program chair for Electrical Engineering at KAUST. Before joining KAUST, he worked as an assistant professor at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, U.S., from 2005 to 2009.

Dr. Salama—a senior member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)—has authored 360 articles and holds 50 patents on low-power mixed-signal circuits for intelligent, fully integrated sensors and nonlinear electronics, particularly memristor devices.

His work on complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) sensors for molecular detection has been funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). He is also the co-founder of Ultrawave Labs, a biomedical imaging company.

Salama received the Stanford-Berkeley Innovators Challenge Award in Biological Science.

Professor Salama’s research interests cover various interdisciplinary aspects of electronic circuit design and semiconductor fabrication. He is actively engaged in developing devices, circuits, systems and algorithms to enable inexpensive analytical platforms for a variety of industrial, environmental and biomedical applications.

Salama’s most recent research has focused on developing neuromorphic circuits for brain emulation.

Nazek El-Atab is an assistant professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) and the principal investigator of the Smart, Advanced Memory Devices and Applications (SAMA) Lab. El-Atab joined the University in October 2017, having obtained her B.Sc. in computer and communications engineering in 2012 from Hariri Canadian University, Lebanon, and her M.Sc. in microsystems engineering in 2014 and Ph.D. in interdisciplinary engineering in 2017 from the Masdar Institute of Science and Technology, UAE, under a cooperative program with MIT, and funded by the US Office of Naval Research.
 
At KAUST, El-Atab has worked on several high-impact research projects focusing on designing and fabricating futuristic electronics. Her current research interest focuses on the design and development of smart multifunctional devices including in-memory sensing and computing, 4D printing of actuators with self-sensing capability, among others.
 
El-Atab is a Senior IEEE Member and currently serves as the Chair of the Western Saudi Arabia IEEE Electron Device Society Chapter. She is an IEEE Electron Devices Society Distinguished Lecturer. She is an associate editor-in-chief at Applied Nanoscience (Springer Nature) and associate editor at the Nano Select by Wiley and Microelectronics Engineering by Elsevier. She has published over 100 papers in international peer-reviewed scientific journals and conference proceedings, authored two book chapters, two books and holds seven filed U.S. patents.
 
El-Atab has received several significant awards for her research, including the 2015 For Women in Science Middle East Fellowship by L’Oreal-UNESCO, the 2017 International Rising Talents Award by L’Oreal-UNESCO, and was portrayed among the 2019 “Remarkable Women in Technology” by UNESCO. Prof. El-Atab was also selected to participate in the 70th Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting in Germany, was selected among the 2020 UC Berkeley EECS Rising Stars, among the 10 Innovators under 35 by MIT Technology Review Arabia in 2020, among the V60 Women in Sustainability by BCG, and as a “NEOM Changemaker” in 2021. 
 
Her research has been extensively covered in various international publications, including IEEE Spectrum, National Geographic, BBC, MIT Technology Review, and Sky News Arabia.

Professor El-Atab’s current research focuses on designing and developing innovative smart memory electronic devices for futuristic in-memory sensing and computing applications. El-Atab and her team aim to enhance an increasingly digitized world for emerging applications like artificial intelligence, IoT and augmented reality.

Shehab Ahmed is a professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) at KAUST, a position he has held since August 2018. He is affiliated with the Physical Science and Engineering (PSE) Division. Professor Ahmed first joined KAUST in 2010 as a visiting assistant professor in the PSE Division, and has since become a key contributor to the University's research landscape.

Beyond his work at KAUST, Shehab Ahmed held various academic roles at Texas A&M University at Qatar (TAMUQ). His tenure included serving as Associate Professor from 2013 to 2018, Assistant Professor from 2007 to 2013, and earlier as a Research Assistant from 1999 to 2002. In parallel with his academic career, Ahmed spent seven years as an electrical engineer at the Schlumberger Integrated Productivity and Conveyance Center in the U.S., where he applied his expertise in real-world engineering challenges.

Ahmed is the author of more than two hundred highly cited publications. He is also the recipient of prominent awards, such as the TEES Engineering Genesis Award, the ARC Best Research Project (2016) and the TAMUQ Faculty Research Excellence Award.

He received his Ph.D. and M.Sc. in Electrical Engineering from Texas A&M University, U.S., in 2007 and 2000, respectively. Ahmed obtained his B.Sc. in Electrical Engineering from Alexandria University, Egypt, in 1999.

Professor Ahmed’s research interests span the broad areas of power conversion and mechatronic systems. He specializes in distributed/renewable power generation, utility power conversion, microgrid energy management/storage, hybrid/electric vehicle drivetrains and high-voltage DC systems.

Among Ahmed’s goals are enhancing drilling operations, improving wellbore integrity assessment and supporting successful wireline conveyance.

Professor Park received his Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering in 2015 from the University of Maryland, U.S. Following his Ph.D., he held postdoctoral researcher positions at the National Geographic Society in 2016 and at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), U.S., from 2016 to 2019.

He joined KAUST in January 2021 as the principal investigator of the Distributed Robotics and Autonomy (DGA) Group. Prior to joining KAUST, he served as an associate research scholar at Princeton University, U.S., where he contributed to cross-departmental robotics projects.

Professor Park’s past research includes developing animal-borne sensor networks to study wild animal groups in their natural environments. He also created a fleet of urban autonomous surface vessels designed for transporting people and providing delivery and trash removal services through urban canal networks. In 2019, his innovative work was highlighted by MIT News.

Professor Park’s research focuses on the design and control of multi-robot systems. He strives to advance robotics science and engineering and seeks innovative ways to solve societal challenges using robotics technology. He pursues new and creative approaches to synergizing the individual robots’ core capabilities and strengthening the autonomy of robotic groups to solve large-scale problems.

His DGA Group investigates innovative concepts to address fundamental research questions in multi-agent, robotics and control systems. Their central focus is conceiving novel models and computational methods for multi-agent coordination and developing and deploying robotic/control systems for monitoring real-world environments such as the Red Sea.

Tareq Al-Naffouri is a professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) Program at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST).

Al-Naffouri earned a B.S. (Hons.) in Mathematics and Electrical Engineering from King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals, Saudi Arabia, 

During the summers of 2005 and 2006, Al-Naffouri was a visiting scholar at the California Institute of Technology, U.S. He was a Fulbright Scholar at the University of Southern California, U.S., in 2008.

An IEEE Senior Member, he has produced over 370 publications in journals and conference proceedings and 24 issued/pending patents. Al-Naffouri received the IEEE Education Society Chapter Achievement Award (2008), the Almarai Award for Innovative Research in Communication (2009) and the Abdul Hameed Shoman Prize for Innovative Research in IoT (2022).

Inference and Learning and their applications to Wireless Communications, Localization, Smart Cities, and Smart Health

Professor Xiaohang Li has extensive research experience in III-nitride and III-oxide (ultra)wide bandgap semiconductors. Prior to KAUST, Li received his Bachelor degree in Applied Physics from Huazhong University of Science and Technology, China, his Master's degree in Electrical Engineering from Lehigh University, U.S., and his Ph.D. degree in Electrical Engineering from Georgia Institute of Technology, U.S.

Since joining KAUST, Li has advised more than 100 students, and led his Advanced Semiconductor Laboratory (ASL) in making many important and pioneering contributions to semiconductor research. Prof Li and his ASL team focus on the fundamental and applied research of ultrawide and wide-bandgap semiconductor materials, devices, physics and hardware. The ASL team aims to leverage these technologies to revolutionize the energy, communications, and health industries crucial for the sustainability of human society.

Professor Li has extensive research experience in III-nitride and III-oxide (ultra)wide bandgap semiconductors. He focuses his interdisciplinary research activities on investigating the growth, simulation, fabrication and characterization of III-nitride structures for next-generation devices. Devices of particular interest include LEDs, lasers, transistors and next-generation CMOS ICs.

Dr. Yating Wan is an Assistant Professor at KAUST, specializing in Silicon Photonics with a focus on integrating on-chip light sources that can be applied to data communication, optical computing, OPA based lidar, and quantum information processing. She earned her Ph.D. in 2017 from HKUST (supervised by Prof. Kei May Lau). From 2016 to 2022, she worked at UCSB (supervised by Prof. John Bowers), where she led Intel’s project on heterogeneously integrated quantum dot lasers, making significant contributions to Si CMOS-compatible light sources. 

Dr. Wan has authored over 100 peer-reviewed publications, including 29 first-author journal papers (10 as covers), 7 corresponding-author journal papers, and >20 invited talks in international conferences. With over 3,500 citations and an h-index of 33, her research has received prestigious awards, including HKUST PhD Research Excellence Award (2017), PIERS Young Scientist Award (2018), CLEO Tingye Li Innovation Prize (2021), Rising Stars of Light by Light: Science & Applications (2022), MIT Technology Review's "35 Innovators Under 35 for China" (2023), Optica Ambassador (2024), and Sony Women in Technology Award with Nature (2025). 

Outside of her immediate research spectrum, Dr. Wan has been a proactive contributor to the broader academic community. She is the Manager & Column Editor for the LSA Editorial Office in Thuwal, Associate editor in Applied Optics, IEEE JQE, guest associate editor in IEEE JSTQE, TPC of IPC and CLEO, and Committee Member of the IEEE Photonics Society (IPS) Conference Council. She has also been a referee for a myriad of prestigious journals, spanning IEEE, OSA, and the Nature Publishing Group more than 100 times.

An expert in silicon photonics, Dr. Wan specializes in on-chip light source integration. Her research extends to data communication, optical computing and quantum information processing.

She is renowned for integrating long-wavelength quantum dot devices on silicon.

Basem Shihada is a leading expert in computer networking and distributed systems. He is a founding professor of the Computer Science and Electrical and Computer Engineering Programs in the Computer, Electrical and Mathematical Sciences and Engineering (CEMSE) Division at KAUST. He earned his Ph.D. in Computer science from the University of Waterloo, Canada. In 2009, he was appointed visiting faculty in the Department of Computer Science at Stanford University. In 2012, he was elevated to the rank of Senior Member of IEEE. His current research covers energy and resource allocation in wired and wireless networks, software-defined networking, cloud/fog computing, the Internet of Things, data networks, and underwater networks.

Professor Shihada's research expertise lies in developing cutting-edge wireless systems, where he has made groundbreaking contributions across various domains, including intelligent wireless systems, wireless underwater systems, molecular communication systems and non-terrestrial systems. His notable achievements include:

• Aqua-Fi: The creation and successful demonstration of Aqua-Fi, the world's first underwater Wi-Fi, enabling high-speed internet connectivity in aquatic environments.
• Sun-Fi: The demonstration of Sun-Fi, the world's first passive internet via building glass.

Derya Baran is an associate professor of Material Science and Engineering in the Organic/Hybrid Materials for Energy Applications (OMEGA) Lab in the Physical Science and Engineering (PSE) Division at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST). She is also affiliated with the Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) Program in the Computer, Electrical, and Mathematical Sciences and Engineering (CEMSE) Division.

Baran’s academic journey includes roles such as Research Associate at Jülich Forschungszentrum, Germany, in 2016, and Postdoctoral Fellow at the Center for Plastic Electronics, Imperial College London, UK, in 2015. She earned her Ph.D. in Material Science and Engineering from Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nurnberg, Germany, in 2014, and holds an M.Sc. in Chemistry from Middle East Technical University, Turkey, in 2010, and a B.Sc. in Chemistry from the same institution in 2008.

Professor Baran aims to expand the applications of solution-processable organic/hybrid semiconductors and to explore their limits in organic/hybrid thermoelectric devices and bio-electronics in the future.

Professor Baran's research interests lie in the area of solution-processable organic/hybrid soft materials for electronic devices. Such soft semiconductor materials possess a viable platform for printed, large area, stretchable and wearable electronics that can be used as solar cells, smart windows, OFETs, thermoelectrics, sensors and bio-electronics.

​Professor Baran is particularly interested in interface engineering for organic/hybrid solar cells, transparent solar cells for building integrated photovoltaics and stability/degradation studies for long lifetime organic solar cells. She has led projects on i) conjugated polymers for electrochromic devices; ii) non-fullerene acceptors for organic solar cells; iii) multi-component and multi-layered solar cell devices; iv) understanding the correlation between recombination and nano-morphology in solution-processed solar cells.

Professor Husam Alshareef is the Chair of the KAUST Center of Excellence for Renewable Energy and Storage Technologies (CREST) and the Principal Investigator of the KAUST Functional Nanomaterials & Devices Laboratory, with research interests in the development of nanoscale materials for energy applications. Alshareef’s work focuses on synthesizing advanced nanomaterials and translating them into practical energy solutions, contributing significantly to innovations in renewable energy and storage technologies.

Husam is the author of 600 journal publications and holds 80 issued patents. With over 62,000 citations and an h-index of 134 (Google Scholar), he was recognized for the fifth consecutive year by the Web of Science and Clarivate Analytics as a highly cited researcher in material science, placing him in the top 1% of worldwide researchers in terms of research output.

Professor Alshareef is a Fellow of several prestigious organizations, including the American Physical Society (APS), the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE, 2024), the U.S. National Academy of Inventors (2022), the UK Institute of Physics (IoP, 2022), the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC), and the Institute of Materials, Minerals, and Mining (2021). These accolades reflect Husam’s extensive contributions to energy storage and materials science, positioning him as a leader in the field.

Professor Alshareef's research focuses on developing nanomaterials for energy storage and electronic applications. His research efforts have recently centered on creating new battery chemistries for harsh environments, and batteries with higher energy density, lower cost, and better safety.  

Osman M. Bakr is a professor in the Material Science and Engineering program at KAUST, where he has been a faculty member since 2010. He previously served as a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Laboratory for Nanoscale Optics at Harvard University and held research assistant positions in the Supramolecular Nanomaterials Group and Advanced Inorganic Materials Group at MIT.

He holds a Ph.D. and M.Sc. in Applied Physics from Harvard University and a B.Sc. in Materials Science and Engineering from MIT. Throughout his academic journey, Bakr has made significant contributions to the field of nanomaterials, and in 2008, he was awarded the King Abdullah Scholar Award at KAUST.

Professor Bakr's research interests are concerned with the physics and chemistry of hybrid materials. His group studies the synthesis and assembly of organic–inorganic hybrid materials and nanomaterials of novel optical and electronic properties. The purpose of these studies is to fabricate advanced material building blocks for solar cells and optoelectronic devices.

Professor Sahika Inal is an Associate Professor of Bioengineering at KAUST. Her research lies at the intersection of organic electronics and biology, focusing on developing bioelectronic materials and devices that interface with living systems.

Her research aims to create tools that can translate biological signals into electronic signals, facilitating real-time monitoring and intervention for health applications, including tissue regeneration, diagnostics and drug delivery.

Prior to joining KAUST, Sahika Inal was a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Bioelectronics at the Center of Microelectronics of Provence, École Nationale Supérieure des Mines de Saint-Étienne, Gardanne, France. She earned her B.Sc. in Textile Engineering from Istanbul Technical University in 2007 and her M.Sc. in Polymer Science in 2009 from a joint program involving TU, HU, FU, and the University of Potsdam in Berlin, Germany. In 2013, she completed her Ph.D. in Experimental Physics from the University of Potsdam, where her doctoral research focused on developing phase transition polymer/conjugated polyelectrolyte-based optical sensors for autonomous pathogen detection. Her M.Sc. work explored optical processes in organic solar cells using small molecule acceptors.

She hold nine patents and has delivered over 50 invited and keynote presentations at international conferences and universities across various countries. She is recognized as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry and has received several awards, including ACS PMSE Young Investigator Award 2022, Beilby Medal and Prize 2022, and the Journal of Materials Chemistry Lectureship 2022. She has authored over 130 publications, and her work has been cited more than 13000 times with a 2024 h-index of 61.

Her innovative contributions help advance the field of bioelectronics and open new possibilities for understanding and interacting with biological systems.

Sahika’s expertise lies in polymer science and bioelectronic devices. She specializes in photophysics of conjugated polymers, characterization of polymer thin films, behavior of polymer films in aqueous environment, and the design of biosensors and actuators comprising conjugated polymers. She currently investigates ion/electron conduction in organic electronic materials and designs bioelectronic devices that can record/stimulate biological signals.  

Combining in-situ techniques to monitor ion and electron motion in films, fibers, and porous scaffolds of organic materials, her team aims to find the best performing materials, formulations, processing conditions and form factors for applications in electrolytes. 

These optimized materials are then applied to build specific devices (transistors, fuel cells, electrodes, electrochemical actuators or drug delivery devices) that can sense or stimulate biological signals.

Suhaib Fahmy is associate professor of Computer Science and the principal investigator of the KAUST Accelerated Connected Computing Laboratory (ACCL).

Professor Fahmy graduated from Imperial College London with an M.Eng. in Information Systems Engineering in 2003 and a Ph.D. in Electrical and Electronic Engineering in 2008. Following his Ph.D., he joined Trinity College Dublin, Ireland, as a postdoctoral research fellow and later worked as a visiting research engineer at Xilinx Research Labs Ireland, focusing on reconfigurable computing systems.

He was an assistant professor of Computer Engineering at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, where his team led early efforts to virtualize FPGAs for cloud computing, as well as pioneering work on efficient mapping of circuits to FPGA primitives.

In 2015, he returned to the UK, joining the University of Warwick as associate professor, then Reader in Computer Engineering. While at Warwick, he led the Connected Systems Research Group and the Adaptive Reconfigurable Computing Lab and launched the joint Computer Systems Engineering degree program. He was also appointed a Turing Fellow at The Alan Turing Institute, the UK’s national institute for data science and artificial intelligence.

He has received numerous notable accolades, including the IEEE Conference on Field Programmable Technology (FPT) Best Paper Award in 2012, IBM Faculty Awards in 2013 and 2017, the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office Collaborative Development Award in 2013, the International Conference on Field-Programmable Logic and Applications (FPL) Community Award in 2016, the ACM Transactions on Design Automation of Electronic Systems Best Paper Award in 2019, and the IEEE High Performance Extreme Computing Conference Best Paper Award in 2021.

In 2023, he was awarded the KAUST Distinguished Teaching Award for his exceptional contributions to the classroom instruction mission of the University.

Professor Fahmy and his team at the ACCL are currently investigating a variety of approaches to hardware acceleration and how connected computing can enable more efficient, performant and secure systems.

His group focuses on overcoming the inherent latency and inefficiency of existing computing abstractions. To achieve this goal, they develop connected accelerator architectures that consider connectivity from the outset alongside specialized accelerator architectures to support more challenging applications.

Wolfgang Heidrich is a professor of Computer Science and Electrical and Computer Engineering at KAUST. He is a member of the KAUST Visual Computing Center and served as its director for eight years, from 2014 to 2021. Heidrich is a pioneer in computational imaging and display, which seeks to advance imaging and display systems by co-designing optics, electronics, and algorithms.

Heidrich received his Diploma in Computer Science from the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg (FAU), Germany, in 1995, followed by an M.Math from the University of Waterloo, Canada, in 1996. He also earned a Ph.D. in 1999 from FAU.

In 2014, Heidrich was honored with a Humboldt Research Award in recognition of his contributions to computational imaging. He is also a Fellow of the IEEE and Eurographics, acknowledging his significant impact on the field.

Professor Heidrich's core research interests are in computational imaging and display, an emerging research area within visual computing, which combines methods from computer graphics, machine vision, imaging, inverse methods, optics and perception to develop new sensing and display technologies.

Computational imaging is the hardware-software co-design of imaging devices, which aims to optically encode information about the real world in such a way that image sensors can capture it. The resulting images represent detailed information such as scene geometry, motion of solids and liquids, multi-spectral information or high contrast (high-dynamic range), which can then be computationally decoded using inverse methods, machine learning and numerical optimization.

Heidrich and his colleagues in the Computational Imaging Group develop end-to-end learned imaging systems, increasing the complexity of the optical design space and expanding the methodology to fully automate the design of complex optical systems instead of individual components.

Ying Wu is an Associate Professor of Applied Mathematics and Computational Science (AMCS) and the principal investigator of the Waves in Complex Media Research Group.

Professor Wu obtained her Ph.D. in Physics in 2008 from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST), which was followed by a two-year postdoctoral fellowship. She received her B.S. in Physics from Nanjing University, China, in 2002.

Wu is a dedicated physicist who studies electromagnetic, acoustic and elastic waves. Her work has advanced theoretical and design knowledge of metamaterials, photonic and phononic crystals and waves in random media.

Among Professor Wu’s research interests are computational physics with a focus on wave propagation in heterogeneous media, electromagnetic, acoustic and elastic metamaterials, effective medium theory, transport theory and time-reversal imaging. Furthermore, she implements fast algorithms for solving large-scale, classical wave propagation problems.

Dr. Salem holds a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University, U.S. Prior to joining KAUST in 2010, he was an Assistant Professor of Electrical Engineering at Alexandria University, Egypt. He has also jointly held an assistant professorship at the Wireless Intelligent Networks Center (WINC) at Nile University, Egypt, since 2008.

Salem has extensive experience teaching at graduate and undergraduate levels. He has taught courses in digital communications, wireless communications and systems, digital signal processing, signal and systems, detection and estimation, probability and stochastic processes, engineering mathematics, signal processing for radar systems, remote sensing, and automatic control.

In 2017, he received the inaugural KAUST Distinguished Teaching Award. His research has yielded over eighty scientific publications in various peer-reviewed journals and conferences.

Dr. Salem’s research interests include energy harvesting, dynamic spectrum access, cognitive radio networks, cooperative communications, orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing for optical communications, distributed and sequential detection, cooperative relay-based multi-hop communications, physical layer-based secrecy, remote sensing and synthetic aperture radar.

Talal Al-Attar has taught electrical engineering at institutions such as Kuwait University, Kuwait; Stanford University, U.S.; Santa Clara University, U.S.; and KAUST, Saudi Arabia, for over 15 years.

Professor Al-Attar received his B.S. and M.S. from Kuwait University and his Ph.D. from Stanford University. His doctoral work focused on impact ionization avalanche transit-time (IMPATT) modeling at the millimeter-wave range, on-chip integration of microstrip patch antennas and transmission lines in standard complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) technology.

Al-Attar’s career began as a senior design and device engineer at Volterra Semiconductor, U.S., where he worked from 2004 to 2007. He also worked as a senior consultant at Sabio Labs in 2007 before joining Magma Design Automation in 2008. Al-Attar consulted several companies between 2007 and 2014, including Ensphere Solutions, AWR, Intersil and Intel.

After joining Santa Clara University (SCU), U.S., he was initially an adjunct professor before becoming a lecturer and full-time assistant professor. He spent eight years at SCU, serving as the SCU Center for Analog Design and Research director.

Al-Attar joined KAUST in 2014 as a consultant/visiting associate professor and in 2018 as a senior lecturer in the Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) program.

Al-Attar’s interests focus on four main topics: (1) Microwave devices: IMPATT modeling and scaling in standard CMOS technology and non-linear transmission lines (NLTL); (2) microstrip patch antenna on-chip for wireless and biomedical applications: Microstrip patch antenna efficiency and losses in standard CMOS beyond 50GHz and novel methods of measuring and characterizing on-chip antennas; (3) analog design optimization: SerDes design, bandgap (voltage and current modes), data converters and DC-DC converters; and (4) LDMOS (laterally-diffused metal-oxide semiconductor) and fin field-effect (FinFet) transistor modeling for RF circuit design.

Al-Attar has contributed to two books: one book on CMOS RF ICs and one book on planar microwave engineering.

• Energy-efficient wireless multi hop networks.
• Cross-layer protocol design.

• Applications of stochastic geometry in performance analysis.

   

Her research interests include computer vision and deep learning, with a focus on video understanding and efficient models.

Hakim Ghazzai, Senior Member, IEEE, joined the CEMSE Division as a Research Scientist in 2021. Previously, he held several research scholar positions with the Qatar Mobility Innovations Center (QMIC), Qatar, Karlstad University, Sweden, and Stevens Institute of Technology, NJ, USA. Since 2019, he has been on the Editorial Board of the IEEE Communications Letters and the IEEE Open Journal of the Communications Society. Since 2020, he joined the Board of IoT and Sensor Networks (a specialty section of Frontiers in Communications and Networks) as an associate editor. He is a recipient of appreciation for being an exemplary reviewer for IEEE Wireless Communications Letters in 2016 and IEEE Communications Letters in 2017. He is the recipient of the best paper awards at the 2023 IEEE International Conference on Smart Mobility and the 2017 International Conference on Advances in Vehicular Systems, Technologies, and Applications. He is the author and co-author of more than 190 publications. His general research interests include applied artificial intelligence for smart cities, the Internet of things, Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS), mobile and wireless networks, and Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs).

Hakim's research focuses on the following areas:

• Green communications
• Smart city applications
• Artificial intelligence
• The Internet-of-Things
• Intelligent transportation systems

ISLAM ASHRY received the B.S. and M.S. degrees from the University of Alexandria, Alexandria, Egypt, in 2003 and 2007, respectively, and the Ph.D. degree from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech), Blacksburg, VA, USA, in 2012. He is currently a Senior Research Scientist with the Photonics Laboratory, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Thuwal, Saudi Arabia. His research interests include optical sensors, fiber-optic sensors, optical communication, machine learning. He is a Senior Member of the National Academy if Inventors (NAI), a Senior Member of IEEE, a Senior Member of IEEE Photonics Society, and a member of SPIE.

Optical sensors; Fiber-optic sensors; Optical communication; Machine learning 

• Molecular communication.
• Terahertz Communications.
• communication networks.
• AI for healthcare.
• Security and reliability analysis of next generation communication networks.

NABIL MOHAMMED (Senior Member, IEEE) received the B.Eng. degree (Hons.) in electrical power engineering from Tishreen University, Latakia, Syria, in 2013, the M.Eng. degree (Hons.) in electrical engineering from Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Johor Bahru, Malaysia, in 2017, and the Ph.D. degree in power electronics from Macquarie University, Sydney, NSW, Australia, in 2022. 

During Summer 2019, he was a Visiting Researcher with the Department of Energy Technology, Aalborg University, Aalborg, Denmark. From 2021 to 2024, he was a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow with Monash University, Clayton, Australia. He is currently a Research Scientist with the Computer, Electrical, and Mathematical Sciences and Engineering Division, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Thuwal, Saudi Arabia.

NABIL MOHAMMED research interests include power electronics, grid integration of renewable energy resources, microgrids, energy storage and management systems, and modeling, control, and stability of power electronic-based power systems.

Silvio Giancola received his Master Degree in Mechatronics Engineering Institut National des Sciences Appliquées (INSA), Strasbourg in France in 2012. He has a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from Politecnico di Milano, Milano, Italy.

Before joining KAUST, Silvio had academic experience in Politecnico di Milano in Italy. He was a teaching assistant for undergraduate and graduate students in Industrial and Information Engineering School, Politecnico di Milano in Italy from 2014 until 2017. In addition to teaching, he was a Research Fellow who later on became a Postdoctoral Fellow.

At KAUST, Silvio was a Postdoctoral Fellow from 2017 to 2020, then became a Research Scientist since 2020. In 2022, Silvio co-founded the start-up Thya Technology, with which he won the TAQADAM accelerator program.

Silvio Giancola is mainly interested in Computer Vision, Deep learning, Sports, and Robotics.

• Digital Signal Processing & algorithms.
• Low sampling & low complexity systems.
• Image Processing.
• Ultra-wideband (UWB) sensing and communications.
• UWB channel impulse response estimation.
• Acoustic sensing and communications.
• Sonars and radars.
• Movement detection and tracking using RF and acoustic waves.
• Respiration detection and tracking.
• Robust estimation and regularization.
• Experimentation and testing.