Group Members
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Feng Li obtained her B.Sc. degree in Physics (2018) and M.Sc. degree in Optics and Photonics (2019) from Imperial College London. She is currently a Ph.D. student majoring in Photonics at UCSD under the supervision of Professor Daniel Sievenpiper. She is interested in manipulating electromagnetic wave propagation with engineered periodic structures and possible applications. Her current research topic is on plasma photonic topological insulators. |
David Schwartz received his B.S. (2022) in Electrical and Computer Engineering with a minor in Physics from Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI). He is now pursuing his Ph.D. in Applied Electromagnetics at UCSD. His interests include electromagnetics in non-LTI systems and propagation in periodic structures.
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Armin Ewert earned his BS in Mathematical Engineering and his MS in Electrical Engineering from the Bundeswehr University Munich in 2017 and 2019, respectively. He has served in the German Air Force as an Aircraft Technical Officer and engineer where he developed and optimized fighter aircraft communication modules as a systems engineer at Airbus Defence and Space. Armin is currently pursuing his PhD and his research centers on plasma physics, with a particular emphasis on exploring topological phenomena within magnetized plasma environments.
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Ian Broadbooks graduated from the University of Southern California in 2023 with two B.S. degrees (Electrical and Computer Engineering, Applied and Computational Mathematics) and an M.S. degree (Electrical Engineering). He is now pursuing his Ph.D. in Applied Electromagnetics at UCSD. His current research is in non-linear and time-varying electrically small antennas.
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Peixing Li received his B.Eng. in electronic and communication engineering from City University of Hong Kong in 2023. He is currently a PhD student at UC San Diego majoring in applied electromagnetics. His research at CityU HK involved time-modulation of metamaterials, programmable metasurface, and antenna design and measurement. Peixing is now focusing on the study of artificial electromagnetic surfaces and incorporating active and/or digital electronics and computational techniques with them.
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Trenton Hegranes graduated from the Georgia Institute of Technology in 2023 with a BS in Electrical Engineering. He is pursuing his MS degree at UCSD in the Applied Electromagnetics track. Trenton's research interests and current research projects are centered around antennas and telecommunications. Trenton was also awarded the SMART Scholarship by the DoD. |
Paul Bastaki received his B.S. in Physics with a specialization in Astrophysics from UC Irvine in 2021 where he researched electroweak phase transitions in the early universe. Prior to UCSD, he worked at Underwriter Laboratories (UL) as an RF Engineer, performing compliance testing on a wide range of wireless devices in the millimeter-wave spectrum. Currently pursuing his M.S. in Electrical Engineering in the Applied Electromagnetics track, his research includes utilizing direct antenna modulation to increase the bandwidth of electrically small antennas.
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Pratap Vangol (Student Member, IEEE) received the bachelor’s degree in electronics and communication from the R. V. College of Engineering, Bengaluru, India, in 2022, and is currently pursuing his Masters (specialization in RFIC design and Applied EM) and PhD (specialization in Applied EM) at UCSD. During his undergraduate studies he has worked in the domain of phased arrays, specifically on algorithms for the synthesis of sparse antenna arrays and isophorically fed sparse antenna arrays, and design of active integrated antenna arrays for various applications. Mr. Vangol was a recipient of the First Place Award at the National Level Student Project Competition Presentation organized by the IEEE AP/MTT Joint Chapter, Bangalore Section. His current research interests include Topological considerations in EM structures, Integration of active circuits with EM structures, and Synthesis and Analysis of quasi-periodic/random EM structures.
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Dr. Matthew C. Smith is a recent recipient of the Intelligence Community (IC) Postdoctoral Fellowship Program, awarded by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI). His research is supervised by Professor Dan Sievenpiper at UCSD, along with a research advisor from the Intelligence Community. His research focuses on the modeling, development and/or fabrication of high reliability electromagnetic structures and subsystems, aimed at enhancing sensor communications. He holds dual bachelor’s degrees, a BSEE and a BSNS from USF. He earned his MSEE in 2019 and his Ph.D. in applied electromagnetics in 2022, both from UCSD. His doctoral research involved the synthesis of complex electric-field patterns using multichannel coil arrays. Before receiving the IC Fellowship, he served as a Senior Research Electrical Engineer (DR-III) at the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL/RVBXC) at Kirtland Air Force Base, and as a Postdoctoral Researcher in UCSD's Applied Electromagnetics Group. He retired from Raytheon Space and Airborne Systems in 2017 after a distinguished 25-year career, where he was a Senior Engineering Fellow. During his time at Raytheon, he specialized in the design of microwave and millimeter-wave circuits, subsystems, and systems for radar, remote sensing, communications, and electronic warfare (EW) systems. His extensive design portfolio includes over 50 fielded and on-orbit microwave and millimeter-wave circuit designs, seven patents (two validated by NIST), and more than 20 IEEE and SPIE publications covering HF to W-Band technologies. He is a Senior Member of IEEE.
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Alumni, and their recent positions:Trenton Hegranes - MS 2025 - General Atomics Paul Bastaki - MS 2025 - Millennium Space Systems Xiaozhen Yang - PhD 2024 - University of Electronic Science and Technology of China Erda Wen - PhD 2023 - University of Electronic Science and Technology of China Rohith Mahalikudi - MS 2023 - PlaneWave Inc Robert Davis - PhD 2023 - Commonwealth Fusion Systems Sara Kandil - PhD 2022 - Stanford Linear Accelerator Center Matt Smith - PhD 2022 - AFRL Kirtland Yun Zhou - PhD 2022 - Skyworks Shreya Singh - PhD 2021 - Tesla Kyle Thackston - PhD 2020 - General Atomics Dia’aaldin Bisharat - Visiting Scholar 2016, and Post-Doc 2019 - City University of New York Xianghong Kong - Visiting Scholar 2019 - National University of Singapore Zhixia Xu - Visiting Scholar 2019 - Dalian Maritime University, China Aobo Li - PhD 2018 - Apple Zhixia Du - Visiting Scholar 2018 - Guangdong University of Technology, China Jiyeon Lee - PhD 2018 - Qualcomm Sanghoon Kim - PhD 2017 - Amazon Shiva Piltan - PhD 2017 - Google Chao Wang - Visiting Scholar 2016 - Huawei Yong Luo - Post Doc 2016 - Shanghai University, China Yunbo Li - Post Doc 2016 - Southeast University, China Ebrahim Forati - Post Doc 2016 - TDK Jessy Yang - B.S. 2016 Mei Li - Visiting Scholar 2016 - Chongqing University, China Minu Jacob - Ph.D. 2016 - Keysight Labs Jiang Long - Ph.D. 2015 - Apple Abas Sabouni - Post Doc 2015 - Wilkes University Hiajian Hou - Visiting Scholar 2015 - Beijing Jiaotong University, China Jeremiah Rushton - M.S. 2014 - Los Alamos National Lab Fei Gao - Visiting Scholar 2014 - Bell Labs, China Zhangjie Luo - Visiting Scholar 2014 - Sichuan University, China Yunshun Zhou - M.S. 2014 - Northrop Grumman Ryan Quarfoth - Ph.D. 2014 - HRL Laboratories Kristian Madsen - M.S. 2014 - Anokiwave Han Lin - M.S. 2014 - SpaceX Ming Huang - Visiting Scholar 2013 - University of Electronic Science and Technology, China Hiroki Wakatsuchi - Post Doc 2013 - Nagoya Institute of Technology, Japan .
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Professor Dan Sievenpiper joined the UC San Diego faculty in 2010. He received his BS in 1994 and his PhD in 1999 from UCLA, where he studied photonic crystals and other periodic structures, and invented the high impedance electromagnetic surface. Dan joined HRL (the former Hughes Research Laboratories) in Malibu, CA in 1999. During the following 11 years, he and his team developed new electromagnetic structures, with an emphasis on small, conformal, tunable, and steerable antennas. Dan held a variety of technical and management positions at HRL including Director of the Applied Electromagnetics Laboratory. In 2010 he joined UC San Diego, where his research is focused on artificial media, and the integration of active electronics with electromagnetic structures and antennas to enable new capabilities and applications. In 2008, Dan received the URSI Issac Koga Gold Medal, and also the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Society Piergiorgio Uslenghi Letters Prize Paper Award. In 2009, he was named as a Fellow of the IEEE, and in 2019, he was awarded the John D. Kraus Antenna Award. During 2010-2017, Dan served as an associate editor of IEEE Antennas and Wireless Propagation Letters. He also served as the chair of the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Society Administrative Committee on New Technology Directions from 2013-2014, and as the general chair of the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Symposium and URSI Radio Science Meeting which was held in San Diego in 2017. He served as the vice chair of the ECE department from 2019-2024, and on the UCSD Admissions Committee from 2024-present. Dan currently has more than 80 issued patents and more than 200 publications.