ECE recently opened our new Engineering Prototype and Invention Center (EPIC) lab on the fifth floor of F. Paul Anderson Tower. The space’s centerpiece is the LPKF rapid PCB prototyping system for rapid PCB prototyping, accompanied by a variety of test equipment, fabrication tools, and 3D printer capabilities.

The ECE Department currently has two open faculty searches, in the areas of Computer Engineering and Power. Outstanding candidates in all focus areas will be considered, including, for computer engineering, VLSI, embedded systems, cybersecurity, biomedical, and neuromorphic computing; and for power engineering, alternative and renewable energy systems, smart grid and buildings, power systems, electric machines, drives, power electronics, and energy storage.

Three UK ECE student, Stewart Jones, Robert Richardson and Abigail Shelton, have been awarded 2017-18 Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Power & Energy Society (PES) Scholarship Plus Initiative scholarships. The IEEE Foundation awarded scholarships to 210 undergraduate students at 116 universities across the U.S., Canada and Puerto Rico.

At its final race, Gato del Sol V finished in 7th place, marking its best finish at the Formula Sun Grand Prix and its last run.. The Gato del Sol VI build is now underway, with plans to complete in time for next summer's race.

The 13 ^th annual GEMS (Girls in Engineering, Math and Science) outreach event took place at UK on Saturday, November 11, 2017.  GEMS is a collaboration between UK and the Girl Scouts that introduces girls to multiple STEM fields through fun hands-on workshops. ECE faculty and students helped make this years event the best ever, nearly doubling participation. President Eli Capilouto and Dean Larry Holloway both spoke at the opening ceremony.  

Dr. Greg Heileman joined the ECE department this fall. Dr. Heileman is the new UK Associate Provost for Student and Academic Life, and serves as the chief advisor to the Provost in recommending new university-wide initiatives and special programs providing support and services across UK's four pillars of student success.Dr. Heileman's academic credentials include research expertise in web applications development and curricular analytics.

Dr. Himanshu Thapliyal, Assistant Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Kentucky, has been awarded funding by the National Science Foundation to explore hardware security measures for vehicle security. His project, “Photovoltaic Based Physically Unclonable Functions (PUFs) for Vehicular Security,” will receive approximately $200,000 over the next two years.  

Dr. Dan M. Ionel, ECE Professor and L. Stanley Pigman Chair in Power, along with colleagues, has received the IEEE Industry Application Society, Electric Machines Committee, Annual Paper Award, Third Prize, for a paper on the calculation of strand eddy current losses in electric machines.

Dr. Aaron Cramer, ECE Associate Professor, and doctoral student Yuqi Zhang have received a best paper award from IEEE Transactions on Energy Conversion for their paper titled “Unified model formulations for synchronous machine model with saturation and arbitrary rotor network representation.”