News Story

Alumna Named to MIT’s TR 35, Joins Faculty at UC-Santa Barbara

Haitao Zheng

Clark School alumna Haitao Zheng has been named one of the top 35 innovators under the age of 35 by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Technology Review magazine.

The magazine cited Zheng for her "youth and... brilliance," noting her work on cognitive radios, which dynamically detect unused radio frequencies, helping alleviate competition in the radio spectrum. Zheng will continue her research on open spectrum systems this fall in her new position as an assistant professor of computer science at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Zheng earned a Ph.D. in electrical and computer engineering (ECE) from the Clark School in 1999, and was nominated for the TR 35 by her former advisor, K.J. Ray Liu (ECE and Institute for Systems Research). As a student at Maryland, she received an Outstanding Grad Student Award from ISR, and the Bell Labs President Gold Medal for her work in the Wireless Communications Research Lab. She was later recruited to Microsoft Research in China.

The TR 35 list includes inventors, discoverers, and entrepreneurs engaged in emerging technology, recognizing individuals in both academia and industry whose "achievements will shape the world we live in for decades to come." Technology Review began the TR list six years ago to recognize the world’s top innovators under 35. The list, which formerly cited the top 100 innovators, was reduced to 35 this year. Inclusion among the TR list has become one of the most prestigious awards for young innovators around the world.

September 21, 2005