EE Systems Seminar

ABSTRACT Wireless communication networks composed of devices that can harvest energy from nature will lead to the green future of wireless, as energy harvesting offers the possibility of perpetual network operation without adverse effects on the environment. By developing effective and robust communication techniques to be used under energy harvesting conditions, some of the communication devices in a heterogeneous network can even be taken off the grid. Energy harvesting brings new considerations to system level design of wireless communication networks, leading to new insights. These include randomness and intermittency of available energy, as well as additional system issues to be concerned about such as energy storage capacity and processing complexity. Energy harvesting also enables a new form of cooperation between nodes by sharing energy. The goal of this talk is to furnish the audience with fundamental design principles of energy harvesting wireless communication networks. The focus will be on identifying optimum transmission scheduling policies in various settings, and the ensuing algorithmic solutions. Time permitting, we will also go into the information theory of energy harvesting communications, which brings in new challenges taking into account energy availability and storage at the channel use level. We will conclude with new directions and how energy harvesting networks connect to various emerging paradigms upcoming for the IoT era.

BIO Aylin Yener is a professor of Electrical Engineering at The Pennsylvania State University since 2010, and a Dean's fellow since 2017. She is currently also a visiting professor of Electrical Engineering at Stanford University.  She joined Penn State's faculty as an assistant professor in 2002, and was an associate professor 2006-2010. She was also a visiting associate professor at Stanford during the academic year 2008-2009. In the summer of 2016, she was a visiting researcher at Telecom Paris Tech. She received the B.Sc. degree in electrical and electronics engineering, and the B.Sc. degree in physics, from Bogazici University, Istanbul, Turkey; and the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical and computer engineering from Wireless Information Network Laboratory (WINLAB), Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ. Her first research recognition was the CAREER award from the National Science Foundation in 2003. Her research recognitions since then include the 2014 IEEE Marconi paper award and various other paper and research awards.  She is a fellow of the IEEE.
Yener's research interests are in information theory, information theoretic security, and fundamental performance limits of networked systems including energy harvesting communications and content delivery networks. In particular, she continues to advocate for the impact of information theory on design insights and understanding of networked and complex systems.
Yener has served as a chair/co-chair, editor and senior editor for various IEEE Communication Society posts. Her service to IEEE Information Theory Society includes chairing the student committee in 2007-2011, and initiating the Annual School of Information Theory in North America (with Gerhard Kramer), co-organizing in years 2008, 2009 and 2010. She was the treasurer of the IEEE Information Theory Society in 2012-2014.  She is an elected member of the Board of Governors for consecutive terms in 2015-2017 and 2018-2020, and is serving as the information theory schools subcommittee chair for 2014-2017.

HOST Michelle Effros