iWEM - IEEE Xplore

Report on 2013 IEEE International Workshop on Electromagnetics (iWEM)

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he 2013 IEEE International Workshop on Electromagnetics: Applications and Student Innovation Competition (iWEM) was held in Hong Kong from August 1 to August 3, 2013, at the Wei Hing Theater, City University of Hong Kong. The workshop was co-organized by the State Key Laboratory of Millimeter Waves at the City University of Hong Kong, and the Hong Kong Joint Chapter of the IEEE Antennas and Propagation/Microwave Theory and Techniques Societies. It was technically cosponsored by the Oriental Institute of Technology, the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Yokohama National University, and the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Society. The General co-Chairs of the workshop were Profs. H. Arai, C. H. Chan, D.-C. Chang, J. L.-W. Li, and K. M. Luk. The Student Innovation Competition Awards co-Chairs were Profs. K. F. Lee and Q. Xue, and the Technical Program Committee Chair was Dr. H. Wong. The predecessor of iWEM was the International Conference on Applications of Electromagnetism and Student Innovation Awards, held in Taipei in 2010. It was renamed to iWEM in 2011, which was also held in Taipei. iWEM 2012 was hosted in Chengdu, and iWEM 2014 will be held in Sapporo, Japan. Two salient features of iWEM are that (i) all oral presentations are invited keynote speeches and invited papers running in a single session, and (ii) students’ papers are given in poster forums, from which winners of the Student Innovation Competition are selected.

Figure 1. Dr. Trevor Bird delivered an opening address.

The workshop was opened with a welcoming speech delivered by Prof. K. M. Luk. Dr. T. S. Bird, President of the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Society, gave an opening address, with a PowerPoint presentation on some new initiatives of IEEE AP-S (Figure 1). He also presented some pioneers such as Faraday, Maxwell, von Helmholtz, Hertz, etc., in electromagnetics. J. A. Fleming’s open waveguide antenna in 1900 was shown, and early contributors to computational electromagnetics, such as J. H. Richmond, R. F. Harrington, K. K. Mei, and K. S. Yee were mentioned. He also pointed out the new directions in the electromagnetically derived materials in terms of size, frequency, and applications.

After the Opening Ceremony, Prof. Arai delivered the first keynote speech. He was followed by four invited speakers: Profs. T. Fukusako, Q.-X. Chu, Y.-J. Feng, and J.-L. Li. After the lunch break, Prof. D.-C. Chang delivered the second keynote speech of the day. The Applications and Student Innovation Competition, in the form of poster presentations, was conducted after the tea break. The first day was concluded by a welcome reception. There was a heavy rain storm at the beginning of the reception, due to the approaching typhoon Alley. Prof. Chan addressed the participants regarding the cancellation of the session if typhoon signal number 8 was hoisted the next day. He also added that in a local saying, the nobles attract wind and rain when they travel. Luckily, Alley moved away from Hong Kong before dawn the next day.

After welcoming the participants, Prof. Luk provided some statistics of the workshop. There were four keynotes and 14 invited papers. The four keynote speakers were Profs. H. Arai of Yokohama National University, D.-C. Chang of the Oriental Institute of Technology, K.-L. Wong of National Sun Yat-Sen University, and J. L.-W. Li of the University of Electronic Science & Technology of China and Monash University (Figure 2). There were a total of 42 papers out of 50 submissions selected for the poster forums. Based on the rating of the 16-member-strong international technical program committee, 18 papers were recommended for the Student Innovation Competition.

The second day of the workshop started with Prof. K.-L. Wong’s keynote speech. It was followed by five invited papers by Profs. Y.-X. Guo, W.-Q. Che, S.-W. Qu, J. Shi, and K.-W. Leung. After the lunch break came Prof. L.-W. Li’s keynote speech, followed by a poster session. The workshop banquet was held in the evening of the second day. It started off with Prof. D.-C. Chang briefing participants on the history and evolution of the workshop. In particular, he acknowledged the contributions made by the late Prof. Jeffrey Fu of Chang Gang University in spearheading the workshop. Before dinner was served, a wonderful magic show was performed, in which Dr. Bird helped to lift up a table and let it fly around (Figure 3).

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Figure 2. The conference organizers and keynote speakers at the opening ceremony: (l-r) Profs. Q. Xue, K. F. Lee, C. H. Chan, J. L.-W. Li , K.-L. Wong, D.-C. Chang, H. Arai, Dr. T. S. Bird, and Prof. K. M. Luk.

Figure 3. Dr. Bird teamed up with the magician.



Figure 4. A group photo of the winners.

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After the magic show, it was time for Prof. Lee to announce the winner of the Applications and Student Innovation Competition. There were three third places, two second places, and one first place, which went to Hao Tian Zhu of City University of Hong Kong, Quan Wei Lin of South China University of Technology, Yusuke Hori of Yokohama National University, Hucheng Sun of National University of Singapore, Yujian Li of City University of Hong Kong, and Lulu Wang of Auckland University of Technology (Figure 4). Prof. Arai gave a short presentation on iWEM 2014, which will be held in Sapporo, Japan.

Figure 5. Prof. Kai Fong Lee’s poem.

Figure 6. The presentation of Chinese calligraphy by Prof. Qing-Xin Chu.

It was the Spanish wine served in the welcome reception that excited the participants, leading to their volunteer participation in the banquet performance. Prof. K. F. Lee, Dean Emeritus of the School of Engineering at the University of Mississippi and the 2009 IEEE Antennas and Propagation Society John Kraus Antenna Awardee, talked about the vision of a leader. He quoted the poem by American poet Edwin Markham which reads, “Ah, great it is to believe the dream; As we stand in youth by the starry dream; But a greater thing is to live life through; and say at the end, the dream came true.” He then showed the earlier Chinese translation of the poem by his brother, and that by Profs. W.-Q. Che and Q. Xue the night before (Figure 5). Also during the banquet, Prof. Q.-X. Chu gave a demonstration of Chinese calligraphy of a poem written by Prof. W.-Q. Che (Figure 6). The banquet continued on with quite a few participants drinking and singing. There were five invited papers in the morning of the third day. The speakers were Profs. J. Hu, X.-Y. Zhang, B. Li, W. E. I. Sha, and Dr. L. Chiu, talking on a wide spectrum of topics, from multi-scale and multi-physics modeling to large reflector antennas and microwave filters. A closing remark was given by Prof. C. H. Chan. He emphasized to the audience – in particular, the student participants – that in addition to the exchange of research achievements, the workshop also served as a platform for networking, and sometimes we are connected without realizing it. He pointed out that both Prof. K. F. Lee and Prof. K. M. Luk have their academic genealogy tracing back to Maxwell, Newton, and Galileo but, unexpectedly, Prof. Luk is one generation senior to Prof. Lee. On the other hand, Prof. Chan’s academic tree goes up from Prof. Raj Mittra to Helmholtz and Gauss, and then to Leibniz and Huygens. It then comes down to Norbert Wiener, and finally to Kane S. Yee. Prof. Chan did not realize this connection before, although he has published a paper each with Kane and his two other brothers, James and Sinclair. The closing ceremony was concluded with the handover of the flag symbolizing the workshop to Prof. Arai for iWEM 2014 at Sapporo (Figure 7).

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Figure 7. The ﬂag handover presentation.

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Chi Hou Chan and Kwai Man Luk State Key Laboratory of Millimeter Waves City University of Hong Kong E-mail: [email protected]; [email protected]

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