March 2014 Issue
Topics

Letter from Alumni

Jie Chen, Director Professor, the Institute of Microelectronics, Chinese Academy of Sciences (IME,CAS), Beijing, China.

Letter from Alumni
At Tiananmen Square, when I was invited by the Chinese government to attend the 60th founding anniversary

I received my master's and doctorate degrees from the Department of Electronic Engineering, the University of Electro-Communications (UEC) in 1991 and 1994, respectively. My research theme was data compression based on information theory and wavelet theory. My supervisors were Professor Shin Hasegawa and Professor Shuichi Itoh.
I recall that when I first met Professor Itoh and discussed the research topics for my master 's degree in 1988, I actucally did not really understand why Professor Itoh advised me to do the research on data compression because at the time I could not imagine that data compression technologies would become so widely used in digital cameras, digital TVs and notebook computers ten years later.Now, when I look back twenty years later, I think that I was really lucky to choose data compression as my research theme at UEC under the guidance from Professor Itoh and Professor Hasegawa. Now, data compression technologies such as gzip for computer data lossless compression, and JPEG, MPEG, H.264 for image and video compression play an important role in the IT world. I really appreciate the foresight for reseach directions of my advisors at UEC. During my time at UEC, I learnt a lot from my superadvisors not only about academia but also issues related to independent thinking and research methdology.
In order commercilaize the findings of my research, I jointed the venture company YOZAN Inc., where I worked on mixed signal IC design for W-CDMA baseband processor for three years, and developed a series of mixed basedband chips with low power consumption feature for NTT DoCoMo.
Then In 1998, I returned to UEC to join the Itoh Lab. in the Graduate School of Information Systems as an associate professor, to work with my supervisor Professor Itoh to study data compression and mixed signal IC design. This was an enjoyable time for me to work in UEC from 1998 to 2001.

Letter from Alumni
Characteristic and evaluation of custom CMOS image sensors developed in-house by Superpix Micro Technology

My studies in Japan were supported by a Japanese government schoolarship (Gokuhi Ryugakusei) but the opportnity to study in Japan was provided by Chinese government. So I had to return to China to serve my motherland where many people were poor and the economy and technology were waiting for developing. In 2001, I was selected by Chinese Academy of Sciences as one of the 100 Talented Scientists from overseas Chinese, and then returned to China to join the Institute of IME, CAS as a professor.
It is about 14 years since returning to China. During these 14 years, I have been involved in research and education on signal processing and mixed signal IC design for satellite navigator positioning baseband processors, multimedia processors and Network on a Chip (NOC) systems, and have advised more than 30 PhD students.
At the same time, I set up the two venture companies, LHWT Microelectronics and Superpix Micro Technology to develop wireless communications chips and CMOS Image Sensor (CIS) products. We have developed W-CDMA Airmonitor for NTT DoCoMo, WiFi baseband IPs for SONY, and also developed a series of CIS products.
I still have a good relationship with colleagues at UEC and support UEC activities in China by organizing the joint annual alumni meeting in Beijing and providing internship positions for UEC students. I am proud to be a UEC graduate and will love UEC forever.