Wei Yu Receives Engineering’s McCharles Prize for Early Career Research

In recognition of exceptional performance and distinction in research early in his career, Professor Wei Yu, of The Edward S. Rogers Sr. Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, received the Faculty’s McCharles Prize for Early Career Research.

“Professor Yu has been made important contributions to the international research community at an early stage in his career,” said Cristina Amon, Dean of the Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering. “We are proud to recognize the achievements of Professor Yu with this award and we look forward to celebrating his continued success.”

The McCharles Prize was originally established in 1907 by Aeneas McCharles through a gift to the Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering. It was re-established this year as the McCharles Prize for Early Career Research. Professor Yu received the prize for his wide-ranging research contributions in the areas of information theory and digital communications and his outstanding publication and citation record.

Professor Yu said that he is truly honoured by the award. He is excited by the prospect of using the research funds to investigate novel methods of using relays to enhance the capacity of wireless communication networks.

Professor Yu joined ECE in 2002 as a tenure-track Assistant Professor in the area of digital communications shortly after completely his PhD at Stanford University. He has been awarded a Tier II Canada Research Chair in Digital Communications in 2003, which was renewed in 2008, along with the Early Research Award from the Province in 2006 and the Early Career Teaching Award from Engineering in 2007.

His long-term research goal is to discover the fundamental limits of information flow in communication networks and to utilize these theoretical insights in the design and optimization of practical communication systems. He has contributed to the fundamental theory of multiuser communications as well as to the development of novel multiuser techniques for DSL (a technology Bell Sympatico uses for high-speed internet service), which led to commercialization by both established and start-up companies.

He has served as an associate editor and guest editor for three journals, and is a member of the Signal Processing for Communications Technical Committee of the IEEE Signal Processing Society.
One of his co-authored papers on the application of convex optimization theory to wireless communications was one of the top 100 downloaded papers in IEEE Xplore in October 2006. Two of his journal papers have been cited more than 250 times; another one of his journal papers has been cited more than 150 times, to date.

He received his MSc in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University in 1998 and his BASc in Computer Engineering and mathematics from the University of Waterloo in 1997.

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