Wireless Engineering Pioneer Joins NYU-Poly and NYU

NEW YORK, Dec. 15, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- New York University and the Polytechnic Institute of New York University (NYU-Poly) announced today they have appointed Theodore (Ted) Rappaport, 51, to lead a new initiative in wireless communications engineering and research.

Rappaport, currently the William and Bettye Nowlin Chair of Engineering at the University of Texas at Austin (UTA), is a leading educator and entrepreneur who founded two well-known academic research programs at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech) and The University of Texas (UTA). He also launched two companies that were instrumental in the deployment of modern day cellular telephone networks.  Rappaport will join the faculty of NYU and NYU-Poly in April. He will serve as the David Lee/Ernst Weber Chair of Electrical Engineering at NYU-Poly and will hold professorships at NYU's Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences and the NYU School of Medicine.

"Ted Rappaport is an outstanding researcher and an engineer with enormous entrepreneurial energy," said NYU Provost David McLaughlin. "His presence on the faculty will greatly advance NYU's global standing in information technology and urban engineering, and bring scholarly strength and leadership to one of the great challenges of our time: integrating technology into solutions to improve the lives of the world's urban dwellers. Recruiting someone of his stature is a validation of our strategy of investment in NYU-Poly."

NYU-Poly President Jerry M. Hultin said: "Ted personifies what we at NYU-Poly call i-squared-e – invention, innovation and entrepreneurship.  He is a natural leader as we expand our scholarship, research and pursuit of real-world solutions to the great technical challenges facing New York City, our country and the world. His experience, guidance and energy will make a major difference as we transform NYU-Poly."

Rappaport holds more than 100 patents and has authored numerous books, including the most popular textbook in the wireless engineering field. In 1990 at Virginia Tech, he founded the Mobile and Portable Radio Research Group (MPRG), a center that became a leading producer of research and young engineers for the booming cellular telephone industry. In 2002, he founded UTA's Wireless Networking and Communications Group (WNCG), an interdisciplinary center with strong industry support and more than 140 students and 15 faculty members dedicated to wireless communications research.

"I love start-ups – and to be invited to build this world-class academic wireless engineering program is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity," said Rappaport. "I am thrilled to be on the ground floor at this transformative time in the history of NYU and NYU-Poly, and look forward to bringing the world's best researchers and corporations to New York City. The strengths of the New York ecosystem to support innovation are enormous, and I am eager to work across campus and with local industry to solve big problems in wireless communications, medicine, and urban engineering."

Zhouyue (Jerry) Pi, director of research of Samsung Telecommunications America, Dallas, stated: "Rappaport's research in massively broadband wireless communications and propagation is truly cutting edge, and it is paving the way for future generations of wireless networks in the coming decades.  He will have a big impact at NYU and NYU-Poly."

"Ted Rappaport's research, including his work on devices that support massive data transmission rates and enable new applications of wireless for biosensors, medical and paperless office technologies, holds exciting potential for being a game-changer in the field of healthcare," said Robert I. Grossman, MD, dean and CEO at NYU Langone Medical Center. "We are excited that he is now a part of the NYU family and are looking forward to working collaboratively with him."

In addition to teaching and advising students at NYU-Poly's Electrical and Computer Engineering Department and NYU's Courant Institute, Rappaport will become the director of the National Science Foundation (NSF) Wireless Internet Center for Advanced Technology (WICAT), a multi-disciplinary research center that involves five universities, including the two academic programs he founded earlier in his career.

Born in Brooklyn, Rappaport received bachelor's, master's and doctoral degrees in electrical engineering at Purdue University.

About New York University

New York University, located in the heart of Greenwich Village, was established in 1831 and is one of America's leading research universities. It is one of the largest private universities, it has one of the largest contingents of international students, and it sends more students to study abroad than any other college or university in the U.S. Through its 18 schools and colleges, NYU conducts research and provides education in the arts and sciences, law, medicine, business, dentistry, education, nursing, the cinematic and dramatic arts, music, public administration, social work, and continuing and professional studies, among other areas.

About Polytechnic Institute of New York University

Polytechnic Institute of New York University (formerly Polytechnic University), an affiliate of New York University, is a comprehensive school of engineering, applied sciences, technology and research, and is rooted in a 157-year tradition of invention, innovation and entrepreneurship: i-squared-e. The institution, founded in 1854, is the nation's second-oldest private engineering school. In addition to its main campus in New York City at MetroTech Center in downtown Brooklyn, it also offers programs at sites throughout the region and around the globe. Globally, NYU-Poly has programs in Israel, China and is an integral part of NYU's campus in Abu Dhabi. For more information, visit www.poly.edu.

SOURCE Polytechnic Institute of New York University; New York University