Programação >> Prof. Rui Martins ( University of Macau )


Speaker
Prof. Rui Martins ( University of Macau )

Title
Two Decades in Macao Microelectronics Education, Industry and Scientific Research

Abstract
Information Technology Revolution and Electronics
In the modern age, the world has evolved based on technology development, achieved in 3 Industrial Revolutions throughout time, the 1st initiated with the Steam Engine (James Watt-1763), followed by the 2nd started with the inventions of Electrical Power Generation (Michael Faraday-1831) and the Combustion Engine (Siegfried Marcus-1864), until the 3rd kicked-off with the discovery of the Transistor (John Bardeen, Walter Brattain and William Shockley-1947) that really marked, being at its core, the commencement of the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Revolution or what is now known as the Information Age, led by continuous and fast developments in Electronics, Computing and Telecommunications, which define the pace of the current planetary globalization where communications are made at the speed of light. These are possible due to very sophisticaded ICT platforms and gadgets with increasingly user-friendly human interfaces, in particular the internet, the mobile phone, the personal computer, the video game console, the media player, the global positioning system (GPS), which have underlying inside complex Electronics.

Starting Education from scratch
Although university level studies in Macao have a long and old tradition dated back to 1594 with the foundation by the Jesuits of the former St. Paul's University College (first western-style university in China), that still constitutes today the most famous “ex-libris” of the Territory, they had a long interruption since the 17th century and until the creation of the University of Macau – UM, in 1981 (initially designated as University of East Asia), leading local higher-education institution, and among the oldest universities in the Pearl River Delta Region, which can be truly considered the heiress of the original College. However, the Faculty of Science and Technology and its Electrical and Electronics Engineering 4-year bachelor program were only created in 1989. And, in a city where the prominent traditional economic activity was and still is the gaming industry (Macao is usually referred as the Las Vegas of the East) it was since the beginning extremely difficult to attract students to study in the engineering fields. From the Microelectronics point-of-view the Territory could be even considered as a Desert because, and in spite of the existence of a very small electronics industry sector, this was mainly devoted to assembling of products, with old LSI technologies, that were designed and developed elsewhere. On the other hand, at the university back then, the teaching concepts of Electronics were completely outdated (with no research). Then, in 1992, a strategy was defined to provoque a “quantum-leap” to state-of-the-art teaching and research by laying out the conditions for creation of EEE post-graduation, as well as setting-up rules for adequate investment in research. This objective originated the launching of Master and PhD programs in mid-90’s and also of a small research project involving the first 10 Master students that designed the first ASIC in Macao, designated UMCHIP.

Attraction of World-level type of Industry
Considering the quality and reliability demonstrated by UM graduates a world-leading microelectronics company - Chipidea, from Lisbon, Portugal, decided in 2001 to create a “spin-off” local design center through a collaboration protocol with the university. This company was in recent years the world-leader in Analog and Mixed-Signal IP Design and in 2009 has been acquired by Synopsys, from Mountain View, Califonia, USA, that defines itself as “a world leader in electronic design automation (EDA), supplying the global electronics market with the software, IP and services used in semiconductor design and manufacturing”. Its operation in Macao, unique in South-China, has been a success and it currently employs close to 40 engineers or masters led by an Associate Professor, with the PhD, mostly graduated at UM, certainly demonstrating the high capability of local knowledge, and inspiring confidence for future developments in the field, as well as promoting economic diversification.

Maturity at 30 in Scientific Research
Besides the situation in Education and Industry, above referred, there was a significant evolution in the last decade in terms of Scientific Research where there was consistent production of significant research results with world-class standards that can briefly be highlighted by the 8 PhDs concluded in the area with the publication of close to 200 papers in leading IEEE conferences and IEEE and IEE archival journals It is also worth to emphasize as great achievements the publication in ISSCC’2002 (USA) (only achieved in China by then, and in 50 years of the conference, also by HKUST), together with 4 Books based in the PhD Thesis, 3 by Springer (2005, 2007 and 2011) and another by Science Press / China (2007). Also, the recent creation of 2 research labs for Wireless Communications (2001-04) and, in particular, of the Analog and Mixed-Signal VLSI Lab (2003) has already led to several paper awards in top journals and conferences. Furthermore, the conceptual design, with simulation, subsequent fabrication (by world-leading foundries, like AMS–Austria, TSMC–Taiwan, SMC-China, or ST Microelectronics-France) and testing of several chips in advanced sub-micron CMOS technologies, with 2 chips in 0.35µm (2002 and 2006), 1 chip in 0.18µm (2007), 4 chips in 90nm (2008 and 2009), and finally 5 chips in 65nm (2010) has also boosted the quantity and quality of the results to a higher level of international exposure, thus opening the door for Excellence in this area. Like this year again, in the world top conference in Microelectronics, the ISSCC 2011, in San Francisco, where UM (through the Analog and Mixed-Signal VLSI Lab) was positioned as the 15th in the world among 46 universities that were able to publish there, 5th in Asia (among 19 universities) and was considered the leading University from China (including Hong Kong and Macao, among 4 universities), with 2 chips selected for presentation and entitled: “A 0.46mm2 4dB-NF Unified Receiver Front-End for Full-Band Mobile TV in 65nm CMOS”, and “A 0.024mm2 8-bit 400 MS/s SAR ADC with 2-bit/Cycle and Resistive DAC in 65 nm CMOS”, the latter to be integrated in mobile applications won the Silk Road Award for a Ph.D student from an emerging area in the Far-East.

Silk-Road Award
Moreover, in the 2 sessions where the papers were presented the other counterparts were, among others: TIT-Japan, ST Microelectronics-France, UC Berkeley, NTU & NCTU-Taiwan, Toshiba, KAIST-South Korea, Texas Instruments, Broadcom, Analog Devices and MIT. As a consequence of this and other great achievements (like 2 US patents filed in 2009 and 2011, and with 5 US Patents pending), it was natural the promotion in January this year of the Analog and Mixed-Signal VLSI to State Key Lab (in a partnership with the ASIC & System Key Lab of Fudan U) by the Ministry of Science and Techonology of China, with the great local support of the Fund for Development of Science & Technology – FDCT, of Macao SAR Government. Thus, revealing that University of Macau is reaching maturity in scientific research in this specific area of Microelectronics, in the year of the celebration of its 30th Anniversary, while opening excellent perspectives for the consolidation of its position in the field with world impact, namely, considering its future installation in the new campus, in Hengqin, with world-level facilities for teaching, research and further service to the community with great potential for supporting future spin-offs.

SHORT CVs
Rui Paulo da Silva Martins (IEEE Member'88 – Senior Member'99 – Fellow'08), born in April 30, 1957, received the Bachelor (5-years), the Masters, and the Ph.D. degrees as well as the Habilitation for Full-Professor in electrical engineering and computers from the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Instituto Superior Técnico (IST), TU of Lisbon, Portugal, in 1980, 1985, 1992 and 2001, respectively. He has been with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering / IST, TU of Lisbon, since October 1980. Since 1992, he has been on leave from IST, TU of Lisbon, and is also with the Electrical and Electronics Engineering Department, Faculty of Science and Technology (FST), University of Macau (UM), Macao, China, where he is a Full-Professor since 1998. In FST he was the Dean of the Faculty from 1994 to 1997 and he has been Vice-Rector of the University of Macau since 1997. From September 2008, after the reform of the UM Charter, he was nominated after open international recruitment as Vice-Rector (Research) until August 31, 2013. He is the financial manager, recognized by EU, of a Jean Monnet Chair in “EU Law – Facing the Constitution and Governance Challenges in the Era of Globalization”, unique in the universities from Hong Kong and Macao. Within the scope of his teaching and research activity he has taught 20 bachelor and master courses and has supervised 24 theses, Ph.D. (11) and Masters (13). He has published: 16 books, co-authoring (5) and co-editing (11), plus 6 book chapters; 198 refereed papers, in scientific journals (38) and in conference proceedings (160); as well as other 70 academic works, in a total of 290 publications, in the areas of microelectronics, electrical and electronics engineering, engineering and university education. He has co-authored also 7 submitted US Patents (2 approved and issued in 2009 and 2011, 1 classified as “patent pending” and 4 still in the process of application). He has founded, and is the Director, of the State Key Laboratory Analog and Mixed-Signal VLSI of UM: http://www.fst.umac.mo/en/lab/ans_vlsi/, first of its kind in engineering in Macao and approved by the Minister of Science and Technology of China and Macao Government.
Prof. Rui Martins is an IEEE Fellow, was the Founding Chairman of the IEEE Macau Section (2003 – 2005), and of the IEEE Macau Joint-Chapter on Circuits And Systems (CAS) / Communications (COM) (2005 – 2008) [2009 World Chapter of the Year of the IEEE Circuits And Systems Society (CASS)]. He was the General Chair of the 2008 IEEE Asia-Pacific Conference on Circuits And Systems – APCCAS’2008, and was elected Vice-President for Region 10 (Asia, Australia, the Pacific) of the IEEE CASS (2009 - 2012). He is Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems II: Express Briefs (2010 - 2011). He was the recipient of 2 government decorations: the Medal of Professional Merit from Macao Government (Portuguese Administration) in 1999, and the Honorary Title of Value from Macao SAR Government (Chinese Administration) in 2001. In July 2010 was elected, unanimously, as Corresponding Member of the Portuguese Academy of Sciences, in the class of Sciences, 7th section of Engineering Science and other Applied Sciences: http://www.acad-ciencias.pt/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=65&Itemid=70