1. We are looking for highly motivated Ph.D. researchers with expertise in wireless communications and signal processing as well as digital or analog design.
2. The applicant should hold a master's degree in electrical engineering, Telecommunication Engineering, or relevant fields.
3. The applicant should also meet the minimum eligibility criteria for enrolling as a Ph.D. student at KU Leuven, namely, having exceptional grades as well as proficiency in English.
4. Additionally, the applicant should have strong interpersonal skills and the ability to work in an international team.
Over the last decades, communication networks have grown exponentially, starting with low-rate applications such as voice calls and now offering high-speed mobile internet based on 4G, 5G and soon 6G deployments. While expanding networks and embracing new frequency bands helps meeting user throughput demands, it also increases the network power consumption, raising environmental, economic and battery lifetime concerns.
In order to improve the energy efficiency of future wireless transceivers, we need to predict their power consumption before building them. Using such a tool, we can explore many possible architectures and configurations, assess their power consumption, select the most appropriate options and dimension them optimally. This also supports the development of run-time control mechanisms maximizing the transceiver energy efficiency in operation.
Power modelling and optimization of wireless transceivers has been successfully investigated at IMEC for more than 10 years, combining specific models for digital processing, analog front-end and power amplifiers. However, considering the diversity of communication devices to design and enhance in future networks, many challenges lie ahead and require fundamental investigations. More specifically, you will investigate the following points in your PhD:
5. New frequency bands are opened towards 6G, e.g., FR3 (7 - 24 GHz). This comes with new transceiver architectures and technologies, but also increased flexibility, with a critical need to investigate the most energy-efficient solutions.
6. Improving the accuracy of an exploratory power model deserves fundamental research and strong benchmarking to state-of-the-art. Digital power estimates based on operation count require a stronger connection to the digital hardware design. Within imec, advanced semiconductor research offers a natural link to deep-scaled CMOS models.
7. Advanced algorithms and architectures need investigation of power-consumption trade-offs. For instance, digital predistortion (DPD) can enhance power amplifier efficiency but at the cost of significant extra digital complexity. A complete system power optimization is hence required.
8. New communication networks will also support radar-like applications (joint communication and sensing) or come in distributed implementations. Both approaches require dedicated models and optimizations to improve energy efficiency.
To support this critical research, you will combine models from diverse sources and develop a flexible simulation environment allowing to model and optimize the power consumption of different wireless transceivers. You may also complement the model by using AI solutions extracting power consumption trends or including the energy penalty of machine learning solutions themselves. And the energy efficiency at the transceiver hardware will be put in a broader perspective of sustainability and life cycle analysis, where run-time power consumption is only a part of the total picture.
As a PhD student, you will be part of a large imec community working on the research, implementation and prototyping of future communications systems with experts in wireless communication, signal processing, digital, analog and mm-wave design, and machine learning. This is a unique opportunity to develop innovative, multi-disciplinary technology and shape future wireless networks. You will publish your research in top-level journals and conferences.
This PhD position is part of a collaboration between imec and KU Leuven under the supervision of Prof. Sofie Pollin (KU Leuven) and co-supervision of Prof. Claude Dessert (IMEC). The vacancy is hosted primarily at imec (Leuven, Belgium). Applications must be submitted through the imec website. Imec is a world-leading research and innovation hub in nanoelectronics and digital technologies. Working closely with KU Leuven, imec combines fundamental research with industrial partnerships to develop the technologies that shape future applications. The research centre WaveCoRE in the Department of Electrical Engineering (ESAT) of KU Leuven focuses on wireless communication fundamentals and systems. In the WaveCoRE, the Networked Systems group led by Prof. Sofie Pollin covers research on various fields of wireless communications and networking such as Cell-Free Massive MIMO, Non-Terrestrial Networks (NTN), Internet of Things (IoT), Joint Communication and Sensing, Machine Learning-based Signal Processing, and Simultaneous Wireless Information and Power Transfer (SWIPT), etc.
9. 20% literature and theory, 60% modelling and simulation, 20% design/experimental
10. A Ph.D. scholarship for up to four years (subject to positive intermediate evaluations)
11. An inclusive research environment, working on the intersection between theory and implementation, in a very multidisciplinary research environment.
12. A Ph.D. title from a highly ranked university, ranked #50 in Best Global Universities according to US News.
13. Opportunity to build up an international network, participation in international conferences and collaborations.
14. Competitive salary and funding
15. Access to imec’s world-class facilities and collaboration with leading experts