Overview

The Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Toronto carries out leading research in a number of areas. To facilitate this research, members of the department are organized into a number of groups. Below you can find a short description of research activity in each group along with link to that group's webpage. A link to a list of research institutes affiliated with the department can also be found here.

Biomedical Engineering Biomedical Engineering involves the integration of engineering and the physical sciences with the life sciences with the intention of addressing problems in medicine and dentistry or, more generally, the health sciences.  The Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering is a unique multi-disciplinary organization in which scientists and practitioners from applied science, engineering, medicine, dentistry, and the life sciences collaborate to pursue research and both graduate and undergraduate teaching mandates within the context of biomedical engineering. http://www.bme.utoronto.ca

Communications The Communications Group has research interests falling into three broad categories: communication networks, digital communication, and signal processing.  Research in communication networks includes areas such as advanced switching concepts, broadband, light wave and local area networks, packet video processing, and queuing theory.  The research areas under digital communication include coded modulation, communication algorithms, communication theory, data compression, error control coding, wireless communication, information theory, mobile communication and spread spectrum systems.  Signal processing covers areas such as adaptive filtering, detection/estimation, digital signal processing, multimedia systems, image processing and analysis, knowledge-based signal processing, nonlinear filters, parallel algorithms, and statistical signal processing. http://www.comm.utoronto.ca

Computer Engineering The Computer Engineering Group was established some thirty years ago, and has grown to the present complement of about twenty professors plus several research associates and technologists.  The group supports about sixty graduate students at any given time. Professors and students in the group are internationally recognized for their state-of-the-art research activity in the design, implementation, and use of both computer software and hardware. http://www.eecg.utoronto.ca

Electromagnetics The Electromagnetics Group is engaged in electromagnetic field theory and measurement, with emphasis on radiation, propagation, and guided-wave phenomena.  Research activity covers the range from very low radio frequencies to millimetre waves and quasi-optics.  Areas of interest include antenna theory and design, microwave circuits, wireless applications,  computational electromagnetics, electromagnetic compatibility, nonlinear wave interactions, quasi-optics, ionospheric plasma waves, spacecraft charge accumulation and electrical breakdown, electromagnetic materials, and bioelectromagnetics. http://www.waves.utoronto.ca

Electronics The Electronics Group research projects cover the areas of basic materials research, integrated circuit technology, integrated circuit/semiconductor device design, analog and digital circuit design, circuit theory, filter design, electronic instrumentation, and biomedical electronics. http://www.vrg.utoronto.ca/EG

Energy Systems Research in the Energy Systems Group is concerned with the generation, transmission, and utilization of electrical energy.  Major resarch areas within the group include power electronics, power systems, magnetic devices, energy storage, and computational electromagnetics.  The Centre for Applied Power Electronics (CAPE) provides a focus for the group's activities relating to: power supply development for telecommunications, computer, automotive and aerospace applications, modern power controllers for power system applications, high performance electric drives, and new energy storage systems.  In the power systems area, research interests include: electromagnetic transients, power systems control, DC transmission, and power quality.  In the electromagnetic area, research interests include: low and high frequency magnetic devices, piezoelectric devices, EMI, finite element methods, boundary element methods, and lightning protection. http://www.ele.utoronto.ca/

Photonics The Photonics Group is comprised of eight professors whose diverse research interests range from theoretical studies to photonics technology.  The group's main research endeavours encompass fibre-optic communication systems and components, fully optical networks, optoelectronic device modelling, design, fabrication, and characterization, photonic crystals and photonic bandgaps, non-linear optics, ultrafast optical phenomena and devices, nanofabrication processes, photonic applications in laser processing, and high-efficiency solar cells. http://photonics.light.utoronto.ca

Systems Control The Systems Control Group does basic and applied research in control engineering. The wide variety of research topics is illustrated by the following recent projects: the development of a magnetic levitation experiment and the application of nonlinear control theory; output stabilization and maneuver regulation; optimal control of optical communication networks using game-theoretic methods; optical CDMA systems with dynamic code allocation; distributed control of autonomous agents, including formation control of networks of mobile robots; hybrid system theory, that is, dynamical systems with logic-based controllers; the decentralized control of a platoon of vehicles; control of systems subject to unanticipated extreme perturbations; time-optimal control of the pendulum and control of multi-link pendula; the design of fault tolerant control systems; the control of timed discrete event systems using binary decision diagrams; the analysis and design of a watermarking algorithm for improved resistance to compression; control design for systems involving communication networks with limited bandwidth. http://www.control.utoronto.ca