Engineers Named Fellows of the National Academy of Inventors

Two professors in the UMD Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering were named 2019 fellows of the National Academy of Inventors (NAI) yesterday, joining the ranks of some of the nation’s most prestigious and creative academic inventors.

The new Maryland inductees are Ray Liu, a Distinguished University Professor and the Christine Kim Eminent Professor of Information Technology, and Min Wu, Distinguished Scholar-Teacher and Associate Dean for Graduate Program in the A. James Clark School of Engineering. They join a body meant to highlight ”academic inventors who have demonstrated a spirit of innovation in creating or facilitating outstanding inventions that have made a tangible impact on quality of life, economic development and the welfare of society.”

Liu was recognized for his work in the field of wireless AI technology that he and his team developed; it has been deployed as Belkin's Linksys Aware for WiFi sensing for home security to over 150 countries. 

"I am honored to be named an NAI Fellow for the recognition of wireless AI technology that my team and I are developing,” Liu said. “I am excited that we are making a real impact to the world with our technology.”

As part of multiple teams, Liu has three times received the University’s Invention of the Year Award: in 2013 for “Time-Reversal Division Multiple Access for Wireless Broadband Communications,” in 2011 for “Active Sensing for Dynamic Spectrum Access” and in 2004 for “Coding Techniques for Maximum Achievable Diversity in Space, Time and Frequency for Broadband Wireless Communications.”           

As an entrepreneur, in 2013 Liu founded Origin Wireless, based in Greenbelt, Maryland. This startup develops wireless AI analytic technologies for smart home systems

Among many pioneering works, he has revolutionized wireless communication with the concept of cooperative communication by improving communication capacity, speed and performance; reducing battery consumption rates to extend network lifetimes, increase throughput and stability and expand transmission coverage area. Liu also is a Fellow in both the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. 

Wu, who has an appointment in the University of Maryland Institute for Advanced Computer Studies (UMIACS), was recognized for her contributions to the field of signal processing, particularly for multimedia security and forensics.

“Not only do I find the joy in discovery and innovations that can make a positive impact on the society, I also appreciate the opportunities to give back by sharing the invention process with students and helping them become future inventors,” said Wu.

In 2015, her work extracting nearly invisible power signatures from videos was selected as an Invention of the Year winner in the information sciences category. She received a 2012 Innovator of the Year award from the Maryland Daily Record.

Wu is the recipient an National Science Foundation CAREER Award, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Harriett B. Rigas Educator Award, an MIT TR100 Young Innovator Award, an Office of Naval Research Young Investigator Award, a Computer World “40 Under 40” IT Innovator Award, the IEEE Mac Van Valkenburg Early Career Teaching Award, and the IEEE Distinguished Lecturer recognition. 

She has served as vice president of the IEEE Signal Processing Society, chair of the IEEE Technical Committee on Information Forensics and Security and editor-in-chief of the IEEE Signal Processing Magazine. 

In 2011, Wu was named an IEEE Fellow for her contributions to multimedia security and forensics.

Liu and Wu join four previous faculty as NAI fellows: C.D. “Dan” Mote, Jr., president emeritus of the National Academy of Engineering, a Regents’ professor and former president of the University of Maryland; Distinguished University Professor Rita Colwell; Distinguished University Professor John S. Baras and Distinguished University Professor Emeritus Benjamin A. Shneiderman. 

The 2019 fellows represent 136 research universities and governmental and nonprofit research institutes worldwide and they collectively hold over 3,500 issued U.S. patents. Among the 2019 Fellows are six recipients of the U.S. National Medal of Technology & Innovation or U.S. National Medal of Science and four Nobel laureates.

NAI fellows hold more than 41,500 U.S. patents, which have generated over 11,000 licensed technologies and companies, and created more than 36 million jobs. In addition, over $1.6 trillion in revenue has been generated based on NAI fellow discoveries, according to the organization.