Research Specialties: Ongoing research in the Department provides a source of project, thesis, and dissertation topics for students. The following list illustrates some of the current research areas: adaptive equalization, biomedical imaging and signal processing,coding theory, computer engineering, cryptology and network security, distributed databases, electronic commerce, graphics and animation, image and data compression, information storage and retrieval, intelligent agents, joint time frequency/time-scale analysis, networks and systems, neural networks, nonlinear optics, object-oriented programming, optical communications and networks, parallel and distributed computing, photonic switches, quantum cryptography and quantum computation, quantum electronics, scientific computation,semiconductor optoelectronics, signal and image processing, solitons on optical fiber, symbolic computation, theory of computation, ultrashort pulse lasers.

The Department encourages interdisciplinary research and invites students to take advantage of resources in related departments, including mathematics and statistics, physics, visual arts, geography, education, information systems management, and other departments within the College of Engineering or at the UMAB Medical School. In addition, opportunities exist for joint research projects with local research laboratories, companies, and government agencies, including for example, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, National Institute of Standards and Technology, National Institutes of Health, Library of Congress, Naval Research Laboratories, and the National Security Agency.

Fields of Specialty and Course Offerings:

The CSEE Department is organized into six fields of specialty: four in the CS program and two in the EE program.

Computer Science

Algorithms, Theory, and Scientific Computation Associated faculty: (7) R. Chang, Kalpakis, Lomonaco, Motteler, Sherman, Stephens, Yaacov Yesha.
Computer Networks and Systems. Associated faculty: (5) Kalpakis,Miller, Motteler, Sidhu, Veronis.
Databases, Information, and Knowledge Management Associated faculty: (7) Finin,Kalpakis, Mayfield, Miller, Nicholas, Peng, Yelena Yesha.
Graphics, Animation, and Visualization Associated faculty: (2) Ebert, Turner.

Electrical Engineering

Communications and Signal Processing Associated faculty: Adali, C.I. Chang, Morris.

Photonics and Microelectronics Associated faculty: (6) Carter, J.-C. Chen, Y.-J. (Ray) Chen, Choa, Menyuk, Yan.

There are three types of courses being offered in the CSEE program:

CORE COURSES: Each field defines a set of core courses that will be offered regularly (typically every one or two years) to provide a solid coverage of the subjects in the field. Each graduate student majoring in the field is expected to take a certain number of core courses in that field. The minimum course requirement is set by the Department. Each field, however, if it deems appropriate, may set a more stringent requirement.

BREADTH COURSES: Breadth courses are a subset of the core courses. They provide a uniform background and a minimum breadth requirement for graduate students. There are four breadth courses for each field. Each graduate student majoring in a given field is required to take all the breadth courses in that field. The number of breadth courses is intentionally designed to be small to offer maximum course planning flexibility to professors and graduate students. The breadth courses define the subjects tested in the Ph.D. comprehensive exams and in the M.S. comprehensive exams.

RESEARCH COURSES: Research courses provide the course credits for the student's research activities, e.g., the Department's Research Seminar, graduate project and scholarly paper, M.S. thesis, and Ph.D. dissertation.

All four Computer Science fields share the same breadth courses. They are:

• CMSC 611 Architecture,
• CMSC 621 Operating Systems,
• CMSC 641 Algorithms, and
• one of the following five courses:
  • CMSC 635 Graphics,
  • CMSC 651 Automata Theory,
  • CMSC 655 Numerical Computation,
  • CMSC 661 Database,
  • CMSC 681 Networks.

For the Communications and Signal Processing field in EE, the breadth courses are:

• ENEE 610 Digital Signal Processing,
• ENEE 620 Probability and Random Process
• ENEE 621 Detection and Estimation Theory, and
• one of the following:
  • ENEE 611 Adaptive Signal Processing,
  • ENEE 622 Information Theory.

For the Photonics and Microelectronics field in EE, the breadth courses are:

• ENEE 630 Solid State Electronics,
• ENEE 631 Semiconductor Devices,
• ENEE 680 Electromagnetic Theory I,
• ENEE 683 Lasers.

Fields of specialization within the Department are listed at the beginning of this section. These fields include:

1. communications (random processes, detection and estimation theory, information theory, coding, communication theory, communication networks, data compression, and applications of adaptive signal processing in communications);
2. signal processing (digital signal processing, adaptive signal processing, array processing, image processing, computer vision, speech processing, neural networks, pattern recognition, spectral analysis, and biomedical signal processing and imaging);
3. photonics (electromagnetic theory, quantum electronics, lasers, photonics, nonlinear optics, optical communication technology, and ultrashort laser pulses); and
4. microelectronics (solidstate electronics, semiconductor devices and processing technology, semiconductor optoelectronics, compound semiconductorelectronics, and integrated circuits).