Robert W. Heath Jr.

Robert W. Heath Jr.
At SXSW 2015
Born (1973-12-04) 4 December 1973
Macon, Georgia, US
Nationality United States
Alma mater
Scientific career
Fields Wireless communications
Institutions The University of Texas at Austin
Doctoral advisor Arogyaswami Paulraj
Other academic advisors G. Giannakis
Website www.profheath.org

Robert W. Heath Jr. is an American electrical engineer, researcher, educator, wireless technology expert, and a Cullen Trust Endowed Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin. He is also the president and CEO of MIMO Wireless Inc. He is the former Director of the Wireless Networking and Communications Group.

Early life and education

Heath received his Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University in 2002 under the supervision of MIMO pioneer Arogyaswami Paulraj.[1] He completed his M.S. degree in the same field from the University of Virginia in 1997 under the supervision of G. Giannakis, and his B.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Virginia in 1996.

Career

From 1998 to 2001, Heath was a Senior Member of the Technical Staff and, later, Senior Consultant at Iospan Wireless Inc, San Jose, CA. At Iospan he was part of a team that designed and implemented the physical and link layers of the first commercial MIMO-OFDM communication system. Since January 2002, he has been with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin where he is a Cullen Trust for Higher Education Endowed Professor, and is a Member of the Wireless Networking and Communications Group. He is also President and CEO of MIMO Wireless Inc. and Chief Innovation Officer at Kuma Signals LLC. He was the Director of the Wireless Networking and Communications Group from 2012-2014, where he oversaw an expansion of the center in terms of faculty and students, and an increase in research expenditures to more than $5M per year. He is a co-author on more than 450 refereed conference and journal publications.[2] He is also a co-inventor of 50 U.S. patents. He authored a laboratory manual that teaches the principles of wireless communication to undergraduate students [3] and co-authored a book on millimeter wave wireless communication.[4] He is particularly known for his work on different aspects of MIMO communication systems.[5]

Professional career

Heath's early work at Stanford advanced the then nascent field of MIMO communication.[6][7] During his Ph.D. he took a leave of absence to be one of the first employees at Iospan Wireless (earlier known as Gigabit Wireless Inc), where he was part of a small team that created the first practical MIMO-OFDM radio (a predecessor of what we now know as IEEE 802.11n).[1] His work at Iospan resulted in several early patents on critical MIMO technologies.[8][9][10]

Heath's work at Iospan led to his discovery that, depending on the wireless propagation conditions, different MIMO configurations, e.g., spatial multiplexing or space-time coding, are preferred.[11][12][13] Heath's discovery opened new research avenues to enhance the fundamental understanding of performance limitations in MIMO wireless communication.[14] From his diversity and multiplexing discovery, he also recognized the critical importance of feedback and adaptation in MIMO wireless systems, i.e., to make MIMO wireless communication commercially viable the receiver must inform the transmitter about the best MIMO configuration before communication [15]

At UT Austin, based on his insights into the importance of feedback in MIMO communication, he pioneered MIMO feedback strategies (limited feedback precoding). Heath was able to construct a strategy for which the overhead penalty for feedback was very small (only a few bits of feedback required to configure an entire MIMO transmitter). This allowed practical MIMO wireless communication to achieve data rates and link reliability very close to theoretical expectations by varying the number of spatial multiplexing streams.

Views on 5G

Heath is an advocate of moving to millimeter-wave spectrum for the 5G cellular standardization. He recognizes, however, that 5G cellular deployments will likely require significant changes to cellular planning. He has predicted that, due to blockage, millimeter wave cellular will need to be much more densely deployed.[16][17] Heath also recognizes that 5G cellular will require significant advancements in beamforming protocols, in particular with respect to the speed in which beamforming is trained, to make 5G cellular at millimeter waves viable. He has been a strong advocate of the automotive application for 5G.[18]

Books

  • R. Heath, Digital Wireless Communication: Physical Layer Exploration Lab Using the NI USRP, National Technology and Science Press, 2012[19]
  • T. S. Rappaport, R. Heath, R. Daniels, J. Murdock, Millimeter Wave Wireless Communications, Prentice Hall, 2015[20]
  • Vutha Va, Takayuki Shimizu, Gaurav Bansal, and R. W. Heath Jr., ``Millimeter Wave Vehicular Communications: A Survey Foundations and Trends in Networking: Vol. 10: No. 1, pp 1–113.[21]

References

  1. 1 2 "Resume - Prof. Robert W. Heath Jr". utexas.edu.
  2. ↑ "Robert Heath - Google Scholar Citations". google.com.
  3. ↑ R. Heath, Digital Wireless Communication: Physical Layer Exploration Lab Using the NI USRP, National Technology and Science Press
  4. ↑ T. S. Rappaport, R. Heath, R. Daniels, J. Murdock, Millimeter Wave Wireless Communications, Prentice Hall, 2015
  5. ↑ "Fun Work Related". profheath.org.
  6. ↑ R. W. Heath, Jr., ``Space-Time Signaling in Multi-Antenna Wireless Systems, Ph.D. Thesis, Stanford University, 2001.
  7. ↑ "Indian-American Engineer & Ex-Indian Navy Officer Arogyaswami Named European Inventor Award 2016 Finalist". 27 April 2016. Retrieved 4 September 2017.
  8. ↑ US #6,067,290 ``Spatial Multiplexing in a Cellular Network. A. J. Paulraj, R. W. Heath, Jr., S. K. Peroor, and D. Gesbert. Issued: May 23, 2000.
  9. ↑ US # 6,377,636 ``Method and wireless communications system using coordinated transmission and training for interference mitigation, A. J. Paulraj, S. K. Peroor, J. Tellado, and R. W. Heath, Jr.. Issued: April 23, 2002.
  10. ↑ US # 6,760,882 ``Mode selection for data transmission in wireless communication channels based on statistical parameters, D. Gesbert, S. E. Catreux, R. W. Heath, Jr., P. K. Sebastian, Arogyaswami J. Paulraj. Issued: July 6, 2004.
  11. ↑ US # 6,298,092 ``Methods of Controlling Communication Parameters of Wireless Systems, R. W. Heath, Jr., S. K. Peroor, and A. J. Paulraj. Issued: Oct. 2, 2001.
  12. ↑ R. W. Heath, Jr. and A. J. Paulraj, ``Switching between multiplexing and diversity based on constellation distance, Proc. of the Allerton Conf. on Comm. Control and Comp., pp. 212-221, Sept. 30 - Oct. 2, 2000.
  13. ↑ R. W. Heath, Jr. and A. J. Paulraj, ``Switching Between Diversity and Multiplexing in MIMO Systems, IEEE Trans. on Communications, vol. 53, no. 6, pp. 962-968, June 2005.
  14. ↑ L. Zheng and D. Tse,``Diversity and multiplexing: a fundamental trade-off in multiple-antenna channels, IEEE Trans. on Info. Theory, vol. 49, no. 5, pp. 1073-1096, May 2003.
  15. ↑ S. E. Catreux, V. Erceg, D. Gesbert, and R. W. Heath, Jr., ``Adaptive modulation and MIMO coding for broadband wireless data networks, IEEE Communications Magazine, vol. 40, no. 6, pp. 108-115, 2002.
  16. ↑ "AT&T's Vision of Ultrafast Wireless Technology May Be a Mirage".
  17. ↑ Tianyang Bai and R. W. Heath, Jr., " Coverage and Rate Analysis for Millimeter Wave Cellular Networks," IEEE Trans. on Wireless, vol. 14, no. 2, pp. 1100-1114, Feb. 2015.
  18. ↑ "Researchers collaborate to keep connected cars safe".
  19. ↑ "Digital Wireless Communication: Physical Layer Exploration Lab Using the NI USRP™". ni.com.
  20. ↑ "Pearson - Millimeter Wave Wireless Communications, CourseSmart eTextbook - Theodore S. Rappaport, Robert W. Heath, Jr., Robert C. Daniels & James N. Murdock". pearsonhighered.com.
  21. ↑ "Millimeter Wave Vehicular Communications: A Survey". nowpublishers.com.
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