You are invited to attend a lecture

Secure and Spectrum-Aware Wireless Communications:
Challenges and Opportunities
By:
Rabia Tugce Yazicigil
Electrical and Computer Engineering Department, Boston University

Abstract
The Internet of Things (IoT) is redefining how we interact with the world by supplying a global view based not only on human-provided data but also human-device connected data. For example, in Health Care, IoT will bring decreased costs, improved treatment results, and better disease management. However, the connectivity-in-everything model brings heightened security concerns. Additionally, the projected growth of connected nodes not only increases security concerns, it also leads to a 1000-fold increase in wireless data traffic in the near future. This data storm results in a spectrum scarcity thereby driving the urgent need for shared spectrum access technologies. These security deficiencies and the wireless spectrum crunch require innovative system-level secure and scalable solutions.
This talk will introduce energy-efficient and application-driven system-level solutions for secure and spectrum-aware wireless communications. I will present an ultra-fast bit-level frequency-hopping scheme for physical-layer security. This scheme utilizes the frequency agility of devices in combination with time-interleaved radio frequency architectures and protocols to achieve secure wireless communications. To address the wireless spectrum crunch, future smart radio systems will evaluate the spectrum usage dynamically and opportunistically use the underutilized spectrum; this will require spectrum sensing for interferer avoidance. I will discuss a system-level approach using band-pass sparse signal processing for rapid interferer detection in a wideband spectrum to convert the abstract improvements promised by sparse signal processing theory, e.g., fewer measurements, to concrete improvements in time and energy efficiency. Beyond these system-level solutions, I will also discuss future research directions including secure package-less THz tags and ingestible micro-bio-electronic devices.

Rabia Tugce Yazicigil is currently an Assistant Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering Department at Boston University and leading the Wireless Integrated Systems and Extreme Circuits (WISE-Circuits) Laboratory since August 2018. She was a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the EECS Department of MIT working with Prof. Anantha P. Chandrakasan from 2016 to 2018. She received her PhD degree in Electrical Engineering from Columbia University in 2016. She received the B.S. degree in Electronics Engineering from Sabanci University, Istanbul, Turkey in 2009, and the M.S. degree in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Lausanne, Switzerland in 2011.

Her research interest lies at the interface of electronics with a specific focus on analog and radio frequency integrated circuits, signal processing, security and wireless communications to innovate system-level solutions for future energy-constrained applications in the context of the Internet of Things. Her recent research work on ultra-fast bit-level frequency hopping for physical-layer security is featured on MIT News with additional press coverage on CNET, EurekAlert!, Engadget, ElectronicsWeekly.com. She has been a recipient of a number of awards, including the “Electrical Engineering Collaborative Research Award” for her PhD research on Compressive Sampling Applications in Rapid RF Spectrum Sensing (2016), the second place at the Bell Labs Future X Days Student Research Competition (2015), Analog Devices Inc. outstanding student designer award (2015) and 2014 Millman Teaching Assistant Award of Columbia University. She presented her research work in the 2015 MIT EECS Rising Stars.

On Thursday, June 25, 2019, 15:00
Room 011, Kitot building