t was like a dream coming true… one of the greatest honors of my life.” So Prof. Khaled B. LETAIEF, former Dean of Engineering, recalled his reaction to the unexpected am email in announcing he had been elected to the US National Academy of Engineering (NAE). The New Bright Professor of Engineering and Chair Professor in the Department of Electronic and Computer Engineering (ECE) was especially pleased for HKUST, given the majority of his career has been spent at the University, and as NAE membership is regarded globally as one of the highest accolades accorded to an engineer in academia or industry. The Tunisian-born academic joined the School of Engineering (SENG) in as an assistant professor, moving from the University of Melbourne in Australia to HKUST just two years a er its establishment. Today he is the world’s sixth most cited scholar in wireless publications with over , citations and an h-index of , as in February , as well as granted patents. “As a ‘home-grown’ faculty member at HKUST, I was deeply honored and humbled to receive this NAE distinction,” he said. He was equally delighted for his home country, which supported his education through scholarships and has recognized his subsequent achievements with the top honor of Best Tunisian Researcher or Inventor Abroad in , an award presented by the President of Tunisia to a single recipient annually. Prof. Letaief’s leadership in wireless communications and networks extends over years, from the field’s emergent days – “wireless communications did not exist when I went to university” – to current research interests ranging from machine learning to tactile internet and G/6G systems. Among his many outstanding research achievements at SENG are contributions to advance the analysis, design, and performance evaluation of orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM). Specifically, he has studied the use of OFDM for high-speed wireless data access and developed enabling techniques for OFDM that include robust channel estimation, synchronization, and space-time processing. In addition, he has created groundbreaking adaptive and resource allocation schemes, as cited by the NAE, which became a key technology in many wireless systems and has been vital in accelerating the explosive growth of broadband wireless communications, with impact on sustainable smart cities, internet of things (IoT), and many other areas. Prof. Letaief accounts for this success in typically modest fashion. “I am lucky to work in a field that makes impact and that is appreciated… We chose to solve difficult problems that were considered impossible by some. When you find the solution, it becomes impactful, it opens a new field, and people start citing your papers.” Brought up in Tunisia’s French-inspired education system in the s and early s, the young Letaief was among the top high school graduates given full scholarships by the Tunisian government for undergraduate studies in the US in . These elite teenagers only started to learn English the summer before flying over to North America in the fall for one semester of English studies ahead of their undergraduate programs. In spring , he started the prestigious bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering at Purdue University in Indiana, completing the four-year program within three years and gaining distinction. He continued on to a master’s and PhD in electrical engineering at the same university, with full scholarships from his home country. “I was inspired by Purdue’s professors to become a scholar doing impactful research for humanity and providing solutions to the world,” he said. The highly positive experience with the Purdue faculty also made Prof. Letaief a firm believer that excellence as an educator had just as important a role to play in an academic career as research. In 8, just five years a er joining HKUST, he received the Michael G. Gale Medal for Distinguished Teaching, HKUST’s highest University-wide teaching award. As Dean of the School of Engineering from to , he further advocated this teacher-scholar philosophy and launched the School’s Center for Engineering Education Innovation. “I 17 IN FOCUS
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