Werner wins 2015 ACES Technical Achievement Award

April 24, 2015 – A professor in the School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science was honored with the 2015 Applied Computational Electromagnetics Society’s (ACES) Technical Achievement Award last month in Wlliamsburg, Virginia.

Douglas Werner, the John L. and Genevieve H. McCain Chair Professor in electrical engineering and the director of the Computational Electromagnetics and Antennas Research Lab, was recognized for his work in “Pioneering the wide-spread use of global optimization techniques for antenna array and metamaterial design.” He is only the second recipient of this prestigious award.

“The ACES award is recognition from your peers of the contributions you’ve made in the field,” said Werner. “I was certainly honored to receive it; it’s always great to know that your work is appreciated and valued by your colleagues.”

Each year ACES identifies individuals who have made significant contributions in ACES fields. The Technical Achievement Award, according to their website, honors those who demonstrate “original technical contributions in the field of applied computational electromagnetics, supported by publications, patents and other products such as developed codes.”

According to Andrew Peterson, who served as the coordinator for this year’s ACES Awards selection committee, a panel of eight engineers evaluated and ranked all the nominations for this award.

“The technical award reflects a certain level of visibility in the community which, in my experience, is sought by most academic programs as an indication of quality of their faculty,” said Peterson. “The recipients of this have accomplished something beyond the ordinary. This will have a positive impact on their career.”

Werner has been a member of the Penn State electrical engineering faculty since 1998 and was named the John L. and Genevieve H. McCain Chair in Engineering in 2011. He teaches a variety of courses in electrical engineering, including undergraduate and graduate antenna engineering classes.

Werner has won numerous awards while at Penn State, including the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Antennas and Propagation Society Harold A. Wheeler Applications Prize Paper Award in 2014, the inaugural IEEE Antennas and Propagation Society Edward E. Altshuler Prize Paper Award in 2011, the 2009 Penn State Outstanding Engineering Alumni Society (PSEAS) Premiere Research Award, the 2006 R.W.P. King Award for a co-authored paper published in the IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation, the 2002 PSEAS Outstanding Teaching Award and the 2000 PSEAS Outstanding Research Award.