Recent breakthroughs in photodetector and optical receiver technologies have increased the performance and functionality of a wide range of existing systems as well as enabling new applications. Ultraviolet detectors are becoming increasingly important in medical, military, and environmental applications, including biological agent detection and non-line-of-sight (NLOS) communications. SiC avalanche photodiodes (APDs) are an attractive candidate for those applications that place a premium on detectors that are compact, rugged, and inexpensive. Recently, SiC have also been operated at room temperature in Geiger mode for single photon detection. By incorporating new materials and impact ionization engineering with beneficially designed heterostructures, the performance of avalanche photodiodes has been improved to levels previously thought to be theoretically unattainable. These photodiodes will be utilized in next-generation fiber optic systems that are projected to have transmission capacities as high as 10 terabits. Monolithic silicon-based optical receivers are an attractive option for low-cost, high-volume applications such as local area networks, fiber-to-the home, and optical interconnects. Recent work has focused on integrating a Ge photodiode with a CMOS preamplifier. The signal to noise ratio of analog optical links such as those utilized for phased array antennas improves at high input optical power levels. Unfortunately, owing to the space charge effect and thermal effects the bandwidth of a conventional photodiode saturates at high photocurrent levels. New photodiode structures that mitigate the space charge effect have achieved record saturation current and high RF output power.

Joe C. Campbell received a B.S. in physics from the University of Texas at Austin in 1969, and his M.S. and Ph.D. in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1971 and 1973, respectively. From 1974 to 1976, he was employed by Texas Instruments where he worked on integrated optics. In 1976, he joined the staff of AT&T Bell Laboratories in Holmdel, New Jersey. In the Crawford Hill Laboratory, he worked on a variety of optoelectronic devices including semiconductor lasers, optical modulators, waveguide switches, photonic integrated circuits, and photodetectors with emphasis on high-speed avalanche photodiodes for high-bit-rate lightwave systems.

In January 1989, he joined the faculty of the University of Texas at Austin as professor of electrical and computer engineering and Cockrell Family Regents Chair in Engineering. In January of 2006, Professor Campbell joined the faculty of the University of Virginia in Charlottesville as the Lucian Carr, III Chair of Electrical Engineering and Applied Science. Professor Campbell's technical area is fiber optic communication systems and his research has focused on the optoelectronic components that are used to generate, modulate, and detect the optical signals. At present, he is actively involved in single-photon-counting avalanche photodiodes, Si-based optoelectronics, high-speed, low-noise avalanche photodiodes, GaN ultraviolet photodetectors, and quantum-dot IR imaging. He has coauthored six book chapters, 320 articles for refereed technical journals, and more than 200 conference presentations. He has served on numerous technical program committees. Professor Campbell teaches graduate and undergraduate courses on lasers and optoelectronic components.

Doug Holly has been an IEEE member for more than 20 years and is active in local and society activities. He is currently the chair of the Washington Chapter of the Communications Society and the joint Washington and Northern Virginia Chapter of the Engineering Managment Society, and he is a Director of the Washington Section. He has co-chaired the National Capital Area Officer Training program for the past three years. At the society level, he is serving on the planning committee for IEEE GlobeCom 2007. He is also serves on the board of the TechCouncil of Maryland.

Mr. Holly is currently vice president of the Technology Projects Group in JDSU's Communication Test Division. He has previously held positions as Director of Engineering and Vice President of the Global Program Management group. Prior to joining JDSU, Doug worked for IBM's Federal Systems, designing and deploying IT systems and avionic computers. He has authored a number of papers on leadership and project management and conducts seminars on project management.

Quality of electric power supply deteriorates with a proliferation of non-linear loads of single phase domestic motors and switch mode power supplies for computers and entertainment electronics. The presence of harmonics in distorted current waveform can cause floating potential at the neutral wire and premature failures of capacitors, power supplies, and other loads connected to the bus. The speaker will present a case study of the problem of harmonics pollution -- and its solution -- on the Indian Railways 25kV 50 Hz electric traction supply system.

Research activities fall into three areas: nonchemical orbit-raising propulsion, chemical propulsion, and plume signatures resulting from both chemical and nonchemical propulsion. Topics include characteristics of pulsed and steady-state plasmas; scaling physics; characteristics of flowing plasma; instabilities of plasma. Topics may also include the modeling of the coupling among unsteady flows, combustion, acoustic fields, and chemical kinetics, detonation phenomenon, modeling using novel tools such as molecular dynamics, direct simulation Monte Carlo, and hybrid approach.

Military radars and other government users are going to share their 5.8 GHz bands with commercial WiFi like users. This bandsharing has never been done before, nor has the cooperation between the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which regulates commercial interests, and the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), which regulates government users.

Robert Sole of the NTIA will describe the agonizing trip of cooperation between NTIA and FCC, the military radar users who are secretive about their waveforms, and the commercial players like Intel, Microsoft, Motorola and others, who argue that the world's wireless networks are desperate for more spectrum.