The Subdisciplines of
Electrical and Computer Engineering

Physical and Quantum Electronics

The tremendous advances in computers, calculators, digital watches, electronic ignitions, transistor radios, and lasers have been spurred by developments in the general area of Electrical Engineering known as "physical electronics." This area concerns itself with the development of the electronic devices that generate, detect, transmit, and amplify electrical energy and information. Based on a strong knowledge of physics, optics, electromagnetic theory and the properties of materials, tremendous strides have been made in the development of transistors, integrated circuits (VLSI), lasers and optical components and systems. Furthermore, advances in developing optical devices and an improved understanding of the underlying physical principles (quantum electronics and nonlinear optics) has led to reliable and increasingly sophisticated applications in optical communications, displays reprographics and medicine. The effect of such advances has revolutionized the electronics industry and continues to play a dominant role in the electrical engineering profession.

The electrical engineering student who is prepared to work in this field can be assured of working in an exciting and fast-moving field. Certainly, the demand for professional competence in electronic device development and fabrication continues to grow with each passing year as the impact of new device technology is felt in the industrial and consumer marketplace. Graduates of this program are leaders in the design of electronic and optical devices and systems and the integration of such devices in systems. The demand for sophisticated electronic products will continue to require the efforts of many electrical engineers prepared to work in the physical electronics area.

Physical and Quantum Electronics includes a variety of topics such as those listed below:

Fiber Optics and Optical Communications, Gas Discharge Phenomena, Integrated Circuit Design and Fabrication Lasers (Gas, Molecular and Solid State), Linear and Non-Linear Optics, Nanoelectronics, Optoelectronics, Plasma and Material Processing, Semiconductor Device Design and Process Developments, Semiconductor Physics and Computational Electronics, Scanning Tunneling Microscopy.

Because of the physical nature of these topics, supplementary courses in physics and mathematics are always useful. Within electrical engineering, there are a number of courses available in this area. The curriculum has a common format for the first four semesters which are listed below with their location in the curricula as follows:

Semester 6

ECE 444

Semester 7

ECE 441, ECE 455, ECE 495

Semester 8

ECE 460, ECE 487, ECE 488

Other Suggested Technical Electives

  • CS 257 - Numerical Methods
  • ECE 447 - Active Microwave Circuit Design
  • ECE 452 - Electromagnetic Fields
  • ECE 457 - Microwave Devices and Circuits
  • ECE 484 - Advanced Microelectronics Processing
  • ME 300 - Thermodynamics
  • MATH 446 - Applied Complex Variables
  • PHYS 460 - Condensed Matter Physics
  • PHYS 486 - Quantum Physics, I
  • PHYS 487 - Quantum Physics, II

For additional aid and advice, contact any faculty member of the Physical and Quantum Electronics area: Ilesanmi Adesida, Steven G. Bishop, Keh-Yung Cheng, James J. Coleman, J. Gary Eden, Milton Feng, Lynford L. Goddard, Nick Holonyak, Kuang C. Hsieh, Kanti Jain, Kyekyoon Kim, Jean-Pierre Leburton, Xuiling Li, Joseph W. Lyding, Eric Pop, Umberto Ravaioli, and John R. Tucker.