On 12 December 2001, the speaker participated in one hundred year anniversary celebration of Marconi's first transatlantic wireless experiment at a receiving site on Signal Hill, near St. John's, Newfoundland, Canada.  After a historical overview we trace the tremendous progress made in the last two decades.  With Wireless Internet access using IMT 2000/WLAN a reality, the role of Information Theory has never been important.  We describe several techniques such as: space-time codes, turbo, convolutional and Reed-Solomon codes, multiuser detection, source coding and encryption, which have served as enabling techniques for sophisticated wireless systems.  Finally, we briefly discuss the current malaise afflicting the wireless industry and possible recovery scenarios.  The presentation will be suitable, not only for researchers but also for a general audience.

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About the Speaker

Vijay K. Bhargava, Candidate for IEEE President-Elect, CEO, University of Victoria, Canada

Vijay K. Bhargava received the B.Sc., M.Sc., and Ph.D. degrees from Queen's University, Kingston, Canada in 1970, 1972 and 1974 respectively.  Currently, he is a Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Victoria and holds a Canada Research Chair in Wireless Communications.  He is a co-author of the book Digital Communications by Satellite (New York: Wiley, 1981), co-editor of the 1994 IEEE Press Book Reed-Solomon Codes and Their Applications and co-editor of Communications, Information and Network Security (Boston: Kluwer, 2002). His research interests are in multi-media wireless communications.  He is an Editor for the IEEE Transactions on Communications and the IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications. Dr. Bhargava is a Past President of the IEEE Information Theory Society and has been nominated by the IEEE Board of Director for the Office of IEEE President-Elect in this year's election.  His election website is located at www.ece.uvic.ca/~bhargava/ieee.