Prem Kumar Receives Walder Award for Research Excellence

May 12, 2006

Prem Kumar, SBC professor of Information Technology, has been named the fifth recipient of the Martin E. and Gertrude G. Walder Award for Research Excellence.

The Walder Award was established by Dr. Joseph A. Walder, who earned a master’s degree in chemistry from Northwestern in 1972 and an MD degree in 1975.

Kumar is director of the Center for Photonic Communication and Computing and holds appointments in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science and the Department of Physics and Astronomy. His research focuses on the development of novel fiber-optic devices and systems for ultrahigh-speed optical and quantum communication/computing networks. His current research is funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF), the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the Army Research Office (ARO), and the Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR). He is a Fellow of the Optical Society of America (OSA), a Fellow of the American Physical Society (APS), a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE), and a Fellow of the Institute of Physics (IoP), UK. He received the 2004 International Quantum Communications Award sponsored by the Tamagawa University in Tokyo, Japan. He is the founder of NuCrypt LLC, a company based in Evanston, IL, which is commercializing the quantum cryptography technology developed by him and his colleagues at the McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science.