Shivendra Panwar named a Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors

BROOKLYN, New York, Thursday, December 8, 2022 – Shivendra Panwar — Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering  at the NYU Tandon School of Engineering and Director of the New York State Center for Advanced Technology in Telecommunications (CATT) — has been named a Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors (NAI).

The fellowship recognizes Panwar’s wide-ranging innovation in the field of wireless communications. That innovation encompasses a broad range of work including cooperative wireless networks, switch performance and multimedia transport over networks.

Panwar holds over 25 patents in areas like packet switches, online media streaming, cybersecurity of wireless communications, and more. His recent work includes a new system called “streamloading,” a technology that improves wireless streaming over wireless cellular networks through preloading fine grain detail to devices, allowing for high quality video and audio even while service deteriorates.

He is also one of nine NYU Tandon researchers who received a combined $2.5 million from the  National Science Foundation (NSF) as part of the Resilient and Intelligent Next Generation Systems (RINGS) partnership to ensure resiliency is part of next-G wireless telecommunications. The projects will focus on making current and future wireless infrastructure, software and hardware systems more resilient to flaws, accidents, subterfuge and hacks.

As the Director of CATT for over 20 years, Panwar has built an economic engine that helps drive New York City’s continued success in the tech sector. CATT promotes industry-university collaborative research and development to create economic impact through research, technology transfer, and faculty entrepreneurship. CATT is sponsored by the New York State’s Empire State Development’s Division of Science, Technology and Innovation (NYSTAR). In his capacity as Director, Panwar has worked with AT&T, Sony, InterDigital, Cisco, several startups and other companies to improve their technology and develop further economic prosperity. 

“Shivendra Panwar’s pioneering work is changing the ways that we interact with our world without wires,” said Jelena Kovačević, Dean of NYU Tandon. “His history of innovation in the fields of communications, cybersecurity and more — and the ways those innovations translate into economic and business success — make him more than worthy of this tremendous honor.”

Panwar received his B.Tech degree in electrical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur, in 1981, and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical and computer engineering from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, in 1983 and 1986, respectively.

He joined the Department of Electrical Engineering at the Polytechnic Institute of New York, Brooklyn (now NYU Tandon) in 1985. He is a co-founder of the NYC Media Lab, as well as a member of NYU Wireless. He spent the summer of 1987 as a Visiting Scientist at the IBM T.J. Watson Research Center, Yorktown Heights, NY, and has been a consultant to AT&T Bell Laboratories, Holmdel, NJ. He has won the Sony Research Award twice.

Preceding Panwar, among those at NYU Tandon who have been named NAI Fellows are Jef Boeke, professor of biomedical engineering at the New York University Tandon School of Engineering and the Sol and Judith Bergstein Director of the Institute of System Genetics at NYU Langone Health; Daniel Sodickson, professor of biomedical engineering at NYU Tandon and professor of radiology and neuroscience and physiology at NYU Langone; Jin Kim Montclare, professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering;  Kurt Becker, Vice Dean for Research, Innovation and Entrepreneurship; H. Jonathan Chao, professor of electrical and computer engineering; Bud Mishra, professor and director of bioinformatics; and Theodore (Ted) S. Rappaport, the David Lee/Ernst Weber Professor of Electrical Engineering and Founding Director of NYU WIRELESS.

Faculty from across NYU who have been elected NAI Fellows include NYU President Andy Hamilton, Jan T. Vilcek, Kenneth Perlin, Leslie Prichep and David Grier.