People

Mehdi Kiani, Ph.D.

Director of Integrated Circuits and Systems Laboratory (ICSL)

Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering

The Pennsylvania State University

Email: mkiani [at] psu.edu

Mehdi Kiani was born in Shiraz, Iran in 1983. He received his B.S. degree at Shiraz University in 2005 and his M.S. degree at Sharif University of Technology in 2008. He designed RF circuits such as oscillators and synthesizers during his MS studies. Mehdi started his Ph.D. at the Georgia Institute of Technology in 2009 in GT-Bionics lab under the supervision of Dr. Maysam Ghovanloo. He received his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical and Computer Engineering in 2012 and 2013, respectively. In his Ph.D., he developed novel circuit- and system-level techniques for wireless interfacing of advanced implantable microelectronic devices. Mehdi was a postdoctoral fellow at GT-Bionics lab in 2014 prior to joining Penn State as a faculty in Aug. 2014.

Mehdi’s research interests include analog, mixed-signal, RF, and power-management integrated circuits/systems and ultrasound-based systems for wireless healthcare monitoring, neural interfacing, implantable microelectronic devices, wireless sensing/actuating, energy harvesting, and low-power short-range telemetry.

Mehdi is the recipient of the Georgia Tech Sigma Xi Best PhD Thesis Award, Georgia Tech Chih Foundation Research Award for excellent research in the fields of engineering and health sciences, the Penn State Dorothy Quiggle Career Development Professorship, and the National Science Foundation (NSF) Early Career Award.

Postdoctoral Associates:

Sayan Sarkar was born and brought up in India and completed his undergraduate studies at the National Institute of Technology, Durgapur, India. After his graduation, he briefly worked at the engineering and maintenance division of Coal India, a Fortune 500 integrated coal mining company, for almost two years. There, he realized the demand for a multipurpose wearable device to cope with the increasing degree of automation and reduce manual intervention in the industrial environment. Later, he utilized the said knowledge to develop his start-up “Wecare Medservice LLP” in the wearable domain and won the top start-up competitions (EUREKA 2016, EMPRESARIO 2017) in India by developing a beta prototype of a multiparameter monitoring wearable for performance enhancement in working-class people. He pursued his Ph.D. at HKUST, Hong Kong, under Prof. Wing Hung Ki and graduated from HKUST in Aug 2023. His thesis topic is “Power and data transmission efficacy improvement of the on-chip encrypted implantable medical device.” His work during Ph.D. opens up avenues for a closely packed encrypted optical nerve stimulator system. His research interest includes Power Management IC Design, Analog and Mixed-Signal IC Design, Wireless Power Transfer, Biomedical Instrumentation, and Biosignal Processing. He was the recipient of the ‘GE Edison Challenge Award’ and ‘Air India Rank and Bolt Award’ for outstanding scholastic achievement. To date, he has authored nearly 40 referred publications (website link: https://sayansarkarnitdgp.github.io/)

PhD Students:

Sujay Hosur received his B.E. in Electronics and Communication Engineering from Visvesvaraya Technological University, Karnataka, India, in 2017. He received his M.S. degree from Penn State University in 2019. For his undergraduate final year project, he worked on optimization problems such as Genetic Algorithm (GA) and Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) applied to PID controllers. For his master’s thesis, his research focused on the Multi-modal Eyelid Drive System at ICSL. Starting 2020, he is working towards his Ph.D. degree at ICSL. His research interests include machine learning (ML) and artificial intelligence (AI), integrated circuit design and biomedical devices.

Ardavan Javid received his B.Sc. and M.Sc. degrees in electrical engineering from the K. N. Toosi University of Technology, Tehran, Iran in 2011 and 2014, respectively. For his B.Sc. and MSc. theses, he developed wireless demodulator integrated circuits for implantable biomedical microsystems. From 2014 to 2018, he worked as an R&D electrical engineer in designing circuits and developing firmware for embedded systems in medical instruments and smart home companies while collaborating with K. N. Toosi Uni. of Tech. as an adjunct instructor in the electrical & computer engineering department. He joined the ICSL in August 2020 as a Ph.D. student. His research interests include integrated circuits, biomedical circuits & systems, and machine learning.

Rudra Biswas received his B.Sc. in Electrical Engineering from Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology, Bangladesh, in 2022. In his undergrad thesis, he developed a model of Nanoscale Depletion mode MESFET design and conducted comparative study using different semiconductor materials. After his graduation he worked as a Research Assistant on Nanoelectronic Memory Devices. His interests span nanoelectronics, semiconductor fabrication and Machine Learning. He joined the ICSL in January 2023 as a PhD student. His major research focus includes developing instrumentation and systems for ultrasound neuromodulation and implantable medical devices.

Tracy Wang received her B.E. double degree in electrical and electronic engineering from the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China and the University of Glasgow in 2020. Her bachelor’s thesis focused on the development of underwater communication equipment. From 2020 to 2021, she worked as a research assistant at the National Key Laboratory of Science and Technology on Communications, where she dedicated to Software-defined Radio Platform Implementation. She received her M.S. from the University of Pennsylvania in 2023, focusing on integrated circuit design, and joined ICSL as a PhD student in August 2023. Her research interests include system design, embedded system development, integrated circuit design, and signal processing.

Khamzat Nugmanuly earned his B.Sc. and M.Sc. degrees in electrical engineering from the Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology (UNIST) in South Korea, completing his undergraduate studies in 2020 and his master’s in 2024. During his undergraduate program, he developed a passion for Analog Integrated Circuit Design, leading to his first tape-out of a MIPI C-PHY high-speed serial interface. His master’s thesis was titled “A 3.5Gsymbol/lane Receiver Design for MIPI C-PHY layer v2.0.” From 2022 to 2024, he worked as an Analog Design Engineer, creating integrated high-speed interface solutions for micro-LED displays at a South Korean startup. In 2024, he began pursuing his Ph.D. at ICSL. His research focuses on Mixed-Signal ICs and systems for industrial and biomedical applications, as well as wireless power and data transmission.

Usama Liaqat received his B.Sc. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Engineering and Technology, Lahore, Pakistan, in 2020, and his M.S. in Electrical Engineering with gold medal from FAST-National University of Computer and Emerging Sciences, Islamabad, Pakistan, in 2023. His M.S. thesis focused on designing an advanced embedding network-based E-band LNA for phased array mm-Wave RADAR, utilizing simultaneous noise and input matching in 65nm CMOS process. From 2022 to 2023, he worked as a Remote Lab Engineer at Global Semiconductor Microelectronics (GSME) Oman, leading a team of engineers from Oman in developing digital baseband processor for FM receiver in 65nm CMOS process. He joined the ICSL in August 2024 as a Ph.D. student. His major research focus includes developing integrated circuits for implantable medical devices.

Lana Joharji received her B.Sc. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from King Abdulaziz University (KAU), Saudi Arabia, in 2021. During her undergraduate studies, she joined MMH Labs at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Saudi Arabia, where she worked on a project titled “Simplified Low-Cost Accelerometer for Monitoring Earthquakes.” Later, in the same lab, she developed her graduation project, “Adaptive Skin for Healthcare Applications.” She obtained her M.Sc. in Electrical and Computer Engineering at the SAMA Lab, KAUST, Saudi Arabia, in 2022, with a thesis focused on “Solution Processable Carbon Nanotubes Based Sensors: Towards 4D Printed Electronics.” She joined ICSL in 2023. Her research interests include flexible and stretchable electronics, integrated circuits, and ultrasound-based systems for therapeutic and diagnostic applications.

MS Students:

Shengtian Luo
Ritwik Ashok
Aafiya Shaikh

Undergraduate Students:

Philip Ray Han
Reilly Schaffer
Andy Chen
Jenicy Latryce Strong

Alumni:

Sheikh Jawad Ilham, PhD, 2024 (Currently at Qualcomm)

Arifur Sarker, MS, 2023 (Currently at Industry)

Aaron Belkin-Rosen, MS, 2023 (Currently at Draper Laboratory)

Krishna Keshav Kodandapani, MS, 2023 (Currently at Microchip Technology Inc.)

Shashank Sagar Mamidi, MS, 2023 (Currently at Microchip Technology Inc.)

Zeinab Kashani, PhD, 2023 (Currently at Montage Technology, Inc)

Philip Graybill, PhD, 2022 (Currently an Assistant Professor of Engineering at Messiah University)

Chris Wible, MS, 2022

Junda Feng, MS, 2021 (Currently at Qualcomm)

Jingqian Zhao, MS, 2021

Chenyuan Zhao, Post Doc, 2021 (Currently at Guangdong Institute of Artificial Intelligence and Advanced Computing)

Hesam Sadeghi Gougheri, PhD, 2020 (Currently at Ferric, Inc.)

Miao Meng, PhD, 2019 (Currently a Professor at Tongji University)

Ahmed Ibrahim, PhD, 2019 (Currently at Broadcom)

Sujay Sheshagiri Hosur, MS, 2019 (Digital Design Engineer at Codelucida; Current: PhD student at PSU)

Pin Tsai, MS, 2019 (Currently at Delta Electronics, Inc., CA)

Gaurav Ramesh Datta, MS (co-advisor), 2019

Amogh Adishesha, MS (co-advisor), 2018 (Currently a PhD Student at PSU)

Enhao Zhang, MS, 2018 (Currently at Maxim Integrated Products)

Shenqi Zhao, MS, 2017

Jinbo Liu, MS, 2016

Previous Undergraduate Students:

Wooyong Shin, 2024
Arya Keni, BS, 2023
Hsin-Ho Chou, BS, 2021
Erica Venkatesulu, BS, 2020
Conghao Liu, BS, 2020
Gengfu Yang, BS, 2020
Shengkai Xu, BS, 2020
Mingkai Zhang, BS, 2020
Yixin Xiong, BS, 2019
Miral Gandhi, BS, 2019
John Stevens, BS, 2019
Jacob Haiman, BS, 2018
Ryan Mbagna-Nanko, BS, 2018
Cody Dillinger, BS, 2018
Ruixiao Zhang, BS, 2017
Yida Yuan, BS, 2017
Alexander Wildgoose, BS, 2017
Richard Pier, BS, 2017
Ecenaz Asku, BS, 2016
Andrew Liu, BS, 2016
Jason Ling, BS, 2016
Meng Kry, BS, 2016
Yifan Zhang, BS, 2016
Mike Tran, BS, 2016
Matt Peretic, BS, 2016
Philip Graybill, BS, 2016
Kevin O’Donnell, BS, 2015
Zicheng Li, BS, 2015
Louis van der Elst, BS, 2015
Viraj Patel, BS, 2014-2015
John Duong, BS, 2014

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Mehdi Kiani, Ph.D.