ECE Perspectives: Abdullah Al-Digs, Power System Studies Consultant
“My industry and graduate research experiences focus on developing real-time tools to operate future power systems reliably and economically… I firmly believe that my research is vital to enabling wide integration of renewable energy.”
Abdullah Al-Digs graduated from ECE with a BASc in Electrical Engineering in 2015, and with a PhD in Electrical Engineering in 2021. Following graduation, he’s begun as a Power System Studies Consultant at PSC Power Systems Consultants. While at ECE, Abdullah studied power systems analysis, developing an expertise in the subject that he’ll now take into his work in the industry.
We spoke to Abdullah to learn about his research in power and energy systems, and how this focus area has taken him from his studies at ECE to his current work in the industry.
What is your current position? What kinds of work do you do?
I am currently a power system studies consultant at PSC North America. In this role, I am involved in the various stages of generation interconnection studies within the PJM power system. Specifically, I develop and test models for renewable generation units such as solar plants, battery energy storage, and wind turbines. These models are then used to perform system impact studies, which serves to ensure the reliable and secure operation of the power system.
How did you find this job (through interviewing, networking, etc.)? What was the process of getting the job like?
I was fortunate enough to know someone who works at PSC North America and referred me to the company following my Ph.D. degree graduation.
The hiring process differs slightly between different companies- however, most job hunts will involve between two to three interviews in the industry. The timeline also varies significantly between different companies for them to make hiring decisions. Overall, I learned that it’s important to reach out to people through networking platforms such as LinkedIn. I was surprised by the responses I received and how my network connections were willing to provide advice and share their industry insights.
What has your career path been like so far?
My career path starting point was acquiring a Bachelor of Applied Science degree in Electrical Engineering in the power and energy systems option from UBC in 2015. I then pursued a Ph.D. degree in power systems at UBC which I completed in 2021. During my six years of graduate studies, I was involved in many research projects that led to several publications and awards.
I discovered my passion for teaching and served as a teaching assistant for several undergraduate- and graduate-level power system courses, and in recognition of my contributions to teaching and student learning, I received the prestigious Killam Graduate Teaching Assistant Award in 2019.
Shortly after completing my graduate studies, I joined PSC North America as a power system studies consultant where I currently perform generation interconnection studies in the PJM power system.
How does your career path and graduate experience connect to your current position?
Modern electric power systems are undergoing dramatic changes due to heterogeneity in electricity sources, such as energy-storage devices, fuel cells, and renewable generation.
Renewable generation introduces levels of variability and uncertainty that are unprecedented in conventional power systems. These special circumstances require the development of analytically tractable and computationally efficient operational schemes for integrating existing systems with emerging electricity generation technologies. Such schemes will help to achieve reliable, cost-effective, and robust electrical power systems with improved system stability, efficiency, and environmental footprint.
My industry and graduate research experiences focus on developing real-time tools to operate future power systems reliably and economically. Specifically, I focus on controlling and predicting post-contingency dynamic transmission-line flows, estimation of feasible active-power nodal injections, and frequency response design. As such, I firmly believe that my research is vital to enabling wide integration of renewable energy generation and preventing severe system-wide failures.
Additionally, my research has the potential to provide tools for power system operators to address severe operational reliability issues in real-time. Realization of this research will enable practical advancements in power system operation and control, which will help to accommodate renewable generation technologies, enhance system responsiveness, and optimize asset utilization, thus bringing us closer to the Smart Grid vision.
What do you enjoy most about this line of work?
I am most excited about contributing to the transition of the power industry towards renewable and more sustainable alternative energy sources. This paradigm shift from a system dominated by high-inertia fossil fuel-based generators to one with low-inertia renewable energy sources presents its unique challenges. However, the excitement for me lies in the challenge of developing new operational schemes and tools to accommodate this necessary transformation.
Do you have any tips or suggestions for a student interested in entering the industry in your field?
Although a graduate degree is not required to enter our industry, it is certainly preferred in many companies. A graduate degree allows you to refine your skillset and contribute to the field in a greater capacity with the knowledge acquired from state-of-the-art research performed during your studies.
Find Abdullah on Linkedin or at his personal site.
Krishan Dayal Srivastava, 1931-2021
Krishan Dayal Srivastava (KD), former Head of the Department of Electrical Engineering, as well as Vice President of Student and Academic Services, passed away on October 20th. He will be dearly missed.
KD came to Canada from England in 1966, where he was professor and later Chair of Electrical Engineering at University of Waterloo. He arrived at UBC in 1983, serving as Head of the Department of Electrical Engineering, and later began as Vice President of Student and Academic Services in 1986.
KD was one of the key individuals behind the founding of the Centre for Integrated Computer Systems Research, now ICICS. This institute now helps to drive pioneering interdisciplinary research between Electrical and Computer Engineering, Computer Science, and Mechanical Engineering. In his work, he made important contributions in the power area, in particular in the study of high-voltage engineering. He was instrumental in a UBC committee that planned a Kuwaiti university, and founded a new university in Trinidad after his retirement.
He was an early supporter of diversity initiatives, and championed female engineers in their careers. In his role as VP, he cared deeply about the well-being of students and worked to support them. In addition, KD was a Thunderbirds football fan.
KD was a vital part of our Electrical and Computer Engineering Department, as well as UBC as a whole. His many contributions to engineering, both at UBC and abroad, will be well-remembered, and his kindness, wisdom, and intelligence will be greatly missed.
In lieu of flowers, please consider donating to the Alzheimer Society of Canada.
Full obituary.
ECE Student Perspectives: Eric Cheng, SFU I2I Venture Pitch Winner
“Cell sequencing is changing the way we understand the most fundamental unit of life, but there are still many bottlenecks… This was the inspiration for Isolatrix.”
Eric Cheng is a PhD candidate in Electrical Engineering at UBC, supervised by Dr. Karen Cheung. He’s passionate about using cutting edge techniques in microfluidics and machine learning to solve challenging life science problems.
Eric has recently won the ‘Invention to Innovation’ Venture Pitch Competition at SFU in the Product Ready Venture category. At this event, qualifying students pitch their ventures to a panel of judges comprised of angel investors, IP experts and successful entrepreneurs. Eric’s winning initiative, Isolatrix, leverages deep learning to perform highly precise single cell isolation, enabling whole genome sequencing applications.
We spoke to him to learn more about his pioneering initiative, the importance of cell isolation in the biomedical field, and the path that led him to this field.
Congratulations! How do you feel about this award?
I am humbled to have won the 2021 SFU Invention to Innovation (i2I) pitch competition. I went against very talented competition, who each presented groundbreaking, commercially viable innovations.
Over the one-year course of the SFU i2I program, our cohort gained competency and refined and assisted each other, developing a strong sense of camaraderie as we embarked on our scientific-entrepreneurial journeys. I have nothing but respect for my peers, as we’re all aiming to bring important innovations to the green-tech and health-tech markets. It was a great experience to have just shared the stage with them.
What is the topic of your award-winning project?
The innovation I presented at the pitch competition was a unique AI-guided approach for a single cell isolation instrument, which is currently in development in our lab.
In contrast to traditional bulk sequencing, where information from homogenized mixtures of thousands or millions of cells is averaged over a population, our system of single cell analysis captures information from individual cells.
Capturing this information gives us the ability to profile tissue composition, identify rare cell subsets, characterize differentiation trajectories, and measure inter-cellular heterogeneity. Single cell genomics is already transforming our understanding of developmental biology, regenerative medicine, and disease.
Our Isolatrix system has the potential to impact cancer genomics, developmental biology, immunology, and beyond. Facilitating new technologies for enabling single cell analysis allows us to acheive previously unattainable levels of insight.
What is the future of your initiative? How can your project impact the industry?
The Isolatrix aims to democratize single cell sequencing, bringing affordable small-volume, large-scale single cell omics experiments to research labs and beyond.
By creating technologies that can profile genomes, transcriptomes, and epigenomes, our initiative allows for the advancement of the understanding of diseases, such as cancers, by studying individual tumor cells. This can reveal the mechanisms underlying treatment resistance and metastatic progression, and pave the way for improved clinical outcomes for patients.
How did you get started studying this? What draws you to this area?
Our lab has been conducting research on cell handling technologies for a while now. I did my master’s in the same lab at UBC, studying complex hydrodynamics within inkjet systems, and solving challenges for cell handling applications. Through interactions with members of the Genome Sciences Centre, I saw firsthand the impact single cell sequencing is having on life science today. Cell sequencing is changing the way we understand the most fundamental unit of life, but there are still many bottlenecks in the workflow, with gaps in technology in cell preparation. This was the inspiration for the Isolatrix instrument.
By using deep learning to provide a high throughput solution guaranteeing high capture and high single cell purity, we are streamlining the process to enable larger scale solutions which were previously limited through either resources or costs.
What has your career path been like so far? Where do you hope you’ll be in 5 years?
After obtaining my master’s degree in Biomedical Engineering at UBC, I spent some time working in the industry before returning for my PhD studies at Electrical and Computer Engineering. In five years, it is our goal to commercialize the Isolatrix instrument and have it integrated into single cell sequencing workflows internationally, making contributions to the advancement of life science.
Learn more about SFU I2I Venture Pitch.
ECE Student Perspectives: David Black, BMIAI Fall Research Award winner
“Bringing a robot to life and getting it to interact with its environment is always exciting and satisfying.”
David Black is a PhD student at Electrical and Computer Engineering. Under the supervision of Tim Salcudean, David researches control and artificial intelligence in medical robots. His recent presentation at the 2021 BMIAI conference, “Human Teleoperation: A Haptically-Enabled Mixed Reality Interface for Teleultrasound”, won BMIAI’s Fall Research Showcase research award.
We spoke to him to learn more about his award-winning research, his career, and what excites him about the future of medical robotics technology.
Congratulations! How do you feel about this award?
Thank you, I’m excited to have been selected! I thought all the presentations were very interesting and well done, and I enjoyed meeting and talking to various students and faculty after. Winning an award at the end was an added bonus!
What has your career path looked like so far? How did you end up at ECE, and why did you choose our department?
I did my undergrad in Engineering Physics at UBC. During that time, I developed an interest in research and medical robotics, through work at Carl Zeiss Meditec AG in Germany and a local robotics start-up, as well as a lab in Germany, at the BC Cancer Research Centre, and with ECE’s Prof. Tim Salcudean. After finishing my bachelor’s degree, it was clear to me that I wanted to do research at the intersection of medical robotics and imaging. Prof. Salcudean’s lab occupies exactly this space, and I knew and liked the people in the lab. Additionally, I love Vancouver and its proximity to the mountains (where I spend most of my free time), so graduate studies under Prof. Salcudean seemed like the ideal next step. I was lucky enough to publish some of my work in journals and conferences throughout my undergraduate studies, so I was able to start as a direct-entry PhD student in ECE, exactly two days after finishing the last exam of my undergrad.
What do you study?
My research focuses on control and artificial intelligence in medical robotics. The Robotics and Control Lab is uniquely equipped with novel force sensing technology, which is built into the da Vinci Surgical System that we use. With this setup, we can investigate control architectures for haptic feedback in robotic surgery, and can use force data in reinforcement learning to train the robot to carry out tasks such as suturing autonomously. We are applying the same concepts to develop a novel control framework, which leverages mixed reality and 5G to effectively use a human as a flexible, safe, and cognitive robot for tele-medicine applications such as tele-ultrasound. The basic premise is that a person wears a mixed reality headset which projects a holographic virtual tool into their space. They then follow the tool, which is controlled in real time by a remote expert, with their own real one. In this work, haptics, teleoperation, and artificial intelligence again play a key role. This latter project is what I presented for the BMIAI event.
How did you get started studying this topic?
I first took an interest in surgical robotics quite a few years ago, because my dad uses surgical robots in his practice. The broad nature of Engineering Physics allowed me to take courses and work on projects in all aspects of robotics, from hardware to electrical design to software, and to take physics courses where my interest for medical imaging was born. Engineering Physics is also fairly math-heavy, which leads well into robotics, controls, and AI. Thus, I gained this very multidisciplinary set of interests, and I was fortunate to find an impactful field of study that involves all of these topics.
What interests you most about your research?
I really enjoy the multidisciplinary nature of my work. One day I might be coding, while the next day I might design a mechanical part, and then outfit it with an electrical system, all with the underlying physics of the application in mind. In addition, bringing a robot to life and getting it to act in a certain way and actually interact with its environment is always exciting and satisfying- when it works! Ultimately a lot of my research involves looking at how a human interacts with a robot or computer in new ways, and drawing biological parallels- for example, the parallels between human versus machine intelligence or sensory perception- or even controlling a person as one would usually control a robot – which I find fascinating. Finally, it is very rewarding to work towards goals that could actually impact people and improve their healthcare and lives.
What’s something people wouldn’t expect about your research topic?
Though we live in one of the world’s most prosperous countries, almost a fifth of Canadians live in rural communities which have substandard access to healthcare. This is especially problematic in many First Nations communities where government healthcare is not necessarily delivered in a culturally sensitive manner. My research topic aims to address both these issues by allowing people to access healthcare in their own homes, delivered by people they trust, and teleoperated by experts.
Learn more about David’s work at his Github portfolio.
Staff Perspectives: Ross Sheppard, President’s Staff Award
“I think the role staff play in creating a safe, positive, and welcoming space where students can feel validated and heard is incredibly important… It can make all the difference when students feel supported.”
Congratulations to UBC Electrical and Computer Engineering’s Student Services Manager Ross Sheppard, who has been awarded a President’s Staff Award for Enhancing the UBC Experience! These awards recognize the personal achievements and contributions that staff make to UBC.
At Electrical and Computer Engineering, Ross supports ECE students. He’s been instrumental in improving the ECE student experience, and in his time at the department has spearheaded the creation of onboarding resources and orientations for new students, initiatives to connect the ECE student body with industry, other departments, and other students, student newsletters, and wellness resources. He’s helped to build a stronger sense of community and connection among students in the department that he hopes can continue to grow, and if you’re a student in our department, you’ve probably seen him at least once!
We spoke to Ross to learn more about his time at ECE, his perspective on Student Services, and why supporting students in Engineering is so important.
Congratulations! How do you feel about this award?
I feel honored to receive this award! It means a lot to me, as I know our team in ECE has done a lot of work over the past few years to try to improve the student experience at ECE. We have lots more still to do, but to be recognized for this award this year has been wonderful and I’m very excited about it!
How did you get started at ECE? How did you get to where you are now?
I started at ECE at the reception desk many years ago! The part of my job I liked the most was helping students whenever they would come in, and through a few staff openings in the admissions team/graduate program, I entered into more of an advising role. I really enjoyed advising, and this led to an eventual management position. I’m happy to say I enjoy my current work with our student services team more than ever, as we’re taking an active role in supporting and enhancing the experience of our student cohort. The other ECE managers and student services team has played a huge role in supporting me over the years get to where I am now, as well.
What do you like most about working at ECE?
My favourite thing about working in ECE has to be the staff I work alongside of, as well as the many students we see start and finish their programs through the years. I’ve met a lot of very cool people during my time in ECE, doing some awesome work and research. I’ve gotten to learn about a variety of engineering topics through the student interactions I have — during advising, social events, onboarding meetings, etc!
It’s also very satisfying to assist students during milestones in their programs, from basic steps to more challenging moments, and helping them move through to eventually graduate.
What’s important to you about working with students?
Aside from the logistical and procedural parts of a university program that our team helps students with (which is indeed important), the most crucial part about working with students to me is being able to provide a safe and “human” attitude towards their experience, where they feel listened to, and understood and supported.
I remember being a student myself, struggling through a busy program, and dealing with the challenges of transitioning to the university experience. I think the role staff play in creating a safe, positive, and welcoming space where students can feel validated and heard is incredibly important for their time at UBC. It can make all the difference when students feel supported — especially with how challenging an engineering program can be.
What should a student do if they’re looking for support?
If a student is looking for support, I want to reinforce that they can always, always, always email help@ece.ubc.ca to get in touch with me or our student services team. While this email address may seem robotic, it actually does go right to myself and our staff, and we want to help as much as we can.
We also offer drop-in virtual advising multiple times each week, and I am always happy to meet for one-on-one advising as needed. Students don’t need to be worried about contacting us, as there are truly no questions too small for us to answer, and we are always there to help. In the rare case that we cannot help with certain questions, at the very least we will put a student in touch with the right campus resource that can help best.
Any tips for a new graduate or undergraduate student in ECE? What resources should they check out?
My biggest tip is, like I mentioned above, ask a question if you’re not sure about something! It’s always better to push through the initial discomfort of asking a question, rather than struggling with something for an extended period of time. Go for it if you’re not sure!
My other major tip is to take part in the social events at ECE, whether they’re casual breakfast socials with other students, workshops, student-led events, industry presentations, etc. There are so many ways to connect with people that can help in your program and beyond. You can find out about societies and clubs here or here, and can see what interesting events are coming up at Electrical and Computer Engineering here.
Your program at UBC is a great time to meet people and learn new things outside of your classes, and you never know what connections or information might lead you to an awesome and interesting place in your future or trigger an idea you haven’t thought about before. Take advantage of these opportunities when you can. It always helps to hear and learn about other people’s experiences!
ECE Faculty Perspectives – Meet Xiaoxiao Li
“In biomedicine, the consequences of failed or biased AI decision-making can be fatal, and there are many privacy risks in existing Al algorithms… These challenges are what really keep me up at night.”
Dr. Xiaoxiao Li arrived at the UBC Electrical and Computer Engineering Department this August, from her previous position as a postdoc at Princeton University. As a new faculty member in ECE, this year she’ll be teaching ELEC 400M in Term 2. Her research focuses on developing advanced AI algorithms and trustworthy AI systems, especially for healthcare applications.
We spoke to her to learn about her career path, her outlook on the uses of AI and the future of this field, and her perspective on teaching.
What has your career path looked like so far?
Before joining the Electrical and Computer Engineering department at UBC, I spent a year at the Computer Science Department at Princeton University. I received my Ph.D. from Yale University in 2020. I received my Bachelor’s degree from Zhejiang University, during which I spent three years in the beautiful city of Hangzhou and one year at Harvard University.
Tell me about your field of study. What is your area of expertise?
I am an Artificial Intelligence (AI) researcher. My current research lies in developing advanced deep learning algorithms/theories and applying them to solve real problems in the field of healthcare. Our group’s research covers computer vision, natural language processing, trustworthy AI (privacy, explainability, robustness, and fairness), federated learning, medical image analysis, and health informatics.
Why did you choose this field? What excites you about the research and work you do?
I’m interested in designing next-generation AI algorithms that are more interpretable, efficient, accurate, and robust in healthcare applications. Unfortunately, AI has not been widely used in actual clinical practice. The primary reason is that current AI algorithms fail to explain how and why the AI makes decisions. In biomedicine, the consequences of failed or biased decision-making can be fatal. There are also many privacy risks with existing Al algorithms. So, when you think about it, solving these issues is critical for biomedical applications under ethics and regulation requirements. Those challenges are what really keep me up at night.
What do you think is in store in the future for your field of study?
I think we will begin to see a broader spectrum of algorithms that are specialized for different clinical applications, and which will focus on accuracy and solving issues with trustworthiness, such as explainability, fairness, and privacy. These next-generation AI algorithms will address issues such as learning from heterogeneous data, unlabeled data, insufficient data, and data distributed in noisy, dynamic, or adversarial environments. For applications in the realm of healthcare, these next-generation AIs will help us to better understand diseases- for example, what biomarkers and environmental factors are causing cancer and other complex diseases. So, the near future of medicine will see a significant impact as well.
What courses will you be teaching in the upcoming year? How would you describe your teaching style?
I will be teaching ‘ELEC 400M: Machine Learning Fundamentals for Engineers’ in term 2. In this course, I’ll emphasize both a theoretical and practical understanding of the materials. I hope that students can gain knowledge no matter whether they want to go into the industry or into academia. I really care about the needs of each student, and the most important ability that I want to teach is the skill of ‘learning to learn.’
You’ve moved to Vancouver recently. What do you think of UBC and Vancouver so far? Any places you are looking forward to visiting?
I really enjoy working at UBC and living in Vancouver so far. I’m waiting for wintertime so I can go skiing.
What are your interests outside of work?
During my spare time, I like playing sports (basketball, tennis, badminton, golf, yoga, hiking, skating- you name it!) I’m also into cooking, calligraphy, photography, and reading science fiction. If I have a vacation, I’ll take the opportunity to travel with my family.
Learn more about Dr. Li.
Welcome Message from Sathish Gopalakrishnan
I am delighted to welcome you all to the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. For those of you who are setting foot on campus for the first time, I extend a special welcome. We have all been through a lot of challenges and we continue to live in uncertain climes. Nevertheless, what I hope you will all find in ECE at UBC is a lively and warm community that challenges you to new levels of achievement.
Our wonderfully talented faculty members will be your guides and your allies as you explore many different aspects of design, implementation, and deployment of systems and solutions. They — along with your peers — will be your principal resource. I am sure that they will open you up to new possibilities. My colleagues at UBC are among the world’s best scholars and are recognized for their expertise in their fields. They are known for their scholarship and contributions to the practice of engineering. Talk to them. Get to know them during office hours — they are eager to have you drop by — or after class. Find out about their research.
I do want to emphasize that you have chosen to attend a research university. What does that mean? At the heart of this university is the spirit of inquiry. Faculty members are hired to ask questions and to explore possible answers, in collaboration with others both at UBC and elsewhere. In collaboration with graduate students and undergraduates like you. We write articles and books, register patents, start companies, and teach courses: these are all the ways in which we take our new ideas to the rest of the world with the lofty aim of improving human life and the world we live in. You are entering this culture of inquiry.
You have reached this stage in your life by demonstrating that you are excellent at answering questions. Now I ask you to learn how to ask questions; questions that matter. To explore possible answers. And to ask more questions. The hardest skill to learn may be to control the impulse to seek out quick and easy answers. As part of your participation in the culture of inquiry, find out how you can undertake your own original project: answering a research question, or creating new systems and products, while working in a professor’s lab or with your peer students. Generating new ideas, new knowledge, is the fundamental mission of a research university. You will find your time here much more rewarding if you — even for a short time –immerse yourself in that mission. There are several research opportunities for undergraduates in ECE and at UBC more broadly.
I invite you to consider the important difference between training and education. The etymology of the word ‘training’ is from Latin for ‘pull’ or ‘drag’, and eventually came to mean, among other things, ‘a connected series of things’. The general implication is that ‘training’ has to do with the known. On the other hand, you will live 60 or more years after you leave UBC and much will change during that time. The word ‘education’ has its roots in the Latin word ‘educere’, which means ‘to lead out’ and suggests a preparation for the unknown. You may be thinking about your first job — and you will be supported in that endeavour – but we believe that it is much morevaluable to educate yourself broadly, foundationally, so that you areready for many years of thoughtful and compassionate engagement with the unexpected.
The entire ECE (and UBC) community is here to support and encourage you with a healthy dose of competition. Again I draw attention to the origin of the word ‘compete’, which relates to ‘aim or seek together’. We are all here to strive together.
Much of what I have said is rhetorical. Let me now offer pragmatism: we all have our strengths and areas for improvement. If you experience a sense of overload and anxiety, do reach out to our advising team early: a modified sequence of courses may be better for you.
Adrienne Rich, in a commencement address to students at Douglas College, in 1977, said: “…that you cannot afford to think of being here to receive an education: you will do much better to think of being here to claim one. One of the dictionary definitions of the verb “to claim” is: to take as the rightful owner; to assert in the face of possible contradiction. “To receive” is to come into possession of: to act as receptacle or container for; to accept as authoritative or true.”
I will combine Rich’s message with UBC’s motto ‘Tuum est’: ‘It is up to you.’ You are in charge of your education. I welcome you to ECE with the exhortation that you be an active and engaged student and not a passive recipient.
All the best to each of you!
— Sathish Gopalakrishnan
(ECE Undergraduate Advisor)
Alumni Perspectives: Al-Shahna Jamal, Microsoft
“This might all sound obvious, but the simple truth is that forming good habits and time management takes effort and practice.”
Al-Shahna Jamal completed her BAsc and MASc at UBC Electrical and Computer Engineering, graduating in 2016 and 2018 respectively. Today, she’s a software engineer at Microsoft, and living in Seattle. We caught up with her to learn about her direction since her graduation from ECE, and how her time in our department has impacted her career.
Career Path
I completed my BASc. in Computer Engineering at UBC in 2016. I chose the co-op option which was an excellent way for me to gain exposure to fields within the software industry, as well as take a break from courses and experience the real world! For one of my co-op placements, I chose to do a research internship at the System-on-a-Chip lab at UBC, supervised by Dr. Wilton. I already had some exposure to digital systems design and FPGAs through coursework and wanted to learn more. Long story short, my undergraduate research time at UBC convinced me to pursue a MASc. at UBC as well.
My master’s degree was an excellent experience. I got to write and publish papers and present my work at conferences. During these conferences, I met students, professors, and industry professionals from around the world. I was very interested in the Catapult group at Microsoft Research since they were pioneering the use of FPGAs in the cloud. I took advantage of the networking opportunities at these conferences to connect with folks at Microsoft Research and interview with them. Our group has since become a product team in Azure, where I still work within the realm of FPGAs, using them as important accelerators in our data centers and cloud applications.
Current Position at Microsoft
I have been a Software Engineer at Microsoft for three years now. My work includes interdisciplinary projects, which involve developing the full stack, from software to hardware. I work with both software and hardware engineers daily, and a big part of my job is understanding the customer’s requirements and delivering what they need.
Previous experiences
You’ve already read about my undergraduate research experience at UBC. As part of the co-op program, I worked as a Quality Assurance Analyst at Atimi Software, where I tested the mobile applications that were developed in-house for third-party customers. I then worked as a Software Developer at Ericsson, where I wrote router software for the Smart Services Router. My final internship was at Altera (now a part of Intel), where I wrote software for the compiler team, targeting their Stratix 10 device.
Each of these experiences exposed me to different fields within the software industry, from mobile applications to networking to FPGA compiler tools. For me personally, I noticed that I had a continued interest working at the intersection of software and hardware and I actively pursued more opportunities in this area. I now feel lucky to be working with very talented and interdisciplinary engineers in the Azure Hardware Architectures group at Microsoft. I would absolutely recommend students to take advantage of the co-op program at UBC Engineering; this is where your career and network start, not after you graduate.
Biggest Obstacle
My first two years of engineering school were quite challenging for me. I think it was a combination of the intense workload, a new environment from high school, and not knowing how to effectively manage my time. I started paying attention to the students who were performing well and noticed some good habits and patterns from them. They were typically active learners who asked questions in class, tried to solve problems early on their own, and then went to office hours to seek help proactively when needed. These students also dedicated time for extracurriculars that they enjoyed, whether that was sports and fitness, or clubs on campus. They understood earlier than me that taking breaks for activities you enjoy is very healthy. This might all sound obvious, but the simple truth is forming good habits and time management take effort and practice. My own good habits didn’t form overnight, it was a process. So, start early and practice often.
Impact of ECE
ECE has an incredible faculty. It is worth taking the time to read about your professors and the research they are doing outside the classroom. From developing techniques to improve robot-assisted surgeries to powering electric vehicles in a sustainable manner, they are solving problems that can impact our society for the better.
In addition to faculty, UBC ECE has several clubs if you want to expand your horizons. I personally participated in the Engineers Without Borders chapter and the IEEE Women’s club.
And finally, my classmates. The students in your cohort will become lifelong friends and an important part of your network. It is inspiring to see the career paths of my fellow ECE alumni and to keep learning from them.
Connect with Al-Shahna on Linkedin.
ECE Faculty Perspective- Meet Mohammad Shahrad
“One of the things I like about cloud computing research is how interdisciplinary it is. The complexity and scale of cloud systems, combined with a wide range of user demands, makes it an exciting research area.”