Students must put together their plan of study in consultation with their advisor, based on their specific interests and needs in connection with their intended research area. Some guidelines and sample programs are given below that may help students in putting together their plan of study.

The guidelines listed below apply to full-time Ph.D. students entering the graduate program in a fall semester. They are organized into sample “tracks.” The list given below is not meant to be exhaustive. For each track, major and minor areas are suggested from the department’s five technical areas: Communications and Signal Processing (CSP), Computer Engineering (COMP), Controls (CONT), Electrophysics (ELEC) and Microelectronics (MICR). Note: 400-level courses may not be counted toward the Ph.D. course requirement.

Sample tracks list three courses per semester. This is a reasonable load for most full-time students, but some may find it heavy in their first semester of enrollment. Also, graduate teaching or research assistants may take fewer than three courses per semester (see full time status in the Regulations section of this Graduate Handbook.)

Sample Tracks:

Controls

Signal and Image Processing

Communications and Networking

Computer Engineering: Architecture

Computer Engineering: CAD/VLSI

Microelectronics: Circuits

Microelectronics: Devices

Micro Electro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS)

Lasers and Optics

Magnetics and Devices

Particle Beams and Microwaves