Omar Ramahi

Dr. Omar Ramahi is a Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Waterloo, leading the Advanced Concepts Research (ACR) Laboratory. He holds a PhD from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and has held academic positions at the University of Maryland and industry roles at Digital Equipment Corporation. His research focuses on electromagnetic phenomena, biomedical applications, renewable energy, and metamaterials, with over 500 publications and co-authorship of the textbook EMI/EMC Computational Modeling Handbook.

Education:

• PhD, Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Illinois (1990)
• MSc, Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Illinois (1986)
• BSc (Mathematics) & BSc (Electrical Engineering), Oregon State University (1984)

Research Interests:

• Radiating systems and antennas
• Biomedical imaging and sensing (e.g., breast cancer detection, bone fractures)
• Electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) and interference
• Metamaterials and metasurfaces
• Renewable energy harvesting and wireless power transfer
• Low-frequency electromagnetic tomography

Awards:

• IEEE Electromagnetic Compatibility Society Technical Achievement Award (2012)
• University of Waterloo Research Excellence Award (2022)
• IEEE Fellow (Elected)
• 2010 Excellence in Graduate Supervision Award

Advising & Labs:

• Directed over 30 PhD and MS students, many now faculty globally.
• ACR Lab develops wearable health sensors, radar-based medical imaging, and energy harvesting systems.
• Notable projects: Jewelry-based health monitors, microwave breast cancer detection, UAV classification via radar.