When it comes to electronic communications, HKUST is right up there with the best of them. This has been reaffirmed by the latest IEEE awards handed out to two of our professors, Prof Matthew McKay and Prof Bing Zeng, both from the Department of Electronic and Computer Engineering, the 2011 Stephen O Rice Prize in the Field of Communications Theory and the 2011 Circuits and Systems Society CSVT Transactions Best Paper respectively.

Prof McKay is being honored for his contributions to the innovative research on multiple-antenna wireless communication systems which enable very high rates of information to be sent across the world without additional power or bandwith. As such, it lays the foundation for the next generation of wireless communication technologies. This paper was published in the IEEE Transactions on Communications.

Prof Bing Zeng for his part co-authored the paper named "Directional Discrete Cosine Transforms—A New Framework for Image Coding"  published in the IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems for Video Technology. This is a revolutionary idea which maximizes the coding efficiency by using minimum digital image or video data, saving up to 30% cost with the same input under conventional format of data transfer.

Both prestigious annual awards are presented to the authors of the best papers published in the publications of IEEE, the world's largest professional association in advancing technological innovation and excellence. They are given to researchers who produced the most significant contributions in a given year. And this year, in time for our 20^th anniversary celebrations, we receive double the honors.