Rate My Professor Mathini Sellathurai

Professor Mathini Sellathurai is a Professor in the School of Engineering and Physical Sciences at Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, specializing in signal processing for wireless communications. She earned her PhD from McMaster University in 2001, for which she received the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) Doctoral Award for her dissertation on the Bell Laboratories Layered Space-Time architecture. Previously, she obtained a Licentiate degree in electrical engineering from the KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden, in 1997, and a Bachelor's degree in engineering from the University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka. Her career trajectory includes a visiting researcher position at Bell Laboratories, New Jersey, USA, in 2000, and Senior Research Scientist at the Canadian Government Communications Research Centre, Ottawa, from 2001 to 2004. She joined Heriot-Watt University in 2004, was promoted to full Professor in 2012, served as Head of the Department of Electrical, Electronic and Communications Engineering from 2015 to 2019, and as Dean of Science and Engineering from 2020 to 2024. She also held an Honorary Adjunct/Associate Professorship at McMaster University from 2009 to 2013.

Sellathurai's research interests encompass adaptive, cognitive, and statistical signal processing techniques for wireless communications, radar, cognitive radio, MIMO systems, network coding, satellite and underwater communications, parasitic antenna technology, and applications of machine learning to assistive care technologies, robotics, and hearing aids. She has published over 250 peer-reviewed papers in leading journals and conferences, including the paper 'Improved Linear Transmit Processing for Single-User and Multi-User MIMO Communications Systems' in IEEE Transactions on Signal Processing (2010), and two research monographs. Her research has attracted funding from EPSRC, DSTL, EU Framework 7 programs, and industry partners such as QinetiQ. Among her honors are Fellow of the IEEE (FIEEE), Fellow of the Asia-Pacific Artificial Intelligence Association (FAAIA), Fellow of the International Artificial Intelligence Industry Alliance (FAIIA), and Fellow of the Women's Engineering Society (FWS); the IEEE Communications Society Women in Engineering Mentorship Award (2022); Fred W. Ellersick Best Paper Award (2005); and Industry Canada Public Service Award (2005). She has served as Editor for IEEE Transactions on Signal Processing (2009-2018), member of the IEEE Signal Processing for Communications and Networking Technical Committee (2014-2019), and General Chair of IEEE Signal Processing Advances in Wireless Communications (2016).