Saleem Kassam

Saleem A. Kassam is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Electrical and Systems Engineering at the University of Pennsylvania School of Engineering and Applied Science. He was appointed the Solomon and Sylvia Charp Professor of Electrical Engineering in 1993. Kassam received a B.S. with Distinction from Swarthmore College in 1972, and M.S.E., M.A., and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical Engineering from Princeton University in 1974 and 1975. His academic career at the University of Pennsylvania began in 1975 as Assistant Professor of Systems Engineering in the Moore School of Electrical Engineering. He advanced to Associate Professor of Systems Engineering in 1980, Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering in 1983, and Professor of Electrical Engineering in 1986, a position he holds to the present. From 1992 to 1994, he served as Chairman of the Department of Electrical Engineering. Additional appointments include Visiting Associate Professor at the University of British Columbia in 1983 and Visiting Fellow at Princeton University in 1992.

Kassam's research specializations include communication systems, wireless channels, blind signal separation, channel equalization, and high-resolution imaging arrays, with applications in wireless communications, data transmission over channels, image analysis, radar and sonar systems, and medical imaging such as ultrasound imaging and brain activity monitoring. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers for contributions to the theory and applications of signal detection and estimation. Other honors include election to Phi Beta Kappa and Sigma Xi. Key publications encompass the books Signal Detection in Non-Gaussian Noise (1988) and Nonparametric Detection: Theory and Application (co-editor with J.B. Thomas, 1980). Selected papers include "Robust Techniques for Signal Processing: A Survey" (Proceedings of the IEEE, with H.V. Poor, 1985, invited paper), "Distributed Signal Detection Part II: Advanced Topics" (Proceedings of the IEEE, with R. Blum and H.V. Poor, 1997, invited paper), "Optimum Quantization for Signal Detection" (IEEE Transactions on Communications, 1977), and "Finite State Markov Model for Rayleigh Fading Channels" (IEEE Transactions on Communications, with Q. Zhang, 1999). Kassam has contributed editorially as Associate Editor for Detection Theory in IEEE Transactions on Information Theory (1990-1993), elected Member of the Board of Governors of the IEEE Information Theory Society (1994-1997), and member of the Editorial Board of the Journal of the Franklin Institute. He was also a member of the International Advisory Board for the International Center for Nonlinear Signal and Image Processing in Tampere, Finland.