Dr. Bassel Beidas Recognized by Peers through Distinguished IEEE Award
The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) announced recently that Dr. Bassel F. Beidas, scientist at Hughes, received the 2021 Satellite Communications Technical Recognition Award. Dr. Beidas was recognized for his significant and consistent contributions to the advancement of satellite communications technology, including more than 35 issued patents and numerous journal publications.
In 2021, Dr. Beidas celebrated his 20th year at Hughes, where he researches and designs advanced technologies to support both near- and long-term initiatives, relying on technical analysis from fundamental communications fields such as signal processing, synchronization, multi-access, Multiple Input/Multiple Output (MIMO) and interference cancellation.
“We are constantly thinking ahead, planning for the next generation of products and technologies,” he said. For much of his career, Dr. Beidas has focused on one of the most important aspects of satellite communications: transmission efficiency.
“Much of my effort has been on maximizing the efficient use of scarce satellite resources, including mass, bandwidth, power, and cost. Because the demand for SATCOM has intensified, making SATCOM efficient on many levels is essential to superior performance and being able to stay competitive,” he said.
One approach, Dr. Beidas explained, is for multiple carriers to share the same transponder amplifier for maximizing satellite mass efficiency. When an amplifier is operated close to its saturation point, there can be great advantages in terms of maximizing power efficiency. The downside: it can cause nonlinear distortion. To solve this complex problem, Dr. Beidas designed several algorithms to enable multiple carriers to share and operate an amplifier close to saturation, save power, and suppress the distortion that results from such an operation. Multiple issued patents and IEEE journal articles stemmed from this innovation.
“Research like this is applied and beneficial to Hughes as a company and to our goals; it’s targeted to our products. We generally look ahead in 5-year spans. Certainly, the last two years have shown how vital it is to be able to work and study from home during the pandemic. We want to provide seamless global coverage with high throughput to meet this relentless demand for connectivity that is ‘more, faster, and everywhere.’”
The IEEE Awards Committee applies a rigorous evaluation and selection process and reflects peer-recognition of industry innovators and visionaries and their distinct achievements. Dr. Beidas was nominated by Prof. Vanelli-Coralli from the University of Bologna, an important research center in Italy, and endorsed by five renowned scientists around the world, including Dr. Lin-Nan Lee, vice president of Advanced Development at Hughes.
Dr. Beidas received his M.S. degree (Hons.) in Electrical Engineering from the California Institute of Technology and his Ph.D. degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Southern California. He has authored the book chapter “Powerful Nonlinear Countermeasures for Multicarrier Satellites: Progression to 5G,” which appears in the textbook Satellite Communications in the 5G Era (IET, 2018). He was the winner of the prestigious IEEE Fred W. Ellersick MILCOM 2014 Award for the Best Paper in the Unclassified Technical Program and has received numerous awards from Hughes.