In this enlightening episode,  Dr. Ilke  Ercan and Samantha discussed preparing students for the quantum computing era and the importance of education in engineering. Quantum computing is a multidisciplinary upcoming field that will need both expertise in Physics and Electrical Engineering. Ilke explained what the initiatives are to bridge the gap. One of the initiatives is developing educational games explaining concepts such as quantum logic gates. Ilke and Samantha then discussed which level of abstraction of quantum physics is relevant to the users and for which age groups it's targeted.  Furthermore, they talked about the separation between computer science and electrical engineering and how the same trend is going to happen for quantum computing. Finally, Ilke recommended to Samantha the book 'Happy Teachers Change the World'.

Dr. Ilke Ercan is the Electrical Engineering Principal Educator in the department of Microelectronics at TU Delft. She has a background in electrical and computer engineering, physics, and philosophy of science. She has founded and directed the quantum and nano computing systems research group at Bogazici University and is involved with starting initiatives that empower minorities such as the Foundations development program and recently, the IEEE women+ in engineering at TU Delft.

In this futuristic episode, Professor Manos Tentzeris and Samantha discussed what is needed to realize a smart city and how Prof. Tentzeris’ ATHENA research group is bringing it closer than ever before. Key technologies that are involved are low-cost and near-zero power additive manufactured sensors, inkjet printed antennas and energy harvesters, and machine learning. Then Tentzeris explained how 4D printing works and how it is becoming scalable with tile-by-tile structures. 4D printing is valuable for 5G networks, energy harvesting, smart cities, and smart agriculture. Furthermore, we discussed how to harness all the IoT data with machine learning, how to make the connection secure with hardware fingerprints, and removing the batteries by energy harvesting modules. Finally, Professor Tentzeris and Samantha talked about what the future will look like for augmented reality and soft robots and he gave interesting book recommendations.

Manos Tentzeris is Ken Byers Professor in flexible electronics in the school of electrical and computer engineering at Georgia Institute of Technology. He is the head of the ATHENA research group which develops novel technologies for electromagnetic, wireless, RF, mm-wave, and sub-THz applications by using inkjet-printed electronics, nano structures, and 3D printing to name a few.

This episode has been recorded at Technical University Eindhoven.
In this information-packed episode, Samantha and Professor Martijn Heck discussed photonic integration. Professor Heck started by explaining how integrated photonics developed out of photonics, his role in pioneering this technology, how it rose up in  California, and the role of Intel back then. Then we discussed the inner workings and fabrication of an integrated photonic circuit which relies heavily on solid-state physics. Furthermore, we discussed the link between photonics and quantum computing and why these fields should collaborate and discuss roadmaps together which is why the Hendrik Casimir Institute has been founded. Then we discussed the implications of exponential technologies, where the integrated circuit is a well-known example,  and what the exponential roadmap of integrated photonics looks like. Finally, Professor Heck discussed how integrated photonics needs people that are both knowledgeable in physics and electrical engineering end ended with a book recommendation called 'the singularity'.

Martijn Heck is an Electrical Engineering professor in the Photonics Integration group at Technical University Eindhoven and Scientific Director of the Eindhoven Hendrik Casimir Institute.  Additionally, he founded the Photonics Integrated Circuits group at Aarhus University in Denmark and is still a part-time group leader there.