Fund List

The Siddarth “Sid” Muthal Memorial ECE Undergraduate Student Entrepreneur of the Year Award Fund was established to honor Sid. Sid graduated from ECE ILLINOIS in May 2015 with his undergraduate degree in Electrical Engineering. He planned to start graduate school in the Fall of 2016 when his life was tragically cut short. An entrepreneur himself, the award is dedicated to the spirit with which Sid lived and illuminated every moment of his life and of those around him.

This fund honors the memory of Professor George Anner and his nearly three decades of service to ECE ILLINOIS.

Professor Joseph W. Lyding has been mentoring students and conducting brilliant research since being recruited to campus by John Bardeen. Lyding’s work focuses on applying carbon nanoelectronics for future semiconducting device applications. The Joseph W. Lyding Endowed Scholarship Fund benefits deserving undergraduate students who exemplify that same passion and commitment to advancing engineering.

Professor Emeritus George Swenson, Jr., was a pioneer in radio astronomy and RF sensing. He joined the faculty of Illinois in both the electrical and computer engineering and astronomy departments in 1956. He went on to serve as department head for each. Swenson and his colleagues developed North Alice I and II, two of the earliest radio beacon transmitters launched with NASA’s Discover satellites. He established the first ionospheric research lab in ECE, spearheaded the construction of the Vermilion River Radio Observatory, and chaired the design of the Very Large Array (VLA) in New Mexico. The Professor George W. Swenson, Jr., Memorial Scholarship Fund was established to honor his lasting legacy.

The ECE Department, with the help of Lolita Chuang, has established the Professor Shun-Lien Chuang Memorial Fund for Excellence in Graduate Education. This fund recognizes outstanding ECE graduate students each year who exemplify Professor Chuang’s work ethic and passion for people.

This scholarship honors Dr. Milton Feng, who with Nick Holonkyak Jr. invented the first transistor laser and demonstrated with oxide VCSELs the fastest U.S. transmission of error-free data over fiber-optic networks.

The Elsa and Floyd Dunn Endowed Fund has been established in the ECE Department at Illinois to honor the memory of Floyd and Elsa. 

The Peter W. Sauer Endowment Fund supports undergraduate and graduate students in honor of Professor Peter W. Sauer.

The George Gross Engineering Visionary Scholarship in Electrical and Computer Engineering fund will be established in honor of his 70th birthday and decades of scholarship and innovation. It will help attract and retain the best and brightest undergraduate students to ECE ILLINOIS. Gifts will initially support the ECE Engineering Visionary Scholarship (EVS) fund. When the Gross fund reaches endowment of $25,000, it will become a named scholarship, still supporting the EVS initiative.

Since 1987, Professor Wen-mei Hwu has been a pioneer in computer engineering teaching and research for ECE ILLINOIS.  Over the years, he has been a steadfast mentor, teacher, and positive influence on numerous students. The Wen-mei W. Hwu Endowed Fund will support outstanding computer engineering graduate students.