# Arogyaswami Paulraj

Arogyaswami J. Paulraj (born 14 April 1944) is an Indian-American electrical engineer, academic. He is a Professor Emeritus (Research) in the Department of Electrical Engineering at Stanford University.

## Early life

Paulraj was born in Pollachi near Coimbatore, British India in 1944, one of six children of Sinappan Arogyaswami and his wife Rose. He attended Montfort Boys' High School in Yercaud, Tamil Nadu. He joined the Indian Navy at age 16 through the National Defense Academy, Khadakvasla Pune and served the Indian Navy for 26 years. Paulraj received a B.E. in electrical engineering from the Naval College of Engineering, Lonavala, India, and a Ph.D. in electrical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, New Delhi, India.

## Career in India

Paulraj's contributions in India came whilst serving in the Indian Navy. In 1972, he developed new electronics for a British origin Sonar 170B. The technology was widely deployed in the Indian fleet. During 1977- 83, Paulraj led the development of a large surface ship sonar APSOH. This became the fleet sonar for the Indian Navy and its variants are still widely deployed. APSOH was a landmark achievement in Indian Electronics. Paulraj also served as the founding director for three major labs in India, Center for Artificial Intelligence and Robotics, Defense R&D Organization, the Central Research Laboratories, Bharat Electronics, and the Center for Development of Advanced Computing, Dept. of Electronics (as co-founder). These labs are now a part of India's vast R&D infrastructure. He retired prematurely from the Indian Navy in 1991 with a rank of Commodore

## Career in USA

Moving from India, Paulraj joined Stanford University as a Research Associate in 1991 and later appointed a Professor (Research) in 1993. His invention (1992) for exploiting multiple antennas at both ends of a wireless link (MIMO) lies at the heart of the current high speed WiFi and 4G and 5G mobile networks, and has revolutionized high-speed wireless services for billions of people. MIMO boosts data rate by creating parallel data streams, multiplying throughput by the number of antennas used. He ran a MIMO research program at Stanford for two decades before retiring in 2013. He founded three companies: Iospan Wireless for MIMO-OFDMA core technology (acquired by Intel), and Beceem Communications for 4G chips (acquired by Broadcom), have helped create a wireless technology eco-system now shipping billions of MIMO wireless devices annually. He founded Rasa Networks (acquired by Aruba /HPE) for WiFi network analytics.
Paulraj has two textbooks on MIMO, over 400 archival research publications and a co-inventor in 83 patents.

## Selected Awards and honors

* The Prince Philip Medal of the Royal Academy of Engineering, presented by HRH The Princess Royal in London on 11 June 2024.
* IET Faraday Medal 2024
* Inducted into the Wireless History Foundation Hall of Fame in 2022.
* Member American Academy of Arts and Sciences (AAAS) in 2020.
* Inducted into the US Patent Trademark Office National Inventors Hall of Fame in 2018.
* Foreign Member Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences
* Foreign Member Chinese Academy of Engineering (2016)
* The Padma Bhushan award by the Indian Government in 2010.
* IEEE Alexander Graham Bell Medal in 2011.
* Marconi Prize and Fellowship in 2014. I
* Foreign Fellow Indian Academy of Sciences
* Foreign Fellow Indian National Science Academy
* Fellow of the Indian National Academy of Engineering
* Overseas Fellow National Academy of Sciences, India.
* Member United States National Academy of Engineering, elected in 2006.
* Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
* Technical Achievement Award from the IEEE Signal Processing Society in 2003.
* Fellow of The World Academy for Sciences, elected in 2007.
* Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) since 1991.