Accurate and Efficient Methods to Simulate Electromagnetic Systems
Simulation tools are often enablers of cutting-edge research in many fields of science and engineering. This also applies to the field of electromagnetics: Design and characterization of many electromagnetic systems and devices, which drive technological advances in areas such as communications, computing, biomedicine, and solar energy, would not be possible without simulation tools. Having said that, developing numerical methods for electromagnetic analysis of such complex systems is not a trivial task. Dimensions of these systems are large (longer than several wavelengths), their frequency of operation has a wide range, and their geometry has sub-wavelength features. When it comes to simulating these systems by solving the Maxwell equations (in differential or integral form), these characteristics translate into multiscale discretizations, large and often ill-conditioned matrix systems with millions of unknowns to be solved for, and long execution times. My research group at KAUST has been developing efficient, accurate, and robust electromagnetic solvers to address these challenges. In this talk, I will provide an overview of my group’s recent research activities. Technical part of my presentation will focus on two examples, where I talk about solvers we have developed to efficiently and accurately simulate photoconductive antennas (used in terahertz source generation) and plasmonic structures (with a wide range of applications from sensing to solar energy). I will provide results that demonstrate the benefits of these solvers over existing methods. I will conclude my talk with a brief description of my future research plans and a few slides about my research supervision, teaching activities, and international visibility of my research group.
Overview
Abstract
Simulation tools are often enablers of cutting-edge research in many fields of science and engineering. This also applies to the field of electromagnetics: Design and characterization of many electromagnetic systems and devices, which drive technological advances in areas such as communications, computing, biomedicine, and solar energy, would not be possible without simulation tools. Having said that, developing numerical methods for electromagnetic analysis of such complex systems is not a trivial task. Dimensions of these systems are large (longer than several wavelengths), their frequency of operation has a wide range, and their geometry has sub-wavelength features. When it comes to simulating these systems by solving the Maxwell equations (in differential or integral form), these characteristics translate into multiscale discretizations, large and often ill-conditioned matrix systems with millions of unknowns to be solved for, and long execution times.
My research group at KAUST has been developing efficient, accurate, and robust electromagnetic solvers to address these challenges. In this talk, I will provide an overview of my group’s recent research activities. Technical part of my presentation will focus on two examples, where I talk about solvers we have developed to efficiently and accurately simulate photoconductive antennas (used in terahertz source generation) and plasmonic structures (with a wide range of applications from sensing to solar energy). I will provide results that demonstrate the benefits of these solvers over existing methods.
I will conclude my talk with a brief description of my future research plans and a few slides about my research supervision, teaching activities, and international visibility of my research group.
Brief Biography
Hakan Bagci received the B.S. degree in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from the Bilkent University, Ankara, Turkey, in June 2001; and the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC), Urbana, IL, USA, in August 2003 and January 2007, respectively. From January 2007 to August 2009, he was a Research Fellow with the Radiation Laboratory, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA. In August 2009, he joined KAUST, where he is currently an Associate Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering. His research interests include various aspects of theoretical and applied computational electromagnetics with emphasis on formulating and implementing accurate, stable, and efficient time-domain integral and differential equation solvers to simulate electrically large, multi-scale, and highly-complex electromagnetic systems.
Dr. Bagci was the recipient of the 2004-2005 Interdisciplinary Graduate Fellowship from the Computational Science and Engineering Program, UIUC, Urbana, IL, USA. He received the International Union of Radio Scientists (URSI) Young Scientist Award presented at the XXIXth URSI General Assembly in August 2008. In the same year, he was one of the three finalists (with honorable mention) for the Richard B. Schulz Best Transactions Paper Award given by the IEEE Electromagnetic Compatibility Society. He authored (as student) or co-authored (as student and advisor) 18 finalist/honorable mention papers in the student paper competitions at the 2005, 2008, 2010, 2014-2018, and 2020 IEEE Antennas and Propagation Society (APS) International Symposiums and 2013, 2014, 2016-2019 Applied Computational Electromagnetics Society (ACES) Conferences. He was one of the recipients of the Gauss Center for Supercomputing (GSC) Award presented at the International Supercomputing Conference (ISC) High Performance in June 2020. In July 2021, he received the KAUST Distinguished Teaching Award.
Dr. Bagci is currently an Associate Editor for the IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation, IEEE Journal on Multiscale and Multiphysics Computational Techniques, and IEEE Antennas and Propagation Magazine. He was the vice-chair of the technical program committee for the IEEE APS International Symposium that was held in Atlanta, GA, USA, in July 2019. Dr. Bagci is a senior member of the IEEE and the URSI Commission B. In January 2021, he was elevated to ACES Fellow.
