BIOGRAPHY

Dr. Zheng Yuanjin received his B.Eng. from Xi’an Jiaotong University, P. R. China in 1993, M. Eng. from Xi’an Jiaotong University, P. R. China in 1996, and Ph.D. from Nanyang Technological University, Singapore in 2001. From July 1996 to April 1998, he worked at the National Key Lab of Optical Communication Technology, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China. He joined the Institute of Microelectronics, A*SATAR on 2001 as a senior research engineer, and then promoted to a principle investigator and group leader for wideband RFIC design group. Here, he has leaded and developed various CMOS RF transceivers and baseband SoC for WLAN, WCDMA, Ultra-wideband, and low power medical radio etc. Since July, 2009, he joined Nanyang Technological University.  He has been working on electromagnetic and acoustics physics and devices, biomedical imaging especially photoacoustics / thermoacoustics imaging and 3D imaging, energy harvesting circuits and systems etc..

Dr. Zheng is an internationally well-recognized researcher on UWB and Radar transceiver IC. He has pioneered on Ultra-wideband transceiver (UWB) IC research, published world first paper of UWB pulse generator IC paper and second most cited paper of UWB transceiver IC. He has consistently published at ISSCC (the word top conference and land marker in the area of solid state circuits), keeping the record of the first and most ISSCC papers (7) published in Singapore. Dr. Zheng has published more than 280 journal and conference papers, 22 patents filed/granted and 5 book chapters. He served as session chairs and TPC chairs/members for several international conferences. He has successfully leaded and contributed numerous public funded research and industry projects. He was accredited excellent thesis award, Xi’an Jiaotong Univ., 2006, Ahmed Elsaify Memorial Award for Best Paper at IEEE International Conference on Body Sensor Networks, Singapore, 2010. He was finalist of best paper award IMS-S, and IEE TSS design competition merit award winner.

Dr. Zheng is active on the service for research community both internally and externally. He serves as Program Directors: VIRTUS IC Design of Excellence, NTU and VALENS Centre of Excellence for Bio-Instrumentation, Devices and Signal Processing, NTU. He is currently an associate editor of Journal of Circuits, Systems & Signal Processing, Journal of X-Acoustics: Sensing and Imaging, and IEEE Trans. on Biomedical Circuit and Systems. He has been organizing over 10 conferences as TPC and session chairs, and has delivered over 20 invited talks at international conferences. He is a senior member of IEEE and member of SID and SPIE.

RESEARCH INTERESTS

• Low Power Integrated Circuits and Devices
• Ultra-wideband and Radar
• Photoacoustics and Thermoacoustics
• 3D Imaging and Display
• Artificial Intelligence

RESEARCH AREAS

• Radio frequency integrated circuits for communications
• Biomedical imaging: Electromagnetic-Acoustics, Photoacoustics imaging, 3D microscopic/spectroscopic imaging and display
• Bio-sensor circuit and system: Low power wearable, implant, and therapy sensors
• SAW/BAW/MEMS oscillator, acoustic sensor, and transceiver design
• System-on-chip architecture and transceiver system
• Low voltage low power analog, mixed-signal and ADC/DAC integrated circuits design
• Radar System

KEY RESEARCH PROJECTS & GRANTS

1. DIRP: An Innovative Non-invasive and Continuous Personal Heat Strain Monitoring System by Photoacoustics Sensing (2014-2017): The Personal Heat Strain Monitor is a device that measures core temperature continuously and wirelessly during physical activities and at rest. This project is to develop a highly portable personal heat strain monitor which require the small sensor to be wearable/patchable and can provide accurate temperature measurement. The target device is to design a photoacoustic based sensor to meet the stringent requirements, including low power, ruggedized design, high accuracy and good penetration depth, which are not met by the current available sensors.
2. NRF – CRP: TOWARDS THE REALITY OF 3D IMAGING AND DISPLAY: Development of the world’s first viable glasses-free television: Continuous Parallax Displays (2014-2019): In the future the majority of display devices are likely to be 3D. We have colour vision and in the latter part of the twentieth century, displays changed from monochrome to colour. We have two eyes so it is highly likely that displays will change from monoscopic to 3D as there is a well-established user preference for this. This has been promised for many years, but viewers dislike wearing special glasses to view television. 3D television will not be widely adopted until it becomes glasses-free (autostereoscopic). Another objection to 3D, whether glasses type or autostereoscopic, is the effect on viewer comfort with a high proportion reporting adverse effects; headaches, nausea etc. These effects are generally avoidable; in the hardware by ensuring correct alignment and by reducing crosstalk (ghosting, where an image is partially seen that is not intended for that particular eye), and in the content, for example by ensuring that the images do not in general appear too far in front of, or behind the screen and also by avoiding excessive jumps in depth between successive scenes. Autostereoscopic displays are currently available but these all suffer from various limitations including; viewer discomfort, loss of resolution, restricted viewing region, limited depth of field, loss of brightness, and crosstalk. Currently there are a small number of possible approaches that have the potential to provide a commercially-viable contender for glasses-free 3D television and these will be investigated in parallel in this project.
3. DRTech: Low Power Radar System On Chip (2012-2015). In small airborne platforms with limited power, careful management of size, weight, power and cooling (SWaP-C) is critical for radar implementations. In a low-power radar system on chip (SOC) capable of pulsed de-chirp or FMCW operation, the incorporation of a waveform exciter capable of direct RF generation, receive LNA, filter, mixer and ADC directly on a chip significantly reduces the power requirements as opposed to integrating discrete components as well as reducing the size dramatically. The project is to development of a low-power radar system on chip capable of pulsed de-chirp or FMCW operation and MIMO IC-based transceiver system with coded chirp waveform generation.
4. NMRC: Non-invasive Transdermal Electrical and Magnetic Stimulators for Pain Management (2011-2014). The project aims at studying a novel non-invasive transdermalpulsed RF and magnetic stimulator capable of relieving pain. This stimulator is potential for helping patients treat themselves at their homes. Through the project, the effects of transdermal magnetic stimulation and transdermal electrical stimulation can be monitored, and a preferable dosage, frequency, duration and current strength can be suggested.
5. NMRC: Photo/Microwave Acoustic Imaging for Cancer Diagnosis (2011-2014). It is to develop a novel photo/microwave acoustic imaging modality and device which can offer both high contrast and high resolution imaging for non-invasive diagnosis. Potentially it can be employed as an alternative diagnostic tool for earlier cancer detection, with an underlying capability to characterize the benign and malignant tissues. The developed prototype will be applied for earlier stage breast cancer and other cancers detection.
6. DRTech: Design of Novel SAW Correlators and Processors for Advanced Radar Systems (2010-2013). A novel SAW correlator will be designed for wideband radar pulse compression and expansion. Simulation in both system level and device level will be conducted to verify the SAW processor performance feasibility study of a delay locked loop (DLL) for wideband radar beamforming. The SAW device will be fabricated and tested for advanced radar systems.
7. AcRF: Intelligent CMOS Cognitive Radio Transceiver for Medical Sensor Networks (2009-2013). The aim of the project is to research and explore the possible solution of cognitive radio. This work includes the system and circuit design of a cognitive radio. The target applications could be a low power sensor transceiver which co-exists with wireless transceivers which work mostly at 1.8 GHz-6GHz range. All the circuits will be implemented in a standard CMOS technology (e.g. 0.18µm) to verify the feasible of the proposed system. To meet the stringent requirement of switching and wide band operating among different wireless standards, several new techniques will be developed.
8. MEDTECH National Research Programme: Wireless Ingestible Capsule: High Resolution Optical Imaging and Real-Time High Rate Image Transmission (2008-2012). The objective of the project is to develop key components for a wireless ingestible capsule application. The components to be developed will include a high resolution Optical Imaging Module (OIM) and a high data rate low power CMOS RF Transceiver IC Chip (RFTRX). The developed components will be integrated with other modules such as data processing ASIC, Antenna, packaging etc. from partners to form a complete wireless ingestible capsule device, and functionally demonstrated in the laboratory environment. For the integrated circuit design part, we propose a new RF system architecture for thro-body communication. A CMOS low power transceiver IC chip will be designed according to the architecture. A complete Pill cameral will be integrated to demonstrate a real-time image/video transmission inside body.  Collaborator: NTU, I2R
9. National Thematic Strategy Research Program (TSRP) Embedded and Hybrid System (EHS) II: WBAN: Low power IC platform and baseband, (March 2006-march 2009). The project works on low voltage low power analog/mixed-signal, digital circuit and system design for wireless body area networks and wearable biomedical applications. The ultra-low power (few tens of µWs) IC blocks like chopper instrumentation amplifier, log-domain subtheshould AGC, delta sigma ADC etc. are designed. A low voltage low power digital ASIC chip including SPI and transceiver PHY algorithm is realized. The analog blocks and digital ASIC will be integrated into a bandband chip in 0.18-µm CMOS which will be further integrated with the RF transceiver chip (from partner) to build a complete low power radio chipset. Collaborator: NTU Circuit and System Division, NUS: ECE, ASTAR: I2R.
10. National Thematic Strategy Research Program (TSRP) Ultra Wideband and Sentient Computing:  Scalable and Wearable UWB-enabled Device: Reconfigurable RF Transceiver IC Platform for Communication and Localization, (May 2006-may 2009). The project works on low power transceiver circuit and system design for wireless personal area networks and wearable/potable biomedical applications. The building blocks such as LNA/mixer/PA/VGA/LPF/ADC etc. are designed and integrated in 0.18-µm CMOS. A complete transceiver chip including transmitter, receiver, and frequency synthesizer will be integrated and consumes power in few hundred µWs.  Collaborator: NTU: PWTC, NUS: ECE, ASTAR: I2R/IHPC.
11. HOME2015 National Research Programme:  Low Power UWB Transceiver for Low Rate to Mid Rate Wireless Personnel Area Networks, (April 2007-April 2009). The project works on low voltage (1V) low power (µWs) transceiver circuit and system design for wireless sensor networks. The building blocks such as LNA/detector/DLL/VGA/LPF/ADC etc. are designed and integrated in 0.13-µm CMOS technology. A complete transceiver chip including transmitter, receiver, and multi-tone frequency generator will be integrated and demonstrated. Collaborator: ASTAR: I2R/SIMTEC.
12. HOME2015 National Research Programme: CROP: Data Communication and Distribution System Within Smart Home Using Powerline With Cognitive Intelligence,  (April 2007-April 2009). The project works on analog front-end IC for next generation power-line communication system based on OFDM cognitive radio technique. Collaborator: ASTAR: I2R.  
13. Collaborated with NTU PWTC center working on three UWB projects founded by A*STAR Thematic Strategic Research Program (TSRP). Collaborated with NUS ECE Department working on UWB healthcare projects funded by A*STAR TSRP (2004-2005).