Terahertz Imaging and Spectroscopy

Computational Electromagnetics Group at the University of Arkansas

Dr. Magda El-Shenawee is a Professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering at the University of Arkansas. Research interests include: Biomedical Engineering, breast cancer imaging (modeling, detection & treatment), microwave imaging algorithms, anti-personnel mine detection modeling and algorithms, rough surface scattering, subsurface sensing of buried objects, computational electromagnetics, RF & microwave circuits.

Dr. El-Shenawee is a Senior member IEEE since 2002. She received the B.S. and M.S. degrees in electrical engineering from Assiut University, Assiut, Egypt, and the Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 1991. In 1992, she worked as a Research Associate in the Center for Electro-Optics at the University of Nebraska where she focused on the problem of enhanced backscatter phenomena. In 1994, she worked as a Research Associate at the National Research Center, Cairo, Egypt, and in 1997, she worked as Visiting Scholar at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. In 1999, she joined the Multidisciplinary University Research Initiative (MURI) team at Northeastern University, Boston, MA. Dr. El-Shenawee is a member of Eta Kappa Nu electrical engineering honor society.

E-mail: magda@uark.edu


Current Students


Nagma Vohra: Ph.D. Student

Nagma Vohra received the B.S. degree in Electrical engineering from the Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar, Punjab, India in 2014 and the M.S. degree from Vellore Institute of Technology University, Tamil Nadu, India in 2017. She is currently pursuing the Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering at the University of Arkansas. Her research work focusses on biological and nonbiological material characterization at microwave, millimeter-wave, and terahertz frequencies in the Terahertz Imaging and Spectroscopy Lab at the University of Arkansas.

E-mail: nvohra@uark.edu

Igliana Castillo: M.S. Student

Igliana Castillo is a senior student in Electrical Engineering. Ms. Castillo has represented the University of Arkansas as a College of engineering recruiter and ambassador over 2017-2018. As a College of Engineering recruiter, Igliana has worked with faculty of the Electrical Engineering Department in order to facilitate and teach electrical engineering principles, theory and applications to high school and elementary school students. She is part of the Society of Hispanic professional Engineers. Her research interests include applied electromagnetics and Terahertz imaging biomedical applications as well as Antennas and applied electromagnetics.

E-mail: iocastil@uark.edu

Jose Santos: M.S. Student

Jose Santos is a Senior Undergraduate Electrical Engineering student at the University of Arkansas. He is member of the Tau Beta Pi Engineering Honor Society, which recognizes academic, professional, and personal integrity. He has worked as research assistant in CMOS Analog Integrated Circuit design, where he designed, simulated, and developed the layout of electronic circuits for particular applications. Now, he is currently conducting Honors Research under Dr. El-Shenawee and Dr. Mantooth co-advisory in the design and characterization of an antenna for a wireless sensor network. His research interests involves computational electromagnetics, antennas, signal processing, and signal integrity for communication systems.
E-mail: jisantos@uark.edu

Luis R. Rodriguez-Aguilar: B.S. Student

Luis Rodriguez is a senior student in Electrical Engineering student.  He is an Honors College Fellow and part of the Delta Phi Alpha German Honor Society.  He is taking part in the study abroad program with Technische Universität Darmstadt.  He was part of the IEEE Robotics team in 2018-2019, where he helped design, implement, and test a robot made to use image recognition to identify lettered blocks and place them in the correct spaces.  His interests include electromagnetics and antennas, embedded systems, and programming.  

E-mail: lr012@uark.edu


Former Students


Tyler Bowman: Ph.D. Student

Tyler Bowman received the B.S, M.S, and Ph.D degrees in electrical engineering from the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, AR, USA, in 2012, 2014, and 2018 respectively. His research focused on terahertz imaging and characterization of cancer tissue in the Terahertz Imaging and Spectroscopy Lab as part of the greater Computational Electromagnetics Lab. Mr. Bowman was a member of Eta Kappa Nu Electrical Engineering Honor Society and Tau Beta Pi Engineering Honor Society. He served as a National Science Foundation GK12 Fellow from 2012 to 2013. He was the recipient of NSF Graduate Research Fellowship in 2013.

E-mail: tcbowman@uark.edu

Clifford Kintner: M.S. Student

Clifford Kintner graduated in December 2017 as a master’s student under Professor Magda El-Shenawee. Mr. Kintner research focused on characterizing substances that support electrostatic fields. One of these substances is a “metamaterial,” or a material that is engineered to have unique properties not found in nature. This type of material is important because it can be used to improve the performance of antennas and to give them unique capabilities. Kintner’s research was part of a collaboration with the U.S. Army Research Lab in Adelphi, Maryland.

Nathan M. Burford: M.S. and Ph.D. Student

Nathan M. Burford obtained his Master of Science and Ph.D. degrees in Microelectronics-Photonics program under Professor Magda-El-Shenawee in May, 2013 and December 2017, respectively. Nathan’s MS research was on plasmonic nanostructures for enhancement of silicon solar cells and his PhD work was on the design, fabrication and measurements of terahertz photoconductive antennas. His research interests included terahertz antennas, terahertz imaging and spectroscopy, computational design for plasmonic optoelectronic devices, nanofabrication processes, and electromagnetic metamaterials. Nathan was awarded the Doctoral Academy Fellowship from the University of Arkansas, the National Science Foundation (NSF) GK-12 fellowship, and the NSF Innovation Corps. He is currently with the Wattglass Inc., Fayetteville.

Christopher C. Arnold: M.S. Student

Christopher C. Arnold joined Dr. El-Shenawee’s Terahertz lab on August 2013. Mr. Arnold obtained his M.S degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, AR, USA, in July 2015. Mr. Arnold worked his research on “Design, Fabrication, and Measurement of a Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) Antenna for Mobile Communication” under Professor Magda-El-Shenawee.

Abayomi Omotola Omolewu: M.S. Student

Abayomi Omotola Omolewu joined Dr. El-Shenawee’s Terahertz lab on August 2013. Mr. Omolewu obtained his M.S degree in Microelectronics-Photonics from the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, AR, USA, in July 2015. Mr. Omolewu worked his research on “Numerical Stimulation of Terahertz Wave Interaction with Breast Cancer Tumor Tissue Sections” under Professor Magda-El-Shenawee.

Alec Bryant Walter: B.S. Honors Student


Alec Bryant Walter obtained his bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering under Professor Magda-El-Shenawee in Decemeber 2016. His undergraduate research was on “Development of Breast Tissue Phantoms for Enhanced Terahertz Imaging Utilizing Microdiamond and Nano-Onion Particles”. Mr. Walter’s contributions to the Terahertz lab include the development of three types of phantoms: solid, tissue and fat. The refractive index and absorption coefficient characteristics of these phantoms were studied using time-domain terahertz spectroscopy performed on the pulsed Terahertz system at the University of Arkansas.

David Carballo: B.S. Honors Student

David Carballo obtained his bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering under Professor Magda-El-Shenawee in December 2016. Mr. Carballo worked his undergraduate honors tesis on “Time Domain Analysis of Terahertz Photoconductive Antennas Using High-Frequency Structures Simulator (HFSS)”. In his thesis, Mr. Carballo presents an in-depth guide and description on how to model and perform frequency and mainly time domain analysis of a THz photoconductive antenna using HFSS. The main purpose of his thesis was to master and document the procedures for transient domain analysis in HFSS in order to fill the lack of documentation about this topic. Currently, Mr. Carballo is working his Master of Science in Electrical Engineering at the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, USA.

Paul Rogers: B.S. Honors Student

Paul Rogers obtained his bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering under Professor Magda-El-Shenawee in May 2015. Mr. Rogers worked his undergraduate project on “Simulation of a Dissimilar Frenel Reflectarray Antenna”. Planar reflectarray antennas behave similarly to parabolic dish antennas, but are flat in their construction. They work by having areas on the planar surface of different reflection phase, causing the signal to be reflected to a focal point. On his work, Mr. Rogers specifically discusses a planar reflectarray antenna that was originally constructed in Millimeter Wave Circularly Polarized Fresnel Reflector for On-Board Radar on Rescue Helicopters by K. Mazouni.

Scarlett Marie Acklin: B.S. Honors Student

Scarlett Acklin obtained her bachelor of Science in Biological Sciences under Professor Magda-El-Shenawee in May 2015. In her thesis “Growth of Breast Tumors in Vitro to Characterize a Terahertz Imaging Platform” different methods were investigated to grow in-vitro breast cancer tumors embedded in gel using the 4T1 cell line. The contributions of her research include the test a new medical imaging modality available at the University of Arkansas using terahertz (THz) waves. Results were produced in two different environments, flat-bottomed plates and round-bottomed multiwell plates.

Huong Quynh Tran: B.S. Honors Student

Huong Quynh Tran obtained her bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering under Professor Shiu- Qing (Fisher) Yu and Professor Magda-El-Shenawee in May 2015. In her thesis “Resonant Spectra of Metal Nanotoroids of Various Sizes”, three samples of infinite arrays of gold nanotoroids with the sizes of inner radii: 50nm, 60nm and 100nm, respectively, while outer radius of 150nm were simulated as well. These gold nanotoroids were fabricated on glass substrate and then optically characterized by ellipsometry’s transmission measurement.In Dr. El-Shenawee’s Terahertz Imaging and Spectroscopy Computational Electromagnetics Group, the behaviors of plasmonic nanostructures were computationally investigated by using the commercial finite element electromagnetic solver Ansys® HFSS.

Ahmed Hassan: Ph.D. Student

Ahmed Hassan got his BS degree with highest honors from Cairo University in 2004. He got his M.Sc. degree in 2006 in the use of Digital Signal Processing (DSP) in solving the inverse scattering problem. Currently he is working towards his PhD in the field of computational electromagnetics and its applications in the detection of breast cancer. Ahmed Hassan received the Doctoral Academy Fellowship (DAF) from the University Of Arkansas in 2007.

E-mail: ahassan@uark.edu

Shannen Adcock: M.S. Student

Shannen Adcock is a recent graduate of the Electrical Engineering department at the University of Arkansas on full scholarship. She will begin work on her master’s degree in the fall. Her focus is on the terahertz spectrum.

E-mail: salexei@uark.edu

May Zeineldin: M.S. Student

May Zeineldin graduated with honors from the Computer Science department of the October 6 University in 2006. She is currently working on the use of DSP kits and FPGAs in order to speed up electromagnetic algorithms. She is co-advised by Dr. Scott Smith.

E-mail: mzeineld@uark.edu

Fadi Deek: M.S.

Fadi Deek received his B.S in Computer and Communications with honors from the American University Of Science &Technology, Beirut, Lebanon in 2005. He then worked for three years as an electronic engineer at Fidus Systems. In 2010 he received his M.S degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, Arkansas. His thesis research was in detecting cracks in buried pipes using complex-frequencies.
E-mail: eldeek_fadi@yahoo.com

Mohammad Reza Hajihashemi: Ph.D.

Mohammad Reza Hajihashemi was born in Isfahan, Iran in 1978. He received his B.Sc. and M.Sc. in electrical engineering from Isfahan University of Technology in 2001 and Shiraz University in 2004, respectively. He is currently working toward his Ph.D. degree at University of Arkansas, Fayetteville. His main research interests include inverse electromagnetics scattering, microwave, and antennas. He will be a postdoctoral fellow in University of Florida, Gainsville, in August 2010.
E-mail: mhajihas@uark.edu

Seth Shumate: M.S.

Seth Shumate hails from Conway, AR where he received his B.A. in Physics and Spanish Literature from Hendrix College. His research interests include simulating the growth of ductal carcinoma in-situ of the breast. Seth is currently a NSF GK-12 fellow teaching math and science activities to 6th graders at J.O. Kelly Middle School. In his spare time, he enjoys writing about himself in the third person, drawing, and playing the harmonica.
E-mail: sshumat@uark.edu

Douglas Woten: Ph.D.

Douglas Woten got his B.A. in physics and mathematics from Hendrix College in Conway, Arkansas. He finished his M.S. in MicroEP in May 2007 and is currently pursueing a PhD in the same program. His M.S. work focused on early breast cancer detection using artificial intelligence algorithms.
E-mail: dwoten@uark.edu

Stephen Crain: Undergraduate Honors

Stephen Crain received his B.S. in electrical engineering from the University of Arkansas in 2010. He received the Student Undergraduate Research Fellowship in 2009 and 2010 for his work on nano-antennas. Stephen also conducted his research at the University of Technology in Troyes in the summer of 2009. He will begin his PhD candidacy at Duke University in the fall of 2010. Stephen received the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship along with Duke’s Pratt/Gardner Fellowship and Chambers Fellowship.

E-mail: sgc8@duke.edu

Jordan Greenlee: Undergraduate Honors

Jordan Greenlee was born in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. He received a B.S. in electrical engineering and a B.S. in applied mathematics from the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville in 2009. He is currently working toward his Ph.D. degree at the Georgia Institute of Technology. His main research interests are in neuromorphic computing.

E-mail: greenle@uark.edu

Lauren Megee: Undergraduate Honors

Lauren Megee graduated from the University of Arkansas with her bachelor’s in Electrical Engineering in 2009. During her undergraduate career, she pursued honors research under Dr. El-Shenawee. She was awarded an IREE by the NSF in 2008 to join a collaborative effort in Troyes, France researching breast tumor detection with Dr. El-Shenawee. Lauren is now pursing her master’s degree in Mixed-signal integrated circuit design at the University of Arkansas.
E-mail: rmegee@uark.edu