NIGERIA — Dr. Okechukwu Ugweje, professor of electrical engineering at the University of Mount Union, was recently invited as a keynote speaker in the 15^th International Conference on Electronics, Computer and Computation (ICECCO), which was held on December 10 – 12, 2019, hosted by Nile University located in Abuja, Nigeria. 

The conference was co-sponsored by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). The title of his keynote speech was “5G key Enabling Technologies: Millimeter Wave Bands and Fog Radio Access Networks.”

In his keynote address, Ugweje presented the key centric technologies of the upcoming fifth generation (5G) cellular networks. Among this is the new radio interface for enhanced mobile broadband technology, which includes the millimeter wave spectrum, suitable for wideband single-carrier transmission. The technology behind mmWave is anticipated to provide users with an increase in data rates of anywhere from 10-100 times as compared to the current rates in 4G networks. 

Ugweje also examined the proposed use of fog computing, which can overcome limitations associated with the current 4G infrastructure, by transferring the computational and storage resources, relaying and caching services to the edge of networks, as a candidate for radio access networks (F-RANs). 

During the conference, Ugweje also served as a program chair for the Wireless and Mobile Sensor Networks track. In addition, he presented a conference paper titled “Optimized Power Management Unit for IoT Applications.” This paper presented a novel optimized power management units (PMU) design for Internet-of-Things (IoT) applications, which can be used as a part of the energy harvesting system that can be composed of solar cells, wind turbine, thermal energy, and vibration. 

The design can be used as a feasible energy harvester, where notable power efficiency is achieved over traditional PMU designs under the same circumstances. The proposed optimized PMU was developed using a buck-boost DC-DC converter and was optimized using the particle swarm optimization techniques.

Ugweje’s presentations were well received and he received an award for his contribution to the success of the conference.

Learn more about Ugweje and the engineering programs offered at Mount Union by visiting the School of Engineering.