PhD Spotlight: Guillem Reus-Muns, PhD’23, Computer Engineering
Advised by Professor Kaushik Chowdhury, Guillem Reus-Muns joined Northeastern’s PhD program in computer engineering in the spring of 2018 after completing his bachelor’s degree in telecommunications systems engineering at the Polytechnic University of Catalonia.
Reus-Muns led a National Science Foundation (NSF) project on applied machine learning for wireless, and his work resulted in several foundational discoveries that will shape next-generation wireless standards. He has published in the most selective conferences and topmost journals on this topic, including IEEE Transactions on Mobile Computing, IEEE Transactions on Vehicular Networks, IEEE Transactions on Networking, and IEEE Sensors. To date, he has published a total of 14 peer-reviewed research papers and submitted two patents.
His doctoral thesis contains several contributions of significant impact. He demonstrated the first results on identifying drone types by designing deep-learning models that uniquely operate on input RF signals, revealing existing vulnerabilities of existing UAV systems and contributing to the creation safer airspaces in both civil and defense scenarios. He implemented models on emitter identification that operate at scale on the Platforms for Advanced Wireless Research (PAWR) experimental testbed in Salt Lake City, Utah, demonstrating the benefit of the $100 million investment made in PAWR by the NSF and an industry consortium. He designed a method that allowed commonplace 802.11 Wi-Fi signals to function as radar pings, an approach being actively incorporated into the 6G standard. His machine learning method for choosing the best channel model for cellular links in given geographical terrain is being incorporated by telecom operators for site-planning activities. Finally, he led research on open programmable radio access networks with industry collaborators including Qualcomm and NVIDIA, supporting translational research that has near-term deployment potential. Additionally, during his PhD he also interned at Mathworks, Nokia Bell Labs, and NVIDIA.
Following graduation, Reus-Muns took his passion for designing and developing new wireless technologies to Apple, which he joined as a wireless systems engineer.