The annual conference focuses on how social media and similar platforms amplify hate speech, extremism, exploitation, misinformation, and disinformation, as well as what measures are being taken to protect people.
With the popularity of social media and the rise of artificial intelligence, content can be more easily created and shared online by individuals and bots, says
Andre Oboler, the general chair of IEEE DPSH. The IEEE senior member is CEO of the Online Hate Prevention Institute, which is based in Sydney. Oboler cautions that a lot of content online is fabricated, so some people are making economic, political, social, and health care decisions based on inaccurate information.
“Addressing the creation, propagation, and engagement of harmful digital information is a complex problem. It requires broad collaboration among various stakeholders including technologists; lawmakers and policymakers; nonprofit organizations; private sectors; and end users.”
Misinformation (which is false) and disinformation (which is intentionally false) also can propagate hate speech, discrimination, violent extremism, and child sexual abuse, he says, and can create hostile online environments, damaging people’s confidence in information and endangering their lives.
To help prevent harm, he says, cutting-edge technical solutions and changes in public policy are needed. At the conference, academic researchers and leaders from industry, government, and not-for-profit organizations are gathering to discuss steps being taken to protect individuals online.
“Addressing the creation, propagation, and engagement of harmful digital information is a complex problem,” Oboler says. “It requires broad collaboration among various stakeholders including technologists; lawmakers and policymakers; nonprofit organizations; private sectors; and end users.
“There is an emerging need for these stakeholders and researchers from multiple disciplines to have a joint forum to understand the challenges, exchange ideas, and explore possible solutions.”
To register for in-person and online conference attendance, visit the event’s
website. Those who want to attend only the keynote panels can register for free access to the discussions. Attendees who register by 22 September and use the code 25off2we receive a 25 percent discount.
Check out highlights from the 2023 IEEE Conference on Digital Platforms and Societal Harms.
In today’s digital world, it’s easy for just about anyone to create a mobile app or write software, thanks to Java, JavaScript, Python, and other programming languages.
But that wasn’t always the case. Because the primary language of computers is binary code, early programmers used punch cards to instruct computers what tasks to complete. Each hole represented a single binary digit.
That changed in 1952 with the A-0 compiler, a series of specifications that automatically translates high-level languages such as English into machine-readable binary code.
IEEE Fellow’s innovation allowed programmers to write code faster and easier using English commands. For her, however, the most important outcome was the influence it had on the development of modern programming languages, making writing code more accessible to everyone, according to a Penn Engineering Today article.
The dedication of the A-0 compiler as an IEEE Milestone was held in Philadelphia on 7 May at the University of Pennsylvania. That’s where the Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corp. got its start.
“This milestone celebrates the first step of applying computers to automate the tedious portions of their own programming,” André DeHon, professor of electrical systems, engineering, and computer science, said at the dedication ceremony.
Eliminating the punch-card system
To program a computer, early technicians wrote out tasks in assembly language—a human-readable way to write machine code, which is made up of binary numbers. They then manually translated the assembly language into machine code and punched holes representing the binary digits into cards, according to a Mediumarticle on the method. The cards were fed into a machine that read the holes and input the data into the computer.
The punch-card system was laborious; it could take days to complete a task. The cards couldn’t be used with even a slight defect such as a bent corner. The method also had a high risk of human error.
The machine they designed was the first known large-scale electronic computer, the Universal Automatic, or UNIVAC I. Hopper was on its development team.
UNIVAC I used 6,103 vacuum tubes and took up a 33-square-meter room. The machine had a memory unit. Instead of punch cards, the computer used magnetic tape to input data. The tapes, which could hold audio, video, and written data, were up to 457 meters long. Unlike previous computers, the UNIVAC I had a keyboard so an operator could input commands, according to the Pennsylvania Center for the Book article.
“This milestone celebrates the first step of applying computers to automate the tedious portions of their own programming.” —André DeHon
Technicians still had to manually feed instructions into the computer, however, to run any new program.
That time-consuming process led to errors because “programmers are lousy copyists,” Hopper said in a speech for the Association for Computing Machinery. “It was amazing how many times a 4 would turn into a delta, which was our space symbol, or into an A. Even B’s turned into 13s.”
According to a Hidden Heroes article, Hopper had an idea for simplifying programming: Have the computer translate English to machine code.
She was inspired by computer scientist Betty Holberton’s sort/merge generator and Mauchly’s Short Code. Holberton is one of six women who programmed the ENIAC to calculate artillery trajectories in seconds, and she worked alongside Hopper on the UNIVAC I. Her sort/merge program, invented in 1951 for the UNIVAC I, handled the large data files stored on magnetic tapes. Hopper defined the sort/merge program as the first version of virtual memory because it made use of overlays automatically without being directed to by the programmer, according to a Stanford presentation about programming languages. The Short Code, which was developed in the 1940s, allowed technicians to write programs using brief sequences of English words corresponding directly to machine code instructions. It bridged the gap between human-readable code and machine-executable instructions.
“I think the first step to tell us that we could actually use a computer to write programs was the sort/merge generator,” Hopper said in the presentation. “And Short Code was the first step in moving toward something which gave a programmer the actual power to write a program in a language which bore no resemblance whatsoever to the original machine code.”
IEEE Fellow Grace Hopper inputting call numbers into the Universal Automatic (UNIVAC I), which allows the computer to find the correct instructions to complete. The A-0 compiler translates the English instructions into machine-readable binary code.Computer History Museum
Easier, faster, and more accurate programming
Hopper, who figured computers should speak human-like languages, rather than requiring humans to speak computer languages, began thinking about how to allow programmers to call up specific codes using English, according to an IT Professional profile.
But she needed a library of frequently used instructions for the computer to reference and a system to translate English to machine code. That way, the computer could understand what task to complete.
Such a library didn’t exist, so Hopper built her own. It included tapes that held frequently used instructions for tasks that she called subroutines. Each tape stored one subroutine, which was assigned a three-number call sign so that the UNIVAC I could locate the correct tape. The numbers represented sets of three memory addresses: one for the memory location of the subroutine, another for the memory location of the data, and the third for the output location, according to the Stanford presentation.
“All I had to do was to write down a set of call numbers, let the computer find them on the tape, and do the additions,” she said in a Centre for Computing History article. “This was the first compiler.”
The system was dubbed the A-0 compiler because code was written in one language, which was then “compiled” into a machine language.
What previously had taken a month of manual coding could now be done in five minutes, according to a Cockroach Labs article.
Hopper presented the A-0 to Eckert-Mauchly Computer executives. Instead of being excited, though, they said they didn’t believe a computer could write its own programs, according to the article.
“I had a running compiler, and nobody would touch it, because they carefully told me computers could only do arithmetic; they could not do programs,” Hopper said. “It was a selling job to get people to try it. I think with any new idea, because people are allergic to change, you have to get out and sell the idea.”
It took two years for the company’s leadership to accept the A-0.
In 1954, Hopper was promoted to director of automatic programming for the UNIVAC division. She went on to create the first compiler-based programming languages including Flow-Matic, the first English language data-processing compiler. It was used to program UNIVAC I and II machines.
Hopper also was involved in developing COBOL, one of the earliest standardized computer languages. It enabled computers to respond to words in addition to numbers, and it is still used in business, finance, and administrative systems. Hopper’s Flow-Matic formed the foundation of COBOL, whose first specifications were made available in 1959.
A plaque recognizing the A-0 is now displayed at the University of Pennsylvania. It reads:
During 1951–1952, Grace Hopper invented the A-0 Compiler, a series of specifications that functioned as a linker/loader. It was a pioneering achievement of automatic programming as well as a pioneering utility program for the management of subroutines. The A-0 Compiler influenced the development of arithmetic and business programming languages. This led to COBOL (Common Business-Oriented Language), becoming the dominant high-level language for business applications.
Administered by the IEEE History Center and supported by donors, the Milestone program recognizes outstanding technical developments worldwide.
About Grace Hopper
Hopper didn’t start as a computer programmer. She was a mathematician at heart, earning bachelor’s degrees in mathematics and physics in 1928 from Vassar College, in Poughkeepsie, N.Y. She then received master’s and doctoral degrees in mathematics and mathematical physics from Yale in 1930 and 1934, respectively.
She taught math at Vassar, but after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and the U.S. entry into World War II, Hopper joined the war effort. She took a leave of absence from Vassar to join the U.S. Naval Reserve (Women’s Reserve) in December 1943. She was assigned to the Bureau of Ships Computation Project at Harvard, where she worked for mathematician Howard Aiken. She was part of Aiken’s team that developed the Mark I, one of the earliest electromechanical computers. Hopper was the third person and the first woman to program the machine.
After the war ended, she became a research fellow at the Harvard Computation Laboratory. In 1946 she joined the Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corp., where she worked until her retirement in 1971. During 1959 she was an adjunct lecturer at Penn’s Moore School of Electrical Engineering.
Hopper remained a member of the Naval Reserve and, in 1967, was recalled to active duty. She led the effort to standardize programming languages for the military, according to the ETHW entry. She was eventually promoted to rear admiral. When she retired from the Navy at the age of 79 in 1989, she was the oldest serving officer in all the U.S. armed forces.
Among her many honors was the 1991 U.S. National Medal of Technology and Innovation “for her pioneering accomplishments in the development of computer programming languages that simplified computer technology and opened the door to a significantly larger universe of users.”
She received 40 honorary doctorates from universities, and the Navy named a warship in her honor.
IEEE Collabratec has made it easier for volunteers to display their IEEE positions. The online networking platform released a new benefit this year for its users: digital certificates for IEEE volunteering. They reflect contributions made to the organization, such as leading a committee or organizing an event.
Members can download the certificates and add them to their LinkedIn profile or résumé. Volunteers also can print their certificates to frame and display in their office.
Each individualized document includes the person’s name, the position they’ve held, and the years served. Every position held has its own certificate. The member’s list of roles is updated annually.
The feature is a result of a top recommendation to improve volunteer recognition made by delegates at the 2023 IEEE Sections Congress, according to Deepak Mathur. The senior member is vice president of IEEE Member and Geographic Activities. The new feature “respects the time and effort of our volunteers and is a testament to the power and versatility of the Collabratec platform,” Mathur said in an announcement.
Members can download their certificates by selecting the Certificates tab on their Collabratec page and scrolling to each of their positions.
In the two years since Arati Prabhakar was appointed director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, she has set the United States on a course toward regulating artificial intelligence. The IEEE Fellow advised the U.S. President Joe Biden in writing the executive order he issued to accomplish the goal just six months after she began her new role in 2022.
Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy
Member grade
Fellow
Alma maters
Texas Tech University; Caltech
Working in the public sector wasn’t initially on her radar. Not until she became a DARPA program manager in 1986, she says, did she really understand what she could accomplish as a government official.
“What I have come to love about [public service] is the opportunity to shape policies at a scale that is really unparalleled,” she says.
Prabhakar’s passion for tackling societal challenges by developing technology also led her to take leadership positions at companies including Raychem (now part of TE Connectivity), Interval Research Corp., and U.S. Venture Partners. In 2019 she helped found Actuate, a nonprofit in Palo Alto, Calif., that seeks to create technology to help address climate change, data privacy, health care access, and other pressing issues.
“I really treasure having seen science, technology, and innovation from all different perspectives,” she says. “But the part I have loved most is public service because of the impact and reach that it can have.”
Discovering her passion for electrical engineering
Prabhakar, who was born in India and raised in Texas, says she decided to pursue a STEM career because when she was growing up, her classmates said women weren’t supposed to work in science, technology, engineering or mathematics.
“Them saying that just made me want to pursue it more,” she says. Her parents, who had wanted her to become a doctor, supported her pursuit of engineering, she adds.
After earning a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering in 1979 from Texas Tech University, in Lubbock, she moved to California to continue her education at Caltech. She graduated with a master’s degree in EE in 1980, then earned a doctorate in applied physics in 1984. Her doctoral thesis focused on understanding deep-level defects and impurities in semiconductors that affect device performance.
After acquiring her Ph.D., she says, she wanted to make a bigger impact with her research than academia would allow, so she applied for a policy fellowship from the American Association for the Advancement of Science to work at the congressional Office of Technology Assessment. The office examines issues involving new or expanding technologies, assesses their impact, and studies whether new policies are warranted.
“We have huge aspirations for the future—such as mitigating climate change—that science and technology have to be part of achieving.”
“I wanted to share my research in semiconductor manufacturing processes with others,” Prabhakar says. “That’s what felt exciting and valuable to me.”
While there, she worked with people who were passionate about public service and government, but she didn’t feel the same, she says, until she joined DARPA. As program manager, Prabhakar established and led several projects including a microelectronics office that invests in developing new technologies in areas such as lithography, optoelectronics, infrared imaging, and neural networks.
In 1993 an opportunity arose that she couldn’t refuse, she says: President Bill Clinton nominated her to direct the National Institute of Standards and Technology. NIST develops technical guidelines and conducts research to create tools that improve citizens’ quality of life. At age 34, she became the first woman to lead the agency.
Believing in IEEE’s Mission
Like many IEEE members, Prabhakar says, she joined IEEE as a student member while attending Texas Tech University because the organization’s mission aligned with her belief that engineering is about creating value in the world.
She continues to renew her membership, she says, because IEEE emphasizes that technology should benefit humanity.
“It really comes back to this idea of the purpose of engineering and the role that it plays in the world,” she says.
After leading NIST through the first Clinton administration, she left for the private sector, including stints as CTO at appliance-component maker Raychem in Menlo Park, Calif., and president of private R&D lab Interval Research of Palo Alto, Calif. In all, she spent the next 14 years in the private sector, mostly as a partner at U.S. Venture Partners, in Menlo Park, where she invested in semiconductor and clean-tech startups.
In 2012 she returned to DARPA and became its first female director.
“When I received the call offering me the job, I stopped breathing,” Prabhakar says. “It was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to make a difference at an agency that I had loved earlier in my career. And it proved to be just as meaningful an experience as I had hoped.”
For the next five years she led the agency, focusing on developing better military systems and the next generation of artificial intelligence, as well as creating solutions in social science, synthetic biology, and neurotechnology.
Under her leadership, in 2014 DARPA established the Biological Technologies Office to oversee basic and applied research in areas including gene editing, neurosciences, and synthetic biology. The office launched the Pandemic Prevention Platform, which helped fund the development of the mRNA technology that is used in the Moderna and Pfizer coronavirus vaccines.
She left the agency in 2017 to move back to California with her family.
“When I left the organization, what was very much on my mind was that the United States has the most powerful innovation engine the world has ever seen,” Prabhakar says. “At the same time, what kept tugging at me was that we have huge aspirations for the future—such as mitigating climate change—that science and technology have to be part of achieving.”
That’s why, in 2019, she helped found Actuate. She served as the nonprofit’s chief executive until 2022, when she took on the role of OSTP director.
Although she didn’t choose her career path because it was her passion, she says, she came to realize that she loves the role that engineering, science, and technology play in the world because of their “power to change how the future unfolds.”
Leading AI regulation worldwide
When Biden asked if Prabhakar would take the OSTP job, she didn’t think twice, she says. “When do you need me to move in?” she says she told him.
“I was so excited to work for the president because he sees science and technology as a necessary part of creating a bright future for the country,” Prabhakar says.
A month after she took office, the generative AI program ChatGPT launched and became a hot topic.
“AI was already being used in different areas, but all of a sudden it became visible to everyone in a way that it really hadn’t been before,” she says.
Regulating AI became a priority for the Biden administration because of the technology’s breadth and power, she says, as well as the rapid pace at which it’s being developed.
“The executive order is possibly the most important accomplishment in relation to AI,” Prabhakar says. “It’s a tool that mobilizes the [U.S. government’s] executive branch and recognizes that such systems have safety and security risks, but [it] also enables immense opportunity. The order has put the branches of government on a very constructive path toward regulation.”
Meanwhile, the United States spearheaded a U.N. resolution to make regulating AI an international priority. The United Nations adopted the measure this past March. In addition to defining regulations, it seeks to use AI to advance progress on the U.N.’s sustainable development goals.
“There’s much more to be done,” Prabhakar says, “but I’m really happy to see what the president has been able to accomplish, and really proud that I got to help with that.”
The annual IEEE election process begins this month, so be sure to check your mailbox for your ballot. To help you choose the 2025 IEEE president-elect, The Institute is publishing the official biographies and position statements of the three candidates, as approved by the IEEE Board of Directors. The candidates are IEEE Fellows Mary Ellen Randall, John Verboncoeur, and S.K. Ramesh.
Randall founded Ascot Technologies in 2000 in Cary, N.C. Ascot develops enterprise applications using mobile data delivery technologies. She serves as the award-winning company’s CEO.
Before launching Ascot, she worked for IBM, where she held several technical and managerial positions in hardware and software development, digital video chips, and test design automation. She routinely managed international projects.
Randall has served as IEEE treasurer, director of IEEE Region 3, chair of IEEE Women in Engineering, and vice president of IEEE Member and Geographic Activities.
In 2016 she created the IEEE MOVE (Mobile Outreach VEhicle) program to assist with disaster relief efforts and for science, technology, engineering, and math educational purposes.
The IEEE-Eta Kappa Nu honor society member has received several honors including the 2020 IEEE Haraden Pratt Award, which recognizes outstanding volunteer service to IEEE.
She was named a top businesswoman in North Carolina’s Research Triangle Park area, and she made the 2003 Business Leader Impact 100 list.
Candidate Statement
Aristotle said, “the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.” Certainly, when looking at IEEE, this metaphysics phrase comes to my mind. In IEEE we have engineers and technical professionals developing, standardizing and utilizing technology from diverse perspectives. IEEE members around the world:
perform and share research, product development activities, and standard development
network and engage with each other and their communities
educate current and future technology professionals
measure performance and quality
formulate ethics choices
and many more – these are just a few examples!
We perform these actions across a wide spectrum of in-depth subjects. It is our diversity, yet oneness, that makes me confident we have a positive future ahead. How do we execute on Aristotle’s vision? First, we need to unite on mission goals which span our areas of interest. This way we can bring multiple disciplines and perspectives together to accomplish those big goals. Our strategy will guide our actions in this regard.
Second, we need to streamline our financing of new innovations and systematize the introduction of these programs.
Third, we need to execute and support our best ideas on a continuing basis.
As President, I pledge to:
Institute innovative products and services to ensure our mutually successful future;
Engage stakeholders (members, partners and communities) to unite on a comprehensive vision;
Expand technology advancement and adoption throughout the world;
Execute with excellence, ethics, and financial responsibility.
Finally, I promise to lead by example with enthusiasm and integrity and I humbly ask for your vote.
IEEE Fellow John Verboncoeur
Steven Miller
Nominated by the IEEE Board of Directors
Verboncoeur is senior associate dean for research and graduate studies in Michigan State University’s (MSU) engineering college, in East Lansing.
In 2001 he founded the computational engineering science program at the University of California, Berkeley, chairing it until 2010.
In 2015 he cofounded the MSU computational mathematics, science, and engineering department.
His area of interest is plasma physics, with over 500 publications and over 6,800 citations.
He is on the boards of Physics of Plasmas, the American Center for Mobility, and the U.S. Department of Energy Fusion Energy Science Advisory Committee.
Verboncoeur has led startups developing digital exercise and health systems and the consumer credit report. He also had a role in developing the U.S. Postal Service’s mail-forwarding system.
His IEEE experience includes serving as 2023 vice president of Technical Activities, 2020 acting vice president of Publication Services and Products Board, 2019-2020 Division IV director, and 2015—2016 president of the Nuclear and Plasma Sciences Society.
He received a Ph.D. in 1992 in nuclear engineering from UC Berkeley.
Candidate Statement
Ensure IEEE remains THE premier professional technical organization, deliver value via new participants, products and programs, including events, publications, and innovative personalized products and services, to enable our community to change the world. Key strategic programs include:
Climate Change Technologies(CCT): Existential to humanity, addressing mitigation and adaptation must include technology R&D, local relevance for practitioners, university and K-12 students, the general public, media and policymakers and local and global standards.
Smart Agrofood Systems(SmartAg): Smart technologies applied to the food supply chain from soil to consumer to compost.
Artificial Intelligence(AI): Implications from technology to business to ethics. A key methodology for providing personalized IEEE products and services within our existing portfolio, and engaging new audiences such as technology decision makers in academia, government and technology finance by extracting value from our vast data to identify emerging trends.
Organizational growth opportunities include scaling and coordinating our public policy strategy worldwide, building on our credibility to inform and educate. Global communications capability is critical to coordinate and amplify our impact. Lastly, we need to enhance our ability to execute IEEE-wide programs and initiatives, from investment in transformative tools and products to mission-based education, outreach and engagement. This can be accomplished by judicious use of resources generated by business activities through creation of a strategic program to invest in our future with the goal of advancing technology for humanity.
With a passion for the nexus of technology with finance and public policy, I hope to earn your support.
IEEE Fellow S.K. Ramesh
S.K. Ramesh
Nominated by the IEEE Board of Directors
Ramesh is a professor of electrical and computer engineering at California State University Northridge’s college of engineering and computer science, where he served as dean from 2006 to 2017.
An IEEE volunteer for 42 years, he has served on the IEEE Board of Directors, the Publication Services and Products Board, Awards Board, and the Fellows Committee. Leadership positions he has held include vice president of IEEE Educational Activities, president of the IEEE-Eta Kappa Nu honor society, and chair of the IEEE Hearing Board.
As the 2016–2017 vice president of IEEE Educational Activities, he championed several successful programs including the IEEE Learning Network and the IEEE TryEngineering Summer Institute.
Ramesh served as the 2022–2023 president of ABET, the global accrediting organization for academic programs in applied science, computing, engineering, and technology.
He received his bachelor’s degree in electronics and communication engineering from the University of Madras in India. He earned his master’s degree in EE and Ph.D. in molecular science from Southern Illinois University, in Carbondale.
Candidate Statement
We live in an era of rapid technological development where change is constant. My leadership experiences of four decades across IEEE and ABET have taught me some timeless values in this rapidly changing world: To be Inclusive, Collaborative, Accountable, Resilient and Ethical. Connection and community make a difference. IEEE’s mission is especially important, as the pace of change accelerates with advances in AI, Robotics and Biotechnology. I offer leadership that inspires others to believe and enable that belief to become reality. “I CARE”!
My top priority is to serve our members and empower our technical communities worldwide to create and advance technologies to solve our greatest challenges.
If elected, I will focus on three strategic areas:
Member Engagement:
Broaden participation of Students, Young Professionals (YPs), and Women in Engineering (WIE).
Expand access to affordable continuing education programs through the IEEE Learning Network (ILN).
Volunteer Engagement:
Nurture and support IEEE’s volunteer leaders to transform IEEE globally through a volunteer academy program that strengthens collaboration, inclusion, and recognition.
Incentivize volunteers to improve cross-regional collaboration, engagement and communications between Chapters and Sections.
Industry Engagement:
Transform hybrid/virtual conferences, and open access publications, to make them more relevant to engineers and technologists in industry.
Focus on innovation, standards, and sustainable development that address skills needed for jobs of the future.
Our members are the “heart and soul” of IEEE. Let’s work together as one IEEE to attract, retain, and serve our diverse global members. Thank you for your participation and support.
Being diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder as a child hasn’t hindered computer engineer Roberto Moreno from reaching his goals. ASD, a neurodevelopmental disorder, impacts how a person behaves, learns, perceives the world, and socializes with others. Moreno, an IEEE member, is a technical leader for AgenciaSur, a Chilean company that develops tools to help businesses digitize their operations. He manages six employees at the Santiago location.
Although Moreno didn’t have a mentor, he says, many people throughout his life assisted him, whether it was with schoolwork or navigating social situations. They also helped him with the mental health issues the struggles prompted.
“The people who made an impact on me,” he says, “helped me fight for the vision I had for my life so as to not fall into the depths of depression and anxiety.”
Roberto Moreno
Employer
AgenciaSur, in Santiago, Chile
Title
Technical leader
Member grade
Member
Alma mater
Universidad Andrés Bello in Santiago
He says that’s why he wants to build a support system for neurodivergent engineers and students, especially those living in South America. The term neurodivergent is used to describe people whose brains process information atypically, including those with ASD, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, and dyslexia. There is a stigma surrounding such conditions in many countries, Moreno says, leading to discrimination at school, work, and professional organizations.
Moreno helps engineering students and young professionals learn how to overcome challenges so they don’t leave the profession. He participates in mentorship programs including the one on IEEE Collabratec, sharing his experiences and helping his mentees navigate challenging situations.
Facing his biggest challenges
Moreno’s success didn’t come easily. Growing up, he faced quite a few challenges including learning how to read, write, and speak English. Moreno is extremely literal and finds it hard to understand sarcasm, as is common among people with ASD.
That made learning a new language more challenging.
In Spanish, he notes, “the graphemes and phonemes differ greatly from Germanic ones.” Graphemes are individual letters or groups of letters that represent speech sounds. Phonemes are the speech sounds that make up words. The difference in graphemes and phonemes makes it difficult to quickly make the connection between words and their meaning in Germanic languages, Moreno says.
He also struggles with the “go with the flow”attitude. He prefers to follow the rules and social norms at all times.
“This caused people to treat me differently,” he says.
When Moreno didn’t know or recognize what was causing his discomfort, it would drain him emotionally, he says. But if he never tried to understand the causes, he says, he wouldn’t have achieved his goals.
“Experiencing things that are out of my comfort zone has led to a lot of personal growth,” he says. “For example, if I had been influenced by people who discriminated against me, I would not feel comfortable being interviewed by The Institute.”
Tips for staying organized and mentally healthy
Having difficulty with being organized is common in people with autism, Moreno says.
Students especially find it difficult to manage their time. Moreno suggests they use programs such as Kanban and Pomofocus to create to-do lists and track the status of their homework and other projects.
Making time for oneself—to play a video game, say, or exercise—is necessary, he says. It’s especially important for students who are easily overwhelmed by their environment, such as bright lights in a classroom, a room that’s too hot or cold, or a place with many loud noises. Setting aside time for hobbies also can help prevent meltdowns, which are common for people with ASD when their nervous system is overloaded.
Recognizing employees’ needs
It’s important for employers to understand that some neurodivergent employees can become intensely focused on activities, causing them to lose track of time and their surroundings, Moreno says. He suggests that managers split large projects into multiple tasks. So-called atomic tasks can make an assignment more manageable and less overwhelming. The method also allows employees to better manage their time.
Managers should also accommodate their employees’ needs, Moreno says.
“For example, one of my team members was having personal difficulties, and because of this he often completed his tasks late at night,” he says. “When assigning him a project, I needed to take this into consideration and estimate how long it would take him to complete it so as to not cause him more stress.”
How IEEE can support neurodivergent members
Being part of IEEE’s technical communities has been invaluable to Moreno’s professional success, he says. As an IEEE Computer Society member, he learned how to be more positive, see the humor in difficult situations, and not be as emotionally affected.
“I have learned a lot from more experienced technical professionals,” he says, “and I continue to grow as an engineer.”
There are ways IEEE can better support neurodivergent members, he says, including creating programs in collaboration with neurodivergent people. For example, he says, IEEE Women in Engineering could expand its Student-Teacher and Research Engineer/Scientist (STAR) program, which connects preuniversity girls with an engineer or scientist to encourage them to pursue a STEM career. The initiative, he says, could add a category specifically for neurodivergent students, enabling them to be mentored by a neurodivergent engineer or scientist.
Moreno suggests that IEEE streamline its proposal process for new projects, including keeping a record of what proposals were accepted or rejected and why. The feedback would help IEEE volunteers replicate successful proposals when writing their own, he says.
IEEE also could update the wording of its bylaws to prevent arbitrary interpretations. Neurodivergent people are likely to miss linguistic subtleties, sarcasm, and irony, he notes. They need regulations to be clear and direct so they can better comply with the rules and use the appropriate terms with other members. The wording in the IEEE Code of Ethics, he says, is a good example of a document that avoids arbitrary discriminatory language.
The benefits of an IEEE membership
The most important member benefit is the networking opportunities, Moreno says. “Without IEEE I would not have been able to meet and work with talented engineers and members such as Tania Quiel, Fernando Boucher, Nita Patel, and others,” he says.
Lynn Conway, codeveloper of very-large-scale integration, died on 9 June at the age of 86. The VLSI process, which creates integrated circuits by combining thousands of transistors into a single chip, revolutionized microchip design.
Conway, an IEEE Fellow, was transfeminine and was a transgender-rights activist who played a key role in updating the IEEE Code of Conduct to prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation, gender identity, and gender expression.
She shared her experiences on a blog to help others considering or beginning to transition their gender identity. She also mentored many trans people through their transitioning.
“Lynn Conway’s example of engineering impact and personal courage has been a great source of inspiration for me and countless others,” Michael Wellman, a professor of computer science and engineering at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, told the Michigan Engineering News website. Conway was a professor emerita at the university.
The profile of Conway below is based on an interview The Institute conducted with her in December.
Some engineers dream their pioneering technologies will one day earn them a spot in history books. But what happens when your contributions are overlooked because of your gender identity?
If you’re like Lynn Conway—who faced that dilemma—you fight back.
Conway helped develop very-large-scale integration: the process of creating integrated circuits by combining thousands of transistors into a single chip. VLSI chips are at the core of electronic devices used today. The technology provides processing power, memory, and other functionalities to smartphones, laptops, smartwatches, televisions, and household appliances.
She and her research partner Carver Mead developed VLSI in the 1970s while she was working at Xerox’s Palo Alto Research Center, in California. Mead was an engineering professor at CalTech at the time. For years, Conway’s role was overlooked partly because she was a woman, she asserts, and partly because she was transfeminine.
Since coming out publicly in 1999, Conway has been fighting for her contributions to be recognized, and she’s succeeding. Over the years, the IEEE Fellow has been honored by a variety of organizations, most recently the National Inventors Hall of Fame, which inducted her last year almost 15 years after it recognized Mead.
From budding physicist to electrical engineer
Conway initially was interested in studying physics because of the role it played in World War II.
“After the war ended, physicists became famous for blowing up the world in order to save it,” she says. “I was naive and saw physics as the source of all wisdom. I went off to MIT, not fully understanding the subject I chose to major in.”
She took many electrical engineering courses because, she says, they allowed her to be creative. It was through those classes that she found her calling.
She left MIT in 1957, then earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in electrical engineering from Columbia in 1962 and 1963. While at Columbia, she conducted an independent study under the guidance of Herb Schorr, an adjunct professor and a researcher at IBM Research in Yorktown Heights, N.Y. The study involved installing a list-processing language on the IBM 1620 computer, “which was the most arcane machine to attempt to do that on,” she says laughing. “It was a cool language that Maurice Wilkes from Cambridge had developed to experiment with self-compiling compilers.”
She must have made quite an impression on Schorr, she says, because after she earned her master’s degree, he recruited her to join him at the research center. While working on the advanced computing systems project there, she invented multiple-out-of-order dynamic instruction scheduling, a technique that allows a CPU to reorder instructions based on their availability and readiness instead of following the program order strictly.
That work led to the creation of the superscalar CPU, which manages multiple instruction pipelines to execute several instructions concurrently.
The company eventually transferred her to its offices in California’s Bay Area.
Although her career was thriving, Conway was struggling with gender dysphoria, the distress people experience when their gender identity differs from their sex assigned at birth. In 1967 she moved forward with gender-affirming care “to resolve the terrible existential situation I had faced since childhood,” she says.
She notified IBM of her intention to transition, with the hope the company would allow her to do so quietly. Instead, IBM fired her, convinced that her transition would cause “extreme emotional distress in fellow employees,” she says. (In 2020 the company issued an apology for terminating her.)
After completing her transition, at the end of 1968 Conway began her career anew as a contract programmer. By 1971 she was working as a computer architect at Memorex in Silicon Valley. She joined the company in what she calls “stealth mode.” No one other than close family members and friends knew she was transfeminine. Conway was afraid of discrimination and losing her job again, she says. Because of her decision to keep her transition a secret, she says, she could not claim credit for the techniques she had invented at IBM Research because they were credited to the name she had been assigned at birth, her “dead name.”
She was recruited in 1975 to join Xerox PARC as a research fellow and manager of its VLSI system design group.
It was there that she made history.
Conway was recruited in 1975 to join Xerox PARC as a research fellow.Lynn Conway
Starting the Mead and Conway Revolution
Concerned with how Moore’s Law would affect the performance of microelectronics, the Advanced Research Project Agency (now known as the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) created a coalition of companies and research universities, including PARC and CalTech, to improve microchip design. After Conway joined PARC’s VLSI system design group, she worked closely with Carver Mead on chip design. Mead, now an IEEE Life Fellow, is credited with coining the term Moore’s Law.
Making chips at the time involved manually designing transistors and connecting them with circuits. The process was time-consuming and error-prone.
“A whole bunch of different pieces of design were being done at different abstraction levels, including the basic architecture, the logic design, the circuit design, and the layout design—all by different people,” Conway said in a 2023 IEEE Annals of the History of Computing interview. “And the various people in the different layers passed the design down in kind of a paternalistic top-down system. The people at any one layer may have no clue what the people at the other levels in that system are doing or what they know.”
Conway and Mead decided the best way to address that communication problem was to use CAD tools to automate the process.
The two also introduced the structured-design method of creating chips. It emphasized high-level abstraction and modular design techniques such as logic gates and modules—which made the process more efficient and scalable.
Conway also created a simplified set of rules for chip design that enabled the integrated circuits to be numerically encoded, scaled, and reused as Moore’s Law advanced.
The method was so radical, she says, that it needed help catching on. Conway and Mead wrote Introduction to VLSI Systems to take the new concepts straight to the next generation of engineers and programmers. The textbook included the basics of structured designs and how to validate and verify them. Before its publication in 1980, Conway tested how well it explained the method by teaching the first VLSI course in 1978 at MIT.
The textbook was successful, becoming the foundational resource for teaching the technology. By 1983 it was being used by nearly 120 universities.
Conway and Mead’s work resulted in what is known as the Mead and Conway Revolution, enabling faster, smaller, and more powerful devices to be developed.
Throughout the 1980s, Conway and Mead were known as the dynamic duo that created VLSI. They received multiple joint awards including the Electronics magazine 1981 Award for Achievement, the University of Pennsylvania’s 1984 Pender Award, and the Franklin Institute’s 1985 Wetherill Medal.
Conway left Xerox PARC in 1983 to join DARPA as assistant director for strategic computing. She led planning of the strategic computing initiative, an effort to expand the technology base for intelligent-weapons systems.
Two years later she began her academic career at the University of Michigan as a professor of electrical engineering and computer science. She was the university’s associate dean of engineering and taught there until 1998, when she retired.
Becoming an activist
In 1999 Conway decided to come out as a transfeminine engineer, knowing that not only would her previous work be credited to her again, she says, but also that she could be a source of strength and inspiration for others like her.
After publicly coming out, she spoke openly about her experience and lobbied to be credited for her work.
Some organizations, including IEEE, began to recognize Conway. The IEEE Computer Society awarded her its 2009 Computer Pioneer Award. She received the 2015 IEEE/RSE Maxwell Medal, which honors contributions that had an exceptional impact on the development of electronics and electrical engineering.
The panelists were asked about what or who inspired them to pursue a career in engineering, as well as their thoughts on continuing education and diversity, equity, and inclusion.
Most said they were inspired to become engineers by a parent. Goldsmith, the recipient of this year’sIEEE James H. Mulligan Jr. Education Medal, credits her father. He was a mechanical engineering professor at UC Berkeley and suggested she consider majoring in engineering because she excelled in math and science in high school.
“When I was young, I didn’t really understand what being an engineer meant,” Goldsmith said at the panel. Because her parents were divorced and she didn’t see her father often, she thought he drove trains. It wasn’t until she was at UC Berkeley, she said, that she realized how technology could change people’s lives for the better. That’s what pushed her to follow in her father’s footsteps.
When asked what keeps them motivated to stay in the engineering field, King Liu said that it’s IEEE’s mission of developing technology for the benefit of humanity. She is this year’s IEEE Founders Medal recipient.
“Diversity is about excellence. The biggest battle is convincing people who don’t believe that diversity has a positive impact on teams and companies.” —Andrea Goldsmith
“Engineering work is done for people and by people,” she said. “I draw inspiration from not only the people we serve, but also the people behind the technology.” The panelists also spoke about the importance of continuing education. “Learning is a lifelong process,” King Liu said. “Engineers need to seek out learning opportunities, whether it’s from having a design fail or from more experienced engineers in their field of interest.”
Diversity, equity, and inclusion was a hot discussion topic. “Diversity is about excellence,” Goldsmith said. “The biggest battle is convincing people who don’t believe that diversity has a positive impact on teams and companies.
“Another issue is finding ways to bring in diverse talent and helping them achieve their full potential,” she added. “One of the things I’m most proud of is the work I’ve done with IEEE on DEI.”
Goldsmith helped launch theIEEE Diversity and Inclusion Committee and is its past chair. Established in 2022 by the IEEE Board of Directors, the committee revised several policies, procedures, and bylaws to ensure that members have a safe and inclusive place for collegial discourse and that all feel welcome. It also launched a website.
Robert E. Kahn proudly displays his IEEE Medal of Honor at this year’s IEEE Honors Ceremony. He is accompanied by IEEE President-Elect Kathleen Kramer and IEEE President Tom Couglin.Robb Cohen Photography & Video
Career advice and the role of AI in society
The IEEE Vision, Innovation, and Challenges Summit got underway on 3 May at the Encore Boston Harbor. It featured a “fireside chat” with Robert E. Kahn followed by discussions with panels of award recipients on topics such as career advice and concerns related to artificial intelligence.
Kahn was interviewed by Caroline Hyde, a business and technology journalist. Widely known as one of the “fathers of the Internet,” he is this year’s IEEE Medal of Honor recipient for “pioneering technical and leadership contributions in packet communication technologies and foundations of the Internet.”
The IEEE Life Fellow reminisced about his experience collaborating with Vint Cerf on the design of the Transmission Control Protocol and the Internet Protocol. Cerf, an IEEE Life Fellow, is another father of the Internet and the 2023 IEEE Medal of Honor recipient.
While working as a program manager in the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s information processing techniques office in 1973, Kahn and Cerf designed the Internet’s core architecture.
One audience member asked Kahn how engineers can create opportunities for young people to collaborate like he and Cerf did. Kahn said that it begins with having a problem to solve, and then thinking about it holistically. He also advised students and young professionals to partner with others when such opportunities arise.
The conversation on career advice continued at the Innovation and Collaboration in Leading Technology Laboratories panel. Panelists and IEEE Fellows Eric Evans, Anthony Vetro, and Peter Vetter offered insights on how to be a successful researcher.
It’s important to identify the right problem and develop a technology to solve it, said Evans, director of MIT Lincoln Laboratory.
When asked what qualities are important for job candidates to showcase when interviewing for a position, Vetro said he looks for employees who are willing to collaborate and are self-driven. Vetro is president and CEO of Mitsubishi Electric Research Labs in Cambridge, Mass. He also stressed the importance of learning how to fail.
During the AI and Society: Building a Future with Responsible Innovation session, Juraj Corba, Christopher D. Manning, Renard T. Jenkins, and IEEE Fellow Claire Tomlin discussed how the technology could affect a variety of fields. They agreed the technology is unlikely to replace humans in the workforce.
“People need to think of AI systems as tools—like what Photoshop is to a photographer.”- Renard T. Jenkins
“People need to think of AI systems as tools—like what Photoshop is to a photographer,” said Jenkins, president of consulting firm I2A2 Technologies, Labs and Studios.
“AI doesn’t have learning and adaptability [capabilities] like humans do,” Manning added. The director of Stanford’s Artificial Intelligence Laboratory is this year’s IEEE John von Neumann Medal recipient. “But there is a good role for technology—it can be life-changing for people.” One example he cited was Neuralink’s brain implant, which would enable a person to control a computer “just by thinking,” according to the startup’s founder, Elon Musk.
ChatGPT, a generative AI program, has become a hot topic among educators since its launch two years ago, said panel moderator Armen Pischdotchian, data scientist at IBM in Cambridge, Mass. Tomlin, chair of the electrical engineering and computer science department at UC Berkeley, said AI will make education more interactive and provide a better experience. “It will help both students and educators,” said the recipient of this year’s IEEE Mildred Dresselhaus Medal.
Pioneers of assistive technology, GPS, and the Internet
The highlight of the evening was the Honors Ceremony, which recognized those who had developed technologies such as assistive robots, GPS, and the Internet.
The IEEE Spectrum Technology in the Service of Society Award went to startup Hello Robot, headquartered in Atlanta, for its Stretch robot. The machine gives those with a severe disability, such as paralysis, the ability to maintain their independence while living at home. For example, users can operate the robot to feed themselves, scratch an itch, or cover themselves with a blanket.
The machine consists of a mobile platform with a single arm that moves up and down a retractable pole. A wrist joint at the end of the arm bends back and forth and controls a gripper, which can grasp nearby objects. Sensors mounted at the base of the arm and a camera located at the top of the pole provide the sensing needed to move around from room to room, avoid obstacles, and pick up small items such as books, eating utensils, and pill bottles.
More than six billion people around the world use GPS to navigate their surroundings, according toGPS World. The technology wouldn’t have been possible without Gladys West, who contributed to the mathematical modeling of the shape of the Earth. While working at theNaval Surface Warfare Center, in Dahlgren, Va., she conducted seminal work on satellite geodesy models that was pivotal in the development of the GPS. West, who is 93, retired in 1998 after working at the center for 42 years. For her contributions, she received the IEEE President’s Award.
The ceremony concluded with the presentation of the IEEE Medal of Honor to Bob Kahn, who received a standing ovation.
“This is the honor of my career,” he said. He ended his speech saying that he “hasn’t stopped yet and still has more to do.”
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IEEE Fellow Grace Hopper inputting call numbers into the Universal Automatic (UNIVAC I), which allows the computer to find the correct instructions to complete. The A-0 compiler translates the English instructions into machine-readable binary code.Computer History Museum
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Conway was recruited in 1975 to join Xerox PARC as a research fellow.Lynn Conway
Robert E. Kahn proudly displays his IEEE Medal of Honor at this year’s IEEE Honors Ceremony. He is accompanied by IEEE President-Elect Kathleen Kramer and IEEE President Tom Couglin.Robb Cohen Photography & Video
