Profiles

Throughout his 30-year academic career, Professor Mohamed-Slim Alouini, an IEEE, OPTICA, and SPIE Fellow, has developed analytical and simulation tools for evaluating the performance of radio-frequency and optical wireless communication systems. He has also designed and optimized innovative technologies for emerging wireless networks.

Professor Alouini, a co-founder of KAUST's ECE program, inspires future engineers through his pioneering work in wireless communications. His integrated space-air-ground networks, spectrum sharing schemes, and optical wireless communication systems research shape connectivity's future and embody KAUST's scientific excellence and global impact.

Professor Alouini has published numerous conference and journal papers and co-authored the textbook Digital Communication over Fading Channels, published by Wiley Interscience. A former editor of IEEE Transactions on Communications and IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communication, he also served as an editor for IEEE Transactions on Mobile Computing and the Wireless Communications and Mobile Computing journal. He was also a series editor for the IEEE Communication Magazine's Optical Communication and Networks Special Series and the founding field chief editor for the Frontiers in Communications and Networks journal. He is now the Founding Editor-in-Chief for the Nature Partnership Journal (npj) on Wireless Technologies (since 2025) and an editor for the IEEE Transactions on Aerospace and Electronics Systems (since 2022).

Professor Alouini has been an IEEE Distinguished Lecturer for the IEEE Communication Society (2016-2017), the IEEE Vehicular Technology Society  (2018-2022), the IEEE Aerospace and Electronic Systems Society (2023-2024), the IEEE Photonics Society (2025), and the IEEE Society on Social Implications of Technology (2026-Present).

In addition to diversity combining techniques and MIMO techniques, Professor Alouini is interested in multi-hop and cooperative communications, optical wireless communication systems, cognitive radio systems, green communication systems, underwater/maritime communication systems, and integrated ground-airborne-space networks for research.

Professor Alouini is actively working on addressing the uneven global distribution, access to, and use of information and communication technologies (ICT) by studying and developing new generations of aerial and space networks as a solution to provide connectivity to rural, low-income, disaster-prone, and/or hard-to-reach areas.

His KAUST Communication Theory Lab (CTL) investigates viable solutions to minimize ICT costs by (i) capitalizing on emerging and new solutions that operate within the unlicensed radio frequency spectrum and by (ii) deploying a variety of aerial and space-based networks.

Abla Kammoun  received the Engineering degree in Signals and Systems from the Tunisia Polytechnic School, La Marsa, Tunisia, and the M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in Digital Communications from Télécom ParisTech, Paris, France (formerly École Nationale Supérieure des Télécommunications). From 2010 to 2012, she was a Postdoctoral Researcher with the TSI Department at Télécom ParisTech, and then worked at Supélecwithin the Alcatel-Lucent Chair on Flexible Radio until 2013. She is currently a Senior Research Scientist at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Thuwal, Saudi Arabia. Her research interests include performance analysis of wireless communication systems, random matrix theory, and statistical signal processing.

José Maria earned his Bachelor of Engineering in Electronic Engineering, with a minor in Telecommunications, from Universidad Peruana de Ciencias Aplicadas (UPC) in Lima, Peru, in 2018. During his undergraduate studies, he was awarded a partially funded scholarship in 2013. In 2018, he received funding for a research project through the VII Annual Research Incentive Competition at UPC, which led to the publication of a paper and a presentation at the XXII Symposium on Image, Signal Processing, and Artificial Vision (STSIVA) in 2019.

José Maria began his career with internships at IBM Peru, first as a Computer Specialist and later as a Software Developer. His interest in the Internet of Things (IoT) grew, leading him to become a speaker at various universities, where he taught IoT and Machine Learning. He focused on using single-board computers to connect multiple devices and leverage environmental data. José Maria has worked on several research projects at UPC, including a notable Digital Image Processing project aimed at developing a reliable method for diagnosing health issues in coffee plants using machine learning in Python, providing early diagnosis tools for cultivators.

José Maria is proficient in Python, Java, and machine learning technologies. His research interests lie in leveraging machine learning to enhance communication methods, with a focus on coding and modulation, Smart Grid technologies, and satellite networks. He is passionate about the Internet of Things (IoT) and has shared his knowledge as a speaker at various universities, teaching IoT and Machine Learning. His sessions emphasize the use of single-board computers for data-driven device connectivity, showcasing practical applications of these technologies.

Karim is a graduate from Bauman Moscow State Technical University. He received a specialist degree in a field of electrical engineering (2014 – 2020), with a focus on radars and wireless communications. He worked at part-time job as embedded systems and DSP engineer for 2.5 years. After that he had internship in summer of 2019 at Huawei Russian Research Institute (RRI) and after graduating from university, he worked at Huawei RRI for 1 year. During his job he improved receiver’s sensitivity applying some convex and non-convex optimization approaches and provide some dimensionality reduction approaches for system identification.

Nowadays Karim works in topics related to Joint Sensing And Communication (JSAC), quantum computing and communications over unlicensed spectrum.

Adaptive algorithms in wireless communications, Radar signal processing and machine learning. Quantum computing.

Abdullah obtained his master's degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering from KAUST in 2021 and his bachelor's degree from The University of Jordan in 2020. During his engineering studies, he did research in wireless sensor networks and cognitive radio. In 2024, Abdullah won the best paper award at the Global Advanced Air Mobility Academic Paper competition, organized by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).

Abdullah's current research interests include stochastic geometry modeling, and flying platforms.

Amanat Kafizov received his B.S. and M.S. degrees in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Nazarbayev University, Kazakhstan, in 2019 and from King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Saudi Arabia, in 2021, respectively. Currently, he is a Ph.D. student at KAUST. His academic journey has been enriched by diverse experiences, including a summer research internship at the University at Buffalo, New York, USA, in 2018, where he developed the OFDM system for Terahertz communication. Later, from 2023 to 2024, he worked as a research engineer at CERN, Geneva, Switzerland.

Amanat's research interests include optical wireless communication, reconfigurable intelligent surfaces, system prototyping, signal processing on FPGA, and machine learning. 

During his summer research internship 2018 at University at Buffalo, New York, USA, he was working on Terahertz (THz) communication networks under a supervision of professor Josep Jornet. To be more specific, Amanat developed OFDM transmitter and receiver blocks in Matlab tailored to THz channel properties and adapted to THz hardware specifications. Amanat was the first who demonstrated OFDM communication at THz frequencies ever. 

Anna Talgat is currently a Ph.D. candidate in Applied Mathematics and Computational Sciences at KAUST. She earned her B.S. in Mathematics from Fatih University, Istanbul, with high honors and a full scholarship. Anna continued her studies at KAUST, completing her M.S., focusing on stochastic geometry-based analysis of LEO satellite communication systems. Her early career includes an internship at Cambridge University’s DAMTP and teaching mathematics at Galaxy International School in Kazakhstan. Additionally, she was a Graduate Teaching Assistant at KAUST, supporting academic development and enhancing teaching methodologies.

Anna Talgat's research interests primarily focus on stochastic geometry and its applications in communication systems. Specifically, her work includes the stochastic geometry-based analysis of LEO satellite communication systems, performance analysis and optimization of wireless communications, and enhancing the efficiency and reliability of these networks. Her research aims to advance the understanding and development of satellite communication networks, which are critical for various applications, including IoT (Internet of Things) and secure data transmission in space communications.