Thanh Tran, professor in the practice of electrical and computer engineering (ECE) at Rice, is the recipient of the 2022 Society of Asian Scientists and Engineers (SASE) Outstanding Career Achievement Award.
Tran will be recognized at the SASE National Convention and STEM Career Fair in Atlanta, Oct. 6-8.
Founded in 2007, SASE is dedicated to “advancement of Asian heritage scientists and engineers in education and employment so that they can achieve their full potential.” It boasts more than 175 leaders across more than 70 Asian employee resource groups and 106 collegiate chapters in 31 states in the U.S.
“In summary, my story is one example of millions of immigrants who came to America empty-handed and overcame obstacles to achieve their dreams and goals,” Tran said.
Imagine a teenage kid who didn’t know a word of English, survived the Vietnam War and came to a new country with his mother and four siblings, grew up and became one of the top innovators in his profession, including holding the highest degree in the field of electrical engineering.
Tran earned his B.S. in electrical engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1984 and his Ph.D. in electrical engineering from the University of Houston in 2001.
In addition to teaching high-speed systems design at Rice, Tran is a senior principal engineer at Raytheon Company. Before joining Rice and Raytheon, he was an engineering technologist at Dell Technologies and Compaq Computer, a chief technical advisor at Halliburton Co. and a CTO/senior engineering manager of New Emerging End Equipment in DSP Systems at Texas Instruments.
He holds 39 patents related to virtual reality, computer gaming/audio systems, PC-Based HDTV, oil and gas logging systems, fiber optic communication, high bitrate telemetry systems and mixed analog/digital ASICs. He is a senior Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) member, has written two books and published more than 24 technical papers.
In addition to the SASE award, Tran is the recipient of three Raytheon Achievement/Innovators Awards, Bronze Excellent@Dell Award, Texas Instruments Patent Hall of Fame, Halliburton MVP and Outstanding Contributions to Innovation and Technology Awards, Compaq Computer Cumulative Patent Award and the first Entrepreneur/Innovation Award from the University of Houston.