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Farhan Rana

Director of Undergraduate Studies

Joseph P. Ripley Professor of Engineering and Associate Director

School of Electrical and Computer Engineering

Farhan Rana
Farhan Rana
Graduate Field Affiliation
Electrical and Computer Engineering

Biography

Farhan Rana is a Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Cornell University.  He received the B.S., M.S. (1997), and Ph.D. (2003) degrees all in Electrical Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Before starting the Ph.D., he worked at IBM’s T. J.Watson Research Center on nanocrystal and quantum dot memory devices. He joined the faculty of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Cornell University, Ithaca, NY in 2003. He received the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Young Faculty Award in 2008, the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) CAREER Award in 2004, the ILX Lightwave faculty award in 2005, Cornell’s Michael A. Tien Excellence in Teaching Award in 2006 and also in 2010, and the Gold Medal for Academic Performance by the Government of Pakistan. He has also received several best paper awards including the “Most Downloaded Paper” title in 2008 by the IEEE Transactions on Nanotechnology. He previously served as Associate Director of the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Cornell University.

Research Interests

Established and leads the semiconductor optoelectronics research group at Cornell University in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering. The underlying themes behind most of the research carried out by the group is understanding and engineering of the properties of electrons, photons, spins, and phonons in semiconductor micro and nano structures in order to realize novel devices, study new science at small scales in both space (micro- and nano-sized materials and devices) and time (ultrafast optical and terahertz spectroscopy and devices), and use novel physics to solve engineering problems and tackle scientific challenges in the development of new technologies.

  • Advanced Materials Processing
  • Advanced Materials
  • Nanotechnology
  • Semiconductor Physics and Devices
  • Nonlinear Dynamics
  • Solid State, Electronics, Optoelectronics and MEMs
  • Physical Electronics, Devices, and Plasma Science

Teaching Interests

Established four new courses in the Department curriculum in six years: 1) ECE4070: Physics of Semiconductors and Nanostructures 2) ECE5310: Quantum Optics 3) ECE3030: Electromagnetic Fields and Waves 4) ECE533: Semiconductor Optoelectronics.

Select Publications

  • Rana, Farhan, Haining Wang. 2017. “Ultrafast coherent dynamics of excitons, phonons, and plasmons in two-dimensional (2D) materials and devices”.” Paper presented at Photonics West, San Francisco, January 2017.

  • Rana, Farhan, Wang Haining, Zhang Changjian, Wei Min Chan. 2016. “Optoelectronic Properties of 2D Materials Beyond Graphene.” Paper presented at Annual Spring Meeting of the Materials Research Society (MRS), Phoenix AZ, April

  • Manolatou, C., H. Wang, W. Chan, S. Tiwari, F Rana. 2016. “Radiative and Non-Radiative Exciton Energy Transfer in Monolayers of Two-Dimensional Transition Metal Dichalcogenides.” Physical Review B 93 (15): 155422.

  • Wang, H., C. Zhang, W. Chan, C. Manolatou, S. Tiwari, F Rana. 2016. “Radiative Lifetimes of Excitons and Trions in Monolayers of Metal Dichalcogenide MoS2.” Physical Review B 93 (4): 045407.

  • Rana, Farhan. “Plasmons in Graphene: new science and new applications,”. Paper presented at Farhan Rana, Graphene 2017, Chicago, July 2017.

Farhan Rana's Google Scholar

Select Awards and Honors

  • Awarded the Cornell 2016 Engineering Research Excellence Award, College of Engineering, Cornell University 2016
  • Michael Tien '72 Excellence in Teaching Award , College of Engineering, Cornell University 2010
  • Young Faculty Investigator Award, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), US Department of Defense (DOD) 2008
  • Michael A. Tien Excellence in Teaching Award, College of Engineering, Cornell University 2006
  • ILX Lightwave Faculty Award 2005

Education

  • B.S., Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology 1994
  • M.S., Electrical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology 1997
  • Ph.D., Electrical and Communication Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology 2003

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