Things about Stuff is a popular freshman course, taught by Lee. This course tells stories behind the greatest inventions, including the telephone, the television and the transistor.[3]
He has written and co-authored several books and papers, and in 2012, concluded a tour of duty as the director of DARPA's Microsystems Technology Office.
He was also awarded an Honoris Causa doctorate from the University of Waterloo in 2012 in recognition of his contributions to wireless technology.[4]
Career
Lee joined Analog Devices in 1990 where he was primarily involved in the design of high-speed clock recovery devices. In 1992, he joined Rambus Inc. where he developed high-speed analog circuitry for 500 megabyte/s CMOS DRAMs. He has also contributed to the development of PLLs in the StrongARM, Alpha and AMD K6/K7/K8 microprocessors.
Lee joined the Department of Electrical Engineering in 1993. In 1994 he founded the Stanford Microwave Integrated Circuits Laboratory.
In 1998, Lee cofounded Matrix Semiconductor (acquired by Sandisk in 2006). He founded ZeroG Wireless (acquired by Microchip Technology) and is a cofounder of Ayla Networks.[5]
In 2012 he was awarded the U.S. Secretary of Defense Medal for Exceptional Civilian Service for his work at DARPA, and was awarded an Honoris Causa Doctorate in Electrical Engineering from the University of Waterloo in 2013.
A freshman seminar he inaugurated, "Things about Stuff" (EE14N), was recognized by the American Society of Engineering Education as one of several "hot courses" in engineering.[11]