Cynthia M. Furse (née Mahoney,[1] born 1963) is an American electrical engineer, the director of graduate studies and a distinguished professor in the University of Utah Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering.[2] Her research involves the use of finite-difference time-domain methods in computational simulations of the absorption and reflection of radio waves by other materials,[3] with applications including the use of spread-spectrum time-domain reflectometry to diagnose aircraft wiring systems, the design of antennae in medical implants, and the effects of cell phone emissions on the human body.[4] Her publications also include works on engineering education.
Education and career
Furse was born in 1963[5] in Hartford, Maine.[6] After her father, food scientist Arthur W. Mahoney,[7] took a professorship at Utah State University in 1969,[8] she grew up in Logan, Utah.[6] After beginning her studies in mechanical engineering,[3] she became a student of electrical engineering at the University of Utah, where she earned a bachelor's degree in 1985, a master's degree in 1988, and a Ph.D. in 1994.[9] Her master's work was mentored by Magdy Iskander; Om P. Gandhi became her doctoral supervisor.[3]
Before returning to the University of Utah as a faculty member, she was a professor at Utah State University for five years, beginning in 1997.[8]
After moving to the University of Utah in 2002,[1] she co-founded in 2003 and became chief scientist of Livewire Test Labs, a spinoff of the University of Utah that later became LiveWire Innovation.[4][10] From 2009 to 2019, she served as Associate Vice President for Research at the University of Utah.[4][6]
Books
Furse is the author or coauthor of technical books including:
Basic Introduction to Bioelectromagnetics (with Douglas A. Christensen and Carl H. Durney; 2nd ed., 2009, and 3rd ed., 2018)
Circuit Analysis and Design (with Fawwaz Tayssir Ulaby and Michel M. Maharbiz, 2018)
She is also a coauthor of a local history book:
History Of Emigration Canyon: Gateway to Salt Lake Valley (with Jeffrey Carlstrom, 2003; 2nd ed., 2019)[11]
Recognition
Furse was named an IEEE Fellow in 2008, "for leadership in electromagnetics education".[12] She was named a Fellow the National Academy of Inventors in 2014.[13] She was named a Fellow of the Applied Computational Electromagnetics Society in 2023, "for exceptional achievements and outstanding contributions in applied computational electromagnetics".[14]
She was named Professor of the Year in the Utah State University College of Engineering in 2000.[15] At the University of Utah, she was named the 2008 College of Engineering Distinguished Professor.[15] She was a 2016 recipient of the Utah Governor's Medal for Science and Technology.[8]
She was the 2009 recipient of the Hewlett-Packard Harriett B. Rigas Award of the IEEE Education Society,[15] and the 2020 recipient of the Chen-To Tai Distinguished Educator Award of the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Society, given to her "for motivating, challenging, educating, and inspiring the next generation of EM engineers through innovative teaching, hands-on experiences, current research, and lively participation".[16]
^Smith, Linda H. (July 2004), "The History of Emigration Canyon Gateway to Salt Lake Valley", Utah Historical Quarterly (book review), 72 (3): 280–282, doi:10.2307/45062877, JSTOR45062877
^ abcBalanis, Constantine A. (August 2009), "Cynthia Furse to Receive the Hewlett-Packard Harriett B. Rigas Award [Report of Awards and Fellow Committee]", IEEE Antennas and Propagation Magazine, 51 (4): 170, Bibcode:2009IAPM...51d.170B, doi:10.1109/map.2009.5338719