Meet Assistant Teaching Professor Niyem Bawana

Charles Ferrer — Fri, 21 Aug 2026 17:20:27 +0000

Meet Assistant Teaching Professor Niyem Bawana Charles Ferrer Fri, 08/21/2026 - 11:20

Bio: Niyem Mawenbe Bawana is an Assistant Teaching Professor in the Department of Electrical, Computer and Energy Engineering at the University of Ģ��Ӱ�� Boulder. He earned a B.S. in Physics from the University of Lomé in 2008, an M.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of South Florida in 2019, and an M.S. in Mechanical Engineering with a concentration in robotics from the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology in 2021.

Before joining Ģ��Ӱ�� Boulder, Niyem taught high school physics and chemistry for nearly a decade. He was also a Fulbright Scholar at the University of South Florida from 2017 to 2019. His experiences as both an educator and an engineer have shaped his commitment to making complex technical concepts accessible and connecting classroom learning to meaningful engineering problems.

He completed his Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology in 2026. His dissertation, Deep Learning for Terahertz Damage Characterization in Glass Fiber-Reinforced Polymer Laminates: From Detection to Quantification, explored how machine learning and terahertz sensing can be combined to detect, locate, and characterize subsurface damage in composite materials.

Research: His research interests lie at the intersection of machine learning, digital systems, computer architecture, and nondestructive evaluation. He is particularly interested in computationally efficient methods that transform inspection signals into reliable information about the condition of materials and structures. His broader research vision includes machine-learning and emerging computing architectures for intelligent sensing and safer engineered systems.

What excites me most about joining ECEE is the opportunity to become part of a collaborative department whose expertise spans areas ranging from quantum engineering and photonics to circuits, embedded systems, and computer architecture. This breadth creates an especially rich environment for teaching, collaboration, and the development of new ideas across traditional disciplinary boundaries.

I am particularly excited to contribute to the teaching of digital systems, embedded computing, and computer architecture. These subjects form the bridge between abstract computational ideas and the physical systems that students can design, build, and test. I look forward to helping students understand that connection through engaging instruction, hands-on projects, and engineering problems grounded in real-world applications.

Ģ��Ӱ�� Boulder’s continued investment in its undergraduate computer engineering curriculum also strongly aligns with my experience and goals as an educator. I am eager to contribute to that effort by helping strengthen course connections, expand experiential learning opportunities, and prepare students to participate in the innovative research taking place across ECEE. More broadly, I am excited to bring together my background in teaching, machine learning, sensing, and digital systems to support students and contribute meaningfully to the department’s educational mission.

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Meet Assistant Professor Cheng Wang

Charles Ferrer — Fri, 21 Aug 2026 17:14:57 +0000

Meet Assistant Professor Cheng Wang Charles Ferrer Fri, 08/21/2026 - 11:14

Bio: Cheng Wang is an incoming Assistant Professor of Electrical and Computer and Energy Engineering at the University of Ģ��Ӱ�� Boulder and an affiliated professor at Iowa State University.

Prior to joining Ģ��Ӱ�� Boulder, Cheng was an Assistant Professor at Iowa State University from 2022 to 2026. He was a Research Scientist at the Center for Brain-inspired Computing Enabling (C-BRIC) at Purdue University from 2019 to 2022, and worked in the industry as a Staff R&D Engineer at Seagate Research Center from 2016 to 2019.

He has served on the Technical Program Committee for beyond-CMOS and emerging technologies for IEEE/ACM Design Automation Conference (DAC), International Conference on Computer-Aided Design (ICCAD), and Great Lakes Symposium on VLSI. He is a recipient of the National Science Foundation (NSF) CAREER Award, Seagate FRC Technical Award, NSF Early-concept Grants for Exploratory Research (EAGER) Award, and Best Paper awards for the IEEE International Conference on Rebooting Computing (ICRC) and IEEE Cross-disciplinary Conference on Memory-Centric Computing.

Cheng received his B.S. degree in Physics from Peking University in 2009 and completed his Ph.D. at the University of Texas at Austin in 2016, with his dissertation on emerging non-volatile and spintronic memories.

Cheng is also affiliated with the Renewable And Sustainable Energy Institute (RASEI), a joint research institute between Ģ��Ӱ�� Boulder and the National Laboratory of the Rockies.

Research: His current research interests include machine learning hardware acceleration and energy-efficient neuromorphic computing with emerging technologies and architectures.

I am excited to join the highly reputed and dynamic faculty at ECEE with deep expertise across a wide spectrum, from quantum electronics/photonics to circuits and systems. I particularly look forward to contributing to the computer system research at ECEE with my cross-disciplinary exploration of next-generation AI hardware.

I also found that my background and research vision are nicely aligned with the recent endeavor of Ģ��Ӱ�� Boulder in building the ecosystem to develop quantum science and technology. Quantum science may be well positioned to provide the underlying technology for addressing the challenge ofcomputer efficiency. I am also excited about the outdoor experiences around Ģ��Ӱ�� Boulder.

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Meet Assistant Teaching Professor Niyem Bawana

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Meet Assistant Professor Cheng Wang

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