George Shaker
Biography
George Shaker earned his bachelors degree from Cairo University, Egypt, and both his masters and PhD from the University of Waterloo, Canada. He is currently the Lab Director of the Wireless Sensors and Devices Laboratory at the Schlegel-UW Research Institute for Aging, where he founded and directs “THE MIRADA - Technology for Health Empowerment: Monitoring, Intervention, and Response for Aging Demonstration Apartment,” a groundbreaking initiative aimed at improving healthcare foraging populations through advanced sensing technology. He is also the Chief Scientist at Spark Technology Labs where he has been leading innovation in wireless sensor technologies since its founding in 2011. Previously, Dr. Shaker was an NSERC scholar at the Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA, USA. He also held multiple roles with Research In Motion (RIM, now BlackBerry), where he significantly contributed to the development of wireless communication technologies.
Dr. Shaker is an adjunct associate professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada. His ongoing research focuses on advancing wireless sensor technologies to enhance healthcare outcomes, improve safety in autonomous systems, and drive innovations in other critical areas such as UAVs and IoT. His contributions extend beyond research and innovation, as he is deeply committed to knowledge sharing and fostering the next generation of engineers and scientists in these fields. With close to 20 years of industrial experience in technology and over ten years as a faculty member, Dr. Shaker has led numerous projects related to the application of wireless sensor systems in healthcare, automotive, and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). His work has had a direct impact on the design of numerous commercial products available from both startups and multinationals alike. A sample list of companies he has closely engaged with includes Agilent, Amazon, Ansys, Apple, Aquasensing, BlackBerry, Bionym, Cloudhawk, COMDEV, DBJ, Ecobee, Eleven-X, Enice, General Dynamics, General Motors, GoldSentintel, Google, Honeywell, Infineon, Loose Wheel, Lyngsoe, Maple Lodge Farms, Medella Health, Microsoft, NERV Technologies, Nidec, North, Northpoint Lifesciences, Novela, ON Semiconductors, Omron, Purolator, Rogers, Spark Tech Labs, Thalmic Labs, Tidal Medical, Texas Instruments, Toyota, and Vayyar, among several others.
Dr. Shaker has co-authored over 200 peer-reviewed publications and holds more than 35 patents, including several assigned to industry leaders such as Google in the fields of Augmented Reality and Sensing. His research has been recognized with numerous prestigious awards, including the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Society (AP-S) Best Paper Award (first @ UW), IEEE AP-S Honorable Mention Best Paper Awards (five-times, including the first @UW), the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Graduate Research Award (first @ UW), the IEEE Microwave Theory and Techniques Society (MTT-S) Graduate Fellowship (first @UW), the IEEE MTT-S NEMO Best Paper Award, the IEEE Electronic Components and Technology Best of Session Paper Award, the arXiv Top Downloaded Article (medical device category), the ACM MobileHCI Best Workshop Paper, and the Computer Vision Conference Imaging Best Paper. Over the years, three of his co-authored papers were among the list of top downloaded articles on IEEE Xplore for several consecutive months. He is the co author of the 2022 top accessed article in Wiley Engineering Reports, and the 2024 7th top accessed article in Nature Communications Engineering. In addition to his research accomplishments, Dr. Shaker has been a dedicated mentor, and his students have earned multiple accolades, including the IEEE AP-S Design Contest Award in 2016, the NSERC Top Science Research Award in 2019, the IEEE AP-S Honorable Mention Paper Awards (twice), the Biotec Top Demo Award in 2019, the Velocity Fund in 2020, the NASA Tech Briefs Honorable Mention Award (medical device category) in 2020, the University of Waterloo Concept Winner in 2021, the U.K. Dragons’ Canadian Competition Winner in 2021, the CMC Nano Winner in 2021, the COIL CoLab Award in 2022, the 2023 Canadian Space Agency Satellite Design Contest Award (involving over 90 UW student members), the 2023 URSI Young Scientist Award, the 2023 Ontario Long Term Care Innovation of Year Award, the Engineer the future Award in 2024, the Norman Esch Entrepreneurship Award in 2024, and the iCAN 2024 Gold Medal.
Dr. Shaker is an i2I Fellow, an IEEE AP-S Distinguished Industry Speaker, and the IEEE Sensors Council Distinguished Lecturer (2025-2027).
Dr. Shaker is an adjunct associate professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada. His ongoing research focuses on advancing wireless sensor technologies to enhance healthcare outcomes, improve safety in autonomous systems, and drive innovations in other critical areas such as UAVs and IoT. His contributions extend beyond research and innovation, as he is deeply committed to knowledge sharing and fostering the next generation of engineers and scientists in these fields. With close to 20 years of industrial experience in technology and over ten years as a faculty member, Dr. Shaker has led numerous projects related to the application of wireless sensor systems in healthcare, automotive, and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). His work has had a direct impact on the design of numerous commercial products available from both startups and multinationals alike. A sample list of companies he has closely engaged with includes Agilent, Amazon, Ansys, Apple, Aquasensing, BlackBerry, Bionym, Cloudhawk, COMDEV, DBJ, Ecobee, Eleven-X, Enice, General Dynamics, General Motors, GoldSentintel, Google, Honeywell, Infineon, Loose Wheel, Lyngsoe, Maple Lodge Farms, Medella Health, Microsoft, NERV Technologies, Nidec, North, Northpoint Lifesciences, Novela, ON Semiconductors, Omron, Purolator, Rogers, Spark Tech Labs, Thalmic Labs, Tidal Medical, Texas Instruments, Toyota, and Vayyar, among several others.
Dr. Shaker has co-authored over 200 peer-reviewed publications and holds more than 35 patents, including several assigned to industry leaders such as Google in the fields of Augmented Reality and Sensing. His research has been recognized with numerous prestigious awards, including the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Society (AP-S) Best Paper Award (first @ UW), IEEE AP-S Honorable Mention Best Paper Awards (five-times, including the first @UW), the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Graduate Research Award (first @ UW), the IEEE Microwave Theory and Techniques Society (MTT-S) Graduate Fellowship (first @UW), the IEEE MTT-S NEMO Best Paper Award, the IEEE Electronic Components and Technology Best of Session Paper Award, the arXiv Top Downloaded Article (medical device category), the ACM MobileHCI Best Workshop Paper, and the Computer Vision Conference Imaging Best Paper. Over the years, three of his co-authored papers were among the list of top downloaded articles on IEEE Xplore for several consecutive months. He is the co author of the 2022 top accessed article in Wiley Engineering Reports, and the 2024 7th top accessed article in Nature Communications Engineering. In addition to his research accomplishments, Dr. Shaker has been a dedicated mentor, and his students have earned multiple accolades, including the IEEE AP-S Design Contest Award in 2016, the NSERC Top Science Research Award in 2019, the IEEE AP-S Honorable Mention Paper Awards (twice), the Biotec Top Demo Award in 2019, the Velocity Fund in 2020, the NASA Tech Briefs Honorable Mention Award (medical device category) in 2020, the University of Waterloo Concept Winner in 2021, the U.K. Dragons’ Canadian Competition Winner in 2021, the CMC Nano Winner in 2021, the COIL CoLab Award in 2022, the 2023 Canadian Space Agency Satellite Design Contest Award (involving over 90 UW student members), the 2023 URSI Young Scientist Award, the 2023 Ontario Long Term Care Innovation of Year Award, the Engineer the future Award in 2024, the Norman Esch Entrepreneurship Award in 2024, and the iCAN 2024 Gold Medal.
Dr. Shaker is an i2I Fellow, an IEEE AP-S Distinguished Industry Speaker, and the IEEE Sensors Council Distinguished Lecturer (2025-2027).
Research Interests
- Antennas
- RF
- Wireless
- mm-Waves
- Sub-THz
- Sensors
- BioElectromagnetics
- Telematics
- V2X Communications
- RF, microwave, millimeter wave, and Terahertz (THz) circuits and antenna systems
- Radio frequency (RF), microwave packaging and Electromagnetic compatibility
- (EMC), and Electromagnetic interface (EMI) analyses
- Vehicle and UAV wireless communications, navigation systems, and telematics systems
- Bio-wearable electronics and systems
- Energy harvesting systems
- Complex propagation and scattering phenomena
- Devices and novel electromagnetic materials and wireless sensors
- Bioengineering
- Biomedical Engineering
Selected/Recent Publications
- *BEST PAPER AWARD* Murdoch, David and Ye, Eric and Shaker, George and Melek, William, Modelling of Terrain Surfaces Using Aerial Radar Mapping, Journal of Computational Vision and Imaging Systems, 3, 2018
- Lee, D and Melek, W and Shaker, G, Investigation of wrapped effects on bow-tie antenna with and without resistive loading for pulsed radar applications, Electronics Letters, 7, 2018
- *GOOGLE SOLI AWARD* Smith, Karly A and Csech, Clment and Murdoch, David and Shaker, George, Gesture recognition using mm-wave sensor for human-car interface, IEEE Sensors Letters, 1, 2018
- Yeo, Hui-Shyong and Minami, Ryosuke and Rodriguez, Kirill and Shaker, George and Quigley, Aaron, Exploring tangible interactions with radar sensing, Proceedings of the ACM on Interactive, Mobile, Wearable and Ubiquitous Technologies, 200, 2018
- Lau, Bernard and Haider, Sahar and Boroomand, Ameneh and Shaker, George and Boger, Jennifer and Morita, Plinio, Gait speed tracking system using UWB radar, , , 2018
- *BEST PAPER AWARD* Shaker, George and Smith, Karly and Omer, Ala Eldin and Liu, Shuo and Csech, Clement and Wadhwa, Udeshaya and Safavi-Naeini, Safieddin and Hughson, Richard, Non-invasive monitoring of glucose level changes utilizing a mm-wave radar system, International Journal of Mobile Human Computer Interaction (IJMHCI), 10, 2018
- Li, Zhichao and Shaker, George and Safavi-Naeini, Safieddin and Melek, William and Mittra, Raj, Antenna system design for multicopter UAVs utilizing characteristic modes, , , 2018
- Omer, Ala Eldin and Shaker, George and Safavi-Naeini, Safieddin and Murray, Kevin and Hughson, Richard, Glucose levels detection using mm-Wave radar, IEEE sensors letters, 1, 2018
- Atkinson, J and Cao, Y and Shaker, G and Goldthorpe, I, Low-cost transfer printing of antennas for smart textiles, , , 2018
- *BEST DESIGN AWARD* Chen, Luyao and Milligan, Ben and Qu, Tony and Jeevananthan, Luxsumi and Shaker, George and Safavi-Naeini, Safieddin, Cellular Wireless Energy Harvesting for Smart Contact Lens Applications [Education Corner], IEEE Antennas and Propagation Magazine, 108, 2018
In The News
- Engineers create tech for watches to track blood sugar
- Researchers develop AI-powered radar to monitor drivers' health
- Protecting buildings from costly water damage
- Startup takes top prize in nanomaterials pitch event
- Leak-detection startup books spot in pitch finals
- Startups win financial backing at Velocity pitch event
- New diabetes device monitors blood using radar and AI, not painful pricks
Graduate studies
- Currently considering applications from graduate students. A completed online application is required for admission; start the application process now.