Dual Degree Programme (B Tech + Master of Science by Research)

B Tech and Master of Science in Electronics and Communication Engineering by Research

About the Programme

Electronics and Communication Engineering (ECE) is an established and a high-impact engineering discipline, which has enabled many things that we take for granted in modern life starting from electricity to mobile communications to smart cities. With the advent of various new applications centred around information and communication technology (ICT), new research areas are emerging making this discipline interesting and exciting. These research areas encompass both theory and practice and include

• Next generation wireless systems (5G and beyond)
• Internet of Things (IoT), Robotics
• Unmanned Autonomous Vehicles (UAVs such as cars and drones)
• Coding for Distributed Storage and Computing
• Speech Processing
• Image Processing
• Sparse Signal Processing
• Machine Learning and Optimization

Brief Objectives of the Programme

The dual degree programme (ECD) enables a student to earn BTech (ECE) and MS (ECE) degrees by completing a research thesis.  The main objectives are to

• Prepare professionals well versed in confluence of hardware/software worlds and adept at problem solving
• Nurture and develop research talent in the ECE discipline for pursuing a career in research

Details of the programme

ECE is envisioned at IIITH to be a confluence of hardware and software worlds and shares much with the EE-CS programmes in leading universities. Hence, equal emphasis is given in the curriculum to both.  The ECE curriculum is designed to have a balanced mixture of course from different fields such as ECE, CSE, Math, Science, Humanities, etc. Overall, a student must complete a total of 177 (course/project) + 24 (thesis) = 201 credits in the ECD programme. A rough distribution of the credits across fields is given below.

The first two years of the program consists of rigorous foundation courses in ECE core and computing. Courses that lay foundations (worth 17 credits) in computing are common to CSE and ECE students to ensure rigour. The curriculum gives students the flexibility beyond the 2^nd year to pursue in-depth study in one of 5 different streams and thus pursue research in the chosen stream.  The streams range from signal processing (including applied areas such as computer vision and speech), communications, VLSI/embedded systems, to Robotics, IoT, etc. Dual degree students are affiliated to a research centre right after the 2^nd year and work closely with other research students under the supervision of a faculty for 3 years. There is ample opportunity for students to pursue their interest be it in developing new analytical techniques or designing new hardware/algorithm/software. Students are enabled to do high quality research which is showcased in prestigious international conferences and published in reputed journals.

ECD graduates from IIITH pursue careers in leading multinational companies, industry research labs or go for doctoral studies in top Universities in the world.