A.Prof. Erich Leitgeb

the University of Technology Graz

Erich Leitgeb was born in 1964 in Fürstenfeld (Styria, Austria) and received his master degree (Dipl.-Ing. in electrical engineering) at the Technical University of Graz in 1994. From 1982 to 1984 he attended a training to an officer for Communications in the Austrian army, (his current military rank is Major). In 1994 he started research work in Optical Communications at the Department of Communications and Wave Propagation (TU Graz). In February 1999 he received his PhD-degree (Dr. at the University of Technology Graz) with honours. Since January 2000 he is project leader of international research projects in the field of optical communications and wireless communications. In 2000 he established and leads the research group for Optical Communications (OptiKom) at TU Graz. He was the Austrian MC-delegate and project coordinator of the finalised COST 270 (Reliability of optical components and devices in communications networks and systems) and the sub-workpackage leader of "Clear Sky Optics" of the finished EU project SatNEx (a NoE). Currently he is the second Austrian MC-delegate of COST 291 and the sub-workpackage leader of "Optical Wireless" of the EU project SatNEx 2 (a follow-up of SatNEx).

He is currently Assistant Professor at the University of Technology Graz and has submitted his research work for the Associate Professor (Habilitation). He is giving lectures in Optical Communications Engineering, Antennas and Wave Propagation and Microwaves. In 2002 he had a research stay at the department of Telecommunications at Zagreb University, Croatia. He is a Member of IEEE, SPIE and WCA. Since 2003 he is reviewer for IEEE and SPIE conferences and journals and he acts as member of Technical Committees and Chairpersons on these conferences. He is guest editor of a special issue (to be published 2006) in the Mediterranean Journal of Electronics and Communications on "Free Space Optics - RF".