By Peter Witten, AAU Communication and Public Affairs

The awards to Petar Popovski come from three different technical committees under the IEEE Communications Society, one of the world's largest organizations in the field of communication engineering, with around 30,000 members globally.

The first two awards are: one from the Wireless Technical Committee (WTC) and one from the Technical Committee on Satellite and Space Communications (SSC).

The third and most recent award is the Outstanding Service Award from the IEEE Communication Theory Technical Committee (CTTC), where Petar Popovski served as chair from 2022 to 2024.

The award from the Wireless Technical Committee was given for numerous significant contributions to wireless communication and mobile networks over the past 20 years.

The award from the Technical Committee on Satellite and Space Communications recognizes Popovski’s work over the past five to six years on distributed artificial intelligence in connection with LEO satellite constellations. LEO stands for "Low Earth Orbit satellites" - satellites that orbit in a relatively low trajectory around Earth.

The award from the IEEE Communication Theory Technical Committee acknowledges Petar Popovski’s leadership and initiatives in the committee as chair and vice-chair.

"Receiving three IEEE awards in such a short time is a great honor and means a lot to me. The awards come from colleagues worldwide, and that is especially meaningful when it concerns long-term and sustained contributions, as in the case of WTC. It is even more special when it comes as a surprise, as it did with the Outstanding Service Award, where I didn’t even know I was nominated," says Petar Popovski.

IEEE is one of the largest and most recognized professional organizations in the world, comprising engineers and researchers in communication technology. Therefore, these awards are among the most prestigious in the field.

"The awards have given me new ambitions and ideas for the future. They motivate me to continue our work on quantum communication and the quantum internet, which we research at the Center of Excellence CLASSIQUE, supported by the Danish National Research Foundation. It represents a major shift in both ideas and methodology for our research group," says Petar Popovski.