Dr. Ervin Sejdić named Associate Director of Pitt’s RFID Center of Excellence

PITTSBURGH  (November 19, 2012) …  Ervin Sejdić, PhD , assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering at the University of Pittsburgh Swanson School of Engineering, was named Associate Director of the  RFID Center for Excellence , according to an announcement from the Office of the Dean, Gerald D. Holder, PhD. Dr. Sejdić will assist with providing strategic direction, obtaining funding, and collaborating on research at the Center, under the supervision of its executive director and founder,  Marlin Mickle, PhD , Bell of PA/Bell Atlantic Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering.

The Center is one of the world's leaders in radio frequency identification technology and research. The RFID Center of Excellence serves as an international resource to academics and members of the business community. Since 2004, four companies have formed as a direct result of Pitt's RFID intellectual property holdings and research, including E-SOC in San Francisco, Calif.; FireFly Power Technologies LLC in Pittsburgh; and Supply Systems Inc. in New Stanton, Pa. Through the Center, the University of Pittsburgh was responsible for establishing the basis of the 915 MHz standard for the U.S. Department of Defense. 

"It's definitely my honor to be working with Dr. Mickle, a world-renowned RFID expert," Dr. Sejdić said. "The RFID Center of Excellence is one of the top three research facilities in the world, and my goal is to continue with this tradition by seeking novel applications of the RFID technology. I am particularly interested in health applications, and how RFID can benefit the health care systems but also to improve the lives of patients. I truly believe that the applications of RFID technology are in its early stages, and RFID still has endless opportunities to enhance our daily lives."

"I am pleased to have Dr. Sejdić join me as associate director, and continue his research at the Center," Dr. Mickle said. "Along with our outstanding graduate students, Dr. Sejdić and I are exploring new RFID applications from healthcare and computer science to energy and secure credit card transactions. He is a fine collaborator and engineer, and I look forward to our continued success."

Dr. Sejdić holds a B.E. Sc. and Ph.D. in electrical engineering from the University of Western Ontario. During his undergraduate studies he specialized in wireless communications while his PhD research focused on signal processing. From 2008-2010 he was a postdoctoral fellow at the Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering at the University of Toronto with a cross-appointment at Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital, Canada's largest children's rehabilitation teaching hospital. During his postdoctoral fellowship, Dr. Sejdić focused on rehabilitation engineering and biomedical instrumentation. He was also a research fellow in medicine at Harvard Medical School cross-appointed at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (July 2010-June 2011), where he focused on cardiovascular and cerebrovascular monitoring of older/diabetic adults.

After joining the University of Pittsburgh in 2011, Dr. Sejdić established the iMED (Innovative Medical Engineering Developments) lab with the goal of becoming an international leader in dynamical biomarkers indicative of age- and disease-related changes and their contributions to functional decline under normal and pathological conditions. In particular, the mission of the lab is to develop clinically relevant solutions by fostering innovation in computational approaches and instrumentation that can be translated to bedside care.