Research Student Wins Prestigious Award

To win this award, Popoola beat other nominees in this category from other UK colleges and universities. Popoola was nominated for this award by his PhD supervisor Prof. Fary Ghassemlooy. The Xcel award is designed to raise aspirations and acknowledge students who have excelled both academically and personally.

Popoola completed his BSc degree in Electronic and Electrical Engineering with First Class Honours and then gained an MSc degree in Optoelectronic and Communication Systems with distinction. As the best student of the year, he was awarded Northumbria University PhD studentship to work on Free-Space Optical Communication Systems. Popoola completed his PhD research in record time and successfully defended his thesis titled "Subcarrier Intensity Modulated Free-Space Optical Communication Systems" with no corrections. In addition to this Popoola published numerous articles in high impact journals and one book chapter.

For his personal qualities, Popoola was unanimously voted as the Research Students' Representative from 2007 to 2009. He represented his colleagues exceptionally well by making their voice heard and protecting the collective interest of his colleagues.   Prof. Fary Ghassemlooy had this to say about Popoola: "Since joining this school and my research group over four years ago, Popoola has defined his minority background and alongside academic skills displayed outstanding personal qualities in the areas of stewardship, team building and leadership".

This prize is a wonderful recognition of Popoola's achievement and a great recognition for the School of Computing, Engineering and Information Sciences.