Electrical Engineering Department, Stanford University

We are the largest department within the School of Engineering, with 60 active faculty, and more than 1,000 PhD, MS, and BS students. Each year, more than 250 students earn Electrical Engineering degrees.

We Are Scholars

Throughout our long history (2019 marked our 125th anniversary), our faculty have received some of the highest honors and awards for their research and teaching. We have set the tone for technology around the world, from the invention of microprocessors, public-key cryptography, and MIMO wireless technology. Our faculty have received a multitude of awards, including the Nobel Prize, three Turing Awards, the National Medal of Science, the Ho-Am Prize, five IEEE Shannon Awards, three Marconi Awards, three IEEE Hamming Awards, two Academy Awards, and induction into the National Inventors Hall of Fame. Eighteen current faculty are members of The National Academy of Engineering (NAE), and two are foreign members of Chinese Academy of Engineering (CAE). Current faculty have a combined Google Scholar citation count exceeding one million.

We Are Interdisciplinary

The application of EE techniques across disciplines is growing rapidly. Of our 60 active faculty, 25 are joint with other departments, including computer science, statistics, material science & engineering, management science & engineering, aeronautics & astronautics, earth sciences, radiology, and SLAC.

Today, nearly every manufactured product, from cars and refrigerators to phones and medical devices, includes electronic circuits, uses signal‐processing algorithms, and is linked to a network. These innovations have originated from research that forms the intellectual core of the department.

We build upon and apply EE techniques to basic sciences, addressing major societal challenges. Our interdisciplinary research includes biomedical and energy projects, including neural prosthetics, wirelessly powered implants, biosensors, solar cells, thermoelectric devices, and the smart grid. Read about EE Research Areas.

We are the Heart of Silicon Valley

The history of Silicon Valley traces back to the Stanford Electrical Engineering department. We continue to work closely with industry while encouraging entrepreneurial innovation. In fact, EE students, faculty & alumni have started an astonishing array of startup companies. Throughout campus, several institutes and centers provide opportunities for students to perform interdisciplinary research that extends beyond the scope of any one of the university's organized schools. We are very proud of our innovative history and excited to discover future directions for entrepreneurship and electrical engineering.