PIPages
Labs

Yasaman Ghasempour

Princeton University, NJ·Engineering·Early-career

Future wireless networks will need to carry far more data than today's, and they increasingly need to sense the world around them as well as communicate. One promising route is the terahertz (THz) band, frequencies above 100 GHz, which offers enormous bandwidth.

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Fields

Engineering

Computer Science

Topics

terahertz communications

THz

NextG wireless

Grants
5 known grants, through Sep 2029

What they work on

  1. Steer narrow terahertz beams electronically using a new multi-slit antenna, in which the beam's angle depends on the signal frequency and the slit geometry, to overcome the high signal loss at frequencies above 100 GHz.
  2. Build network control functions, such as path tracking and THz link diagnostics, that keep a terahertz connection running while users and surrounding objects move.
  3. Reuse wideband data signals from the multi-slit antenna to find the receiver's location and map surrounding objects, combining sensing and communication above 100 GHz.
  4. Model and exploit near-field curved wavefronts from large THz arrays to form beams that bend around or re-form after obstacles, and design a programmable array that adapts them to user movement.
  5. Develop power-efficient digital signal processing for tens of GHz of bandwidth, and model interference when one base station serves both near-field and far-field users.
  6. Give robots a beyond-vision sense by using THz signals to infer object materials without contact, and combine mmWave, THz, and camera data to perceive objects that are hidden or in cluttered scenes.
  7. Co-optimize sensing and control for robotic manipulation tasks, so that each improves the other, and test the approach through prototypes and experiments.
  8. Develop AI-enabled ISAC for post-disaster networks, using wireless digital twins for rapid restoration and multi-static sensing to locate people and objects in damaged, cluttered areas.
  9. Combine ISAC with first responders' augmented-reality headsets and mobile edge computing to sense around obstacles, demonstrated with OpenAirInterface 5G and distributed massive MIMO nodes.
  10. Plan the integration of multi-band wireless testbeds at partner institutions into a single AI-controlled virtual platform, with tools for multi-site experiments and real-time data visualization.

More about the research

These signals are hard to use, though. They lose strength quickly, travel in narrow beams, and are easily blocked. Across five projects, the lab builds the antennas, signal processing, and network control needed to make very-high-frequency wireless links work for moving users. It also reuses those same signals to sense people, objects, and materials, for applications ranging from robots to disaster response.

Why it matters

Faster and more resilient wireless links could support connected robots, virtual and extended reality, and next-generation 6G networks. Sensing through wireless signals could let factory, warehouse, assistive, and home robots handle objects they cannot see or touch. After hurricanes or other disasters, wireless networks that also sense their surroundings could help restore communication faster. They could also help first responders find people and navigate damaged areas with limited visibility.

Known grants

From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.

Collaborative Research: NeTS: Medium: Resilient Multi-User Mobile sub-THz Networks using Near-Field Wavefronts

NSF · Oct 2025 – Sep 2029

VINES: Track 2: AReS: Assessing, Restoring, and Supporting Post-Disaster Connectivity and Situational Awareness Through AI-Enabled ISAC and ISAC-AR Integration

NSF · Sep 2026 – Aug 2029

Collaborative Research: Planning: AI-Ready: DHARMA.AI Digital Hardware + Analog-RF for Multifunctional Apertures with AI

NSF · Aug 2025 – Jul 2027

Closest labs

Subhanshu Gupta

Washington State University, WA·Engineering

Use the frequency-dependent beams of true-time-delay arrays to cut beam-training overhead, and design a low-latency protocol that trains beams and estimates interference at the same time in dense millimeter-wave networks.

Rose Qingyang Hu

Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, VA·Engineering

Reconstruct how wireless signal energy varies with position and direction by combining sparse channel state information measurements with 3D environment layouts rebuilt from images, using radiance-field-inspired models and array signal processing.

Hualiang Zhang

University of Massachusetts-Lowell, MA·Engineering

Design and fabricate photonically driven THz reflectarray unit cells built from hybrid gold–germanium mesa-array semiconductor structures whose reflection phase changes under light.

The school

Princeton University: 26 labs on PI Pages, $559M a year on research, 403 research doctorates a year.

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