Biographical Note*
Wolfgang J. R. Hoefer received his Diplom-Ingenieur (Dipl.-Ing.) degree from the Technical University (Rheinisch-Westfälische Technische Hochschule - RWTH) in Aachen, Germany, in 1965, and his Docteur-Ingénieur (D. Ing.) degree from the University of Grenoble, France, in 1968. In 2007, he was awarded an honorary Doktor-Ingenieur (Dr.-Ing. h.c.) degree by the Technical University of Munich (Technische Universität München - TUM), Germany.
He began his career as a postdoctoral researcher and lecturer at the Institut Universitaire de Technologie - IUT) in Grenoble. In 1969, he joined the University of Ottawa as a faculty member, where he served as Chair of Electrical Engineering for three years. In 1992, he was appointed Professor and NSERC Industrial Research Chair at the University of Victoria in British Columbia. There, he founded and directed the Computational Electromagnetics Research Laboratory (CERL) until his retirement in 2006. Subsequently, he held a three-year position as Principal Scientist and Director of the Independent Investigatorship Department at the Institute of High Performance Computing (IHPC) in Singapore. Currently, he is a Professor Emeritus at the University of Victoria, Canada.
Throughout his academic career, Professor Hoefer held visiting appointments at numerous universities and institutions worldwide, including the Universities of Grenoble, Rome Tor Vergata, Nice-Sophia Antipolis, Perugia, Munich, and Duisburg, as well as the Ferdinand Braun Institut Berlin, ETH Zürich, AEG-Telefunken in Backnang, CRC Ottawa, the Institute of High Performance Computing in Singapore, and the Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA, USA. Beyond academia, he is the founder of Faustus Scientific Corporation, where he served as President and CEO for 21 years.
Professor Hoefer is widely recognized for his pioneering contributions to the field of electrical and electronics engineering. He has been honored as a Life Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) and is a Fellow of several Academies and international organizations, including the Royal Society of Canada (RSC), the German Academy of Science and Engineering (ACATECH), the Canadian Academy of Engineering (CAE), the Engineering Institute of Canada (EIC), the Applied Computational Electromagnetics Society (ACES), and the Electromagnetics Academy at MIT (EMA).
Throughout his career, Professor Hoefer has held numerous leadership roles. He co-founded the International Journal of Numerical Modelling (J. Wiley & Sons) with Peter B. Johns and served as its Managing Editor for 21 years. He also has been an Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Techniques for 3 years. Additionally, he chaired and co-chaired the IEEE MTT-15 Technical Committee on Field Theory (now MTT TC-1) for 14 years and served as a Distinguished Microwave Lecturer for the IEEE Microwave Theory and Techniques Society (IEEE MTT-S) for 3 years.
His seminal contributions have earned him prestigious awards, including the IEEE MTT-S Microwave Career Award, the IEEE MTT-S Microwave Pioneer Award, the IEEE MTT-S Distinguished Educator Award, the IEEE Canada McNaughton Award and Gold Medal, the Most Inspiring Mentor Award from A*Star Singapore, the ACES Mainstay Award, and the Peter Johns Prize. According to a ranking by Stanford University and Elsevier, Professor Hoefer is among the top 2% of scientists worldwide.
* Detailed autobiographies are included in the following book chapters:
cb10 Hoefer. W.J.R.
“In Search of the Intangible - 43 years of Research in
Electromagnetics”
Chapter 1 of “Time Domain Methods in
Electrodynamics — A Tribute to Wolfgang J. R. Hoefer”, P. Russer
and U. Siart, Editors
Springer
Proceedings in Physics 121, Berlin & Heidelberg, Germany, 2008,
pp. 1-18, (18 pages) |
Google Books |
▼Vault
ISBN: 978-3-540-68766-5 (print) ;
978-3-540-68768-9 (online)
cb11 Hoefer. W.J.R.
“Fifty Years of Research in Electromagnetics: A Voyage Back in
Time”
Chapter 1 of “Computational Electromagnetics –
Retrospective and Outlook — In Honor of Wolfgang J. R. Hoefer”,
I. Ahmed and Z. D. Chen, Editors
Springer, Singapore,
2015, pp. 1-27, (27 pages) |
Google Books |
▼Vault
ISBN: 978-981-287-094-0 (print) ;
978-981-287-095-7 (online)
Principal Full-Time Positions
1968 - 1969 Lecturer, Institut Universitaire de Technologie (IUT) de Grenoble, France
1968 - 1969 Postdoctoral Research Associate, Electromagnetics Laboratory, Institut National Polytechnique de Grenoble, France
1969 - 1975 Assistant Professor of Electrical Engineering, University of Ottawa, Canada
1975 - 1980 Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering, University of Ottawa, Canada
1978 - 1981 Chair of Electrical Engineering, University of Ottawa, Canada
1980 - 1992 Professor of Electrical Engineering, University of Ottawa, Canada
1992 - 2006 Professor and NSERC Industrial Research Chair in Radio-Frequency Engineering, and Head of the Computational Electromagnetics Research Laboratory, Dept. of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Victoria, Canada
1996 - 2017 President and Chief Executive Officer, Faustus Scientific Corporation, Victoria, BC, Canada
2006 - pres. Professor Emeritus of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Victoria, Canada
2009 - 2012 Principal Scientist, Department of Electronics and Photonics, Institute of High Performance Computing, A*Star, Singapore
2010 - 2012 Director, IHPC Independent Investigatorship (I^3) Department, Institute of High Performance Computing, A*Star, Singapore
Visiting & Adjunct Positions
Visiting Scientist, Satellite Electronics Laboratory, AEG-Telefunken, Backnang, Germany, Jun 1976 - Dec 1976 (6 months)
Visiting Professor, Laboratoire d'Électromagnétisme, Institut National Polytechnique de Grenoble, France, Jan 1977 - Jul 1977 (6 months)
Visiting Scientist, Space Electronics, Communications Research Center, Department of Communications, Government of Canada, Ottawa, Canada, Jul 1984 - Jun 1985 (1 year)
Visiting Professor, Dept. of Electronic Engineering, University of Rome II "Tor Vergata", Italy, Jul 1990 - Sep 1990 (3 months)
Visiting Professor, Laboratoire d'Électronique, University of Nice–Sophia, Antipolis, France, Oct 1990 - Mar 1991 (6 months)
Visiting Professor, Institute of High Frequency Engineering, Technical University of Munich, Germany, Apr 1991 - Jun 1991 (3 months)
Adjunct Professor, Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Ottawa, Canada, Sep 1992 - Aug 1995 (3 years)
Visiting Professor, Electrical Engineering and Sonderforschungsbereich 254, Gerhard Mercator University of Duisburg, Germany, Apr 1996 - May 1996 (1 month)
Visiting Professor, Institute of High Frequency Engineering, Technical University of Munich, Germany, Oct 1999 - Dec 1999 (3 months)
Visiting Professor, Georgia Electronic Design Center, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia, USA, Mar 2005 - Apr 2005 (1.5 months)
Visiting Professor, Department of Electronic and Information Engineering, University of Perugia, Italy, Apr 2005 - Jun 2005 (1.5 months)
Visiting Professor, Institute of High Frequency Engineering, Technical University of Munich, Germany, Apr 2007 - Jul 2007 (4 months)
Visiting Professor, Laboratory for Electromagnetic Fields and Microwave Electronics, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zürich (ETHZ), Aug 2007 - Nov 2007 (4 months)
Visiting Scientist, Institute of High Performance Computing, Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR), Singapore, May 2008, and Feb 2009 - Mar 2009 (3 months)
Membership in Learned Societies
The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) - M'71, SM'78, F'91, LF'07
The Royal Society of Canada (RSC), Academy of Sciences - Fellow since 2003
The Canadian Academy of Engineering (CAE) - Fellow since 2009
The Engineering Institute of Canada (EIC) - Fellow since 2016
The German National Academy of Science and Engineering (ACATECH) - Fellow since 2008
The Advanced Systems Institute of British Columbia (now BCIC) - Fellow, 1992 - 2004
The Electromagnetics Academy (MIT) - Fellow since 1989
Union Radio-Scientifique Internationale (URSI) - Member since 1978
The Applied Computational Electromagnetics Society (ACES) - Member since 1992, Fellow since 2020
Editorships
Associate Editor, Electromagnetics/Guided Waves, IEEE Trans. on Microwave Theory and Techniques, 1998 - 2000
Managing Editor, International Journal of Numerical Modelling - Electronic Networks, Devices and Fields (John Wiley & Sons), 1988-2009
Guest Editor, IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Techniques, Special IMS Symposium Issue, December 2002
Editorial Reviewer
Selected Committees and Boards
IEEE-MTT Technical Committee on Field Theory and Computational EM
(MTT TC-1)
(Former Technical Committee on Field
Theory MTT-15)
- Chair, 1996 - 2002
- Co-Chair, 1989 - 1995, 2002 - 2004
- Member, since 1985
Steering Committee, IEEE MTT-S International Microwave
Symposium
- Chair of Local Arrangements, Ottawa, Canada, 1978
- Editor, Special Symposium Issue, Seattle, 2002
International Workshop on TLM
(later "Computational
Electromagnetics in Time-Domain")
- General Chair, Victoria, Canada, 1995
- Program Committee, 1997 - 2007
Asia-Pacific Symposium on Electromagnetic Compatibility
General Chair, Singapore, 2012
Scientific Advisory Board, Ferdinand Braun Institute
Berlin,
Germany, 1993 - 1998
Scientific Review Panel, Pacific Institute for the Mathematical
Sciences (PIMS)
Vancouver, BC, Canada, 1996 - 2000
Board of Directors, Vancouver Island Advanced Technology Center
(VIATEC)
Victoria, BC, Canada, 1997 - 1999
New Fellows Committee, Academy of Sciences, Royal Society of
Canada
Ottawa, ON, Canada, 2003 - 2006
Task Force on Nanoelectronics, German Acad. of Science & Engineering
(acatech)
Berlin and Munich, Germany, 2008 - 2011
Agency for the Evaluation of University Research (AERES), Govt. of
France
Expert Evaluator, Nice, France, 2010 - 2011
Executive Committee, Institute of High Performance Computing (IHPC),
A*Star
Singapore, 2009 - 2012
Executive Committee, NEMO-IEEE MTT-S International Conference on
Numerical Electromagnetics and Multiphysics Modeling and Optimization
2014 - present
International Advisory Committee, APEMC 2026 Asia-Pacific International
Symposium and Exhibition on Electromagnetic Compatibility
Kuala
Lumpur, Malaysia, May 4-7, 2026
Updated on 11 December 2024
