UC Women in Science: Carmo Medeiros
Carmo Medeiros, Professor at the Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering – Faculty of Sciences and Technology of the University of Coimbra and researcher at the UC Institute of Telecommunications, is the 'UC Women in Science' featured guest for June.
Carmo Medeiros became interested in telecommunications as a way of dealing with "the feeling of isolation". She was born in the Azores, and living on an island led to "a growing urge to communicate", she says, adding that she always liked maths and physics.
Today, Carmo Medeiros is a professor at the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the Faculty of Sciences and Technology of the University of Coimbra (UC) and a researcher at the UC Institute of Telecommunications.
She started her undergraduate studies in Electronics and Telecommunications at the University of Aveiro and tells us: "When I arrived, there were five girls and 60 boys enrolled," she says. This discrepancy immediately struck her, she admits that she had no idea there was a gender bias in engineering: "I didn't know the statistics," she reveals. It's something that worries her a lot today, because "there are still very few of us in the field, and we shouldn't be telling girls that they're not good at maths or physics,".
As soon as she finished her undergraduate degree, she flew to Wales with a scholarship that she secured to do her master's degree. She then went on to pursue her doctorate with a contract as a research assistant. In the meantime, she married, had a child, and decided to return to Portugal.
She started her teaching career in the Algarve. Finding funding to continue her research, however, was the biggest challenge. "As a colleague of mine said, you have to apply for five projects to get one accepted." In 2012, the course she taught was cancelled due to insufficient enrolment. However, Carmo couldn't see herself working in any field other than telecommunications, which brought her to the University of Coimbra.
English subtitles available soon
In a nutshell, Carmo Medeiros has been researching "efficient ways of transmitting information over distance." So far, radio frequencies have been the norm, but the future lies in the use of optics, i.e., light. "Telecommunications is always evolving," she points out. "We've had 4G, 5G, and we're already planning for 6G." It's the same with optical communications. "We are now moving away from cables to transmitting light signals through space." In practical terms, this means being able to access the internet without a router.
Still, she is somewhat apprehensive about the future. "We've been fortunate to be able to evolve, but now we're seeing wars in different parts of the world." However, she believes that "we must remain optimistic and continue to evolve as human beings."
Maria do Carmo Medeiros is a professor at the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (DEEC) at FCTUC and a senior researcher at the UC Institute of Telecommunications (IT).
She holds a degree in Electronics and Telecommunications from the University of Aveiro and an M.Sc. and Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering, specialising in Telecommunications, from Bangor University, UK, in 1989 and 1993, respectively.
She began her academic career as a research associate at the University of Bangor, UK. From 1993 to 2012, she was a professor at the University of the Algarve, where she was a founding member and coordinator of the Centre for Electronics, Optoelectronics, and Telecommunications (CEOT).
Since 2012, she has been an Associate Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Faculty of Sciences and Technology, at the University of Coimbra. Her research, conducted at the Telecommunications Institute, focuses on the development of innovative light-based telecommunication technologies that can respond to the massive growth of internet traffic.
More recently, her work has focused on optical communication networks and systems, whether using invisible light, infrared or even visible light from LEDs used simultaneously.
A notable feature of these systems is the ability to extract information about the environment from the characteristics of the communication signals, such as identifying objects, counting the number of people in a room, or detecting motion. She is the PI of the LandMark - Light Communication Detection and Ranging project.