Mac Van Valkenburg

Mac Elwyn Van Valkenburg (October 5, 1921–March 19, 1997) was an American electrical engineer and university professor. He wrote seven textbooks and numerous scientific publications.^[1]

Van Valkenburg was born in Union, Utah.^[1] He graduated from the University of Utah in 1943 with a Bachelor's degree in electrical engineering, received a master's degree in electrical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1946, and a PhD in electrical engineering from Stanford University in 1952, under advisor Oswald Garrison Villard, Jr.

Van Valkenburg was a professor at the University of Illinois from 1955 to 1966, then joined Princeton University as professor and head of electrical engineering until 1974, when he returned to UIUC. He received an endowed position, the W. W. Grainger Professorship, in 1982, and became Dean of the College of Engineering in 1984.^[1]

Van Valkenburg was author of seven textbooks and numerous scientific publications. He died in Orem, Utah at the age of 75.

• Member of the National Academy of Engineering
• The Lamme Medal, the highest honor of the American Society for Engineering Education
• The IEEE Centennial Medal in 1984^[1]
• The ASEE George Westinghouse Award (1963)^[2]
• The IEEE Education Medal (1972)^[3]
• Halliburton Engineering Education Leadership Award of the College of Engineering at the University of Illinois.

The IEEE Education Society offers an annual Mac Van Valkenburg Early Career Teaching Award. UIUC established the M. E. Van Valkenburg Graduate Research Award in 1990.

His Ph.D. students have included:^[4]

• Leon O. Chua ('64; IEEE Fellow and Professor in the electrical engineering and computer sciences department at the University of California, Berkeley, considered to be the father of nonlinear circuit theory and cellular neural networks)
• Prof. VGK Murthi (Prof. and Dean at the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras, India)
• Franklin Kuo ('58; Prof. at the University of Hawaii), who was instrumental in the development of the Aloha protocol
• Jose B. Cruz Jr. ('59; control theorist and Prof. at Ohio State University)
• King-Sun Fu ('59; founding president of the International Association for Pattern Recognition and Prof. at Purdue University)
• S. L. Hakimi ('59; mathematician at Northwestern University)
• Shlomo Karni ('60; Prof. at the University of New Mexico, founding dean of engineering at Tel Aviv University '70)
• Steven B. Sample ('65; President of University of Southern California).