Programme in Detail
The WiCoS programme is spread over 2 years with 4 quarters per year. Your courses will evolve from the more general ones in the common core in the beginning of the programme to more specialised in the second quarter and beyond, and finally your thesis project. See below.
| First Year (60 EC) | |||
| 1st quarter | 2nd quarter | 3rd quarter | 4th quarter |
| Main core courses | Main core courses | Main core courses | Track core courses |
| Track core courses | Track core courses | Specialisation courses | |
| Specialisation courses | Specialisation courses | Specialisation courses | |
| Second Year (60 EC) | |||
| 1st quarter | 2nd quarter | 3rd quarter | 4th quarter |
| Free elective courses | Graduation project (45 EC) | ||
For more information, visit studyguide.tudelft.nl
| Main Core (18 EC) | ||
| An individual exam programme (IEP) of the track Wireless Communication and Sensing consists of the parts as indicated below. Note that course loads are expressed in EC, with 1 EC indicating nominally 28 hours of active study, including class and self-study. |
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| 1. Compusary courses | ||
| Profile Orientation and Academic Skills | 3 EC | |
| Systems Engineering | 5 EC | |
| 2. Main core courses Choose 2 out of 9 (more is allowed) | ||
| The so-called main core consists of a set of fundamental courses in EE, of which you are required to select 3. Each of them is 5 EC. These courses aim to strengthen your general fundamental knowledge and skills. One of the reasons for this setup is that you will be better able to work in multi-disciplinary teams. Most of these courses have an assignment that will allow you to apply the theory of the course in the direction of your chosen track, i.e. WiCoS. These courses are all in the 1st quarter. |
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| Advanced Computing Systems | 5 EC | |
| Analog Circuit Design Fundamentals | 5 EC | |
| Control System Design | 5 EC | |
| Electromagnetics | 5 EC | |
| Machine Learning for Electrical Engineering | 5 EC | |
| Measurement and Instrumentation | 5 EC | |
| Networking | 5 EC | |
| Statistical Digital Signal Processing and Modeling | 5 EC | |
| Wireless Systems for Electrical Engineering Applications | 5 EC | |
| 3. Track core (select 3 out of 5) | ||
| The WiCoS track core consists of a number of broadly applicable fundamental courses as listed below, of which you are required to select at least 3. Generally, these courses are in the 2nd and 3rd quarter. Most courses are 5 EC. |
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| Advanced Electromagnetics | 5 EC | |
| Estimation and Detection | 5 EC | |
| Fundamentals of Wireless Communications | 5 EC | |
| Performance Analysis | 5 EC | |
| Propagation and Scattering of EM waves | 5 EC | |
| 4. Specialisation courses (at least 24 EC) | ||
| You are required to take at least 24 EC of specialisation courses (about 4 to 5 courses). The specialisation courses as offered by the Wireless Communication and Sensing related research groups are shown below. However, in consultation with the master coordinator and/or your tentative thesis supervisor, you can take any EE or CE or even any EEMCS course as a specialisation course. You can also take extra track core courses (or common core courses) in your specialisation space. |
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| Ad-hoc Networks | Applied Convex Optimization | Applied Electromagnetic Analysis in Wireless, Microwave and Radar Engineering | Blockchain Engineering | Distributed Algorithms | Error Correcting Codes | Integrated Circuits for RF wireless applications | High Frequency Wireless Architectures | Internet of Things Seminar | Intro to UWB technology, systems and applications | Measuring and Simulating the Internet | Mobile Networks | Modelling and Data Analysis in Complex Networks | Network Security | Networked and Distributed Control Systems | Object Classification with Radar | Optimization in systems and control | Quasi Optical Systems | Radar I: From Basic Principles to Applications | Radar II: Theory and System Design | Security and Cryptography | Sensor Signal and Data Processing | Signal Processing for Communications | Smartphone Sensing | Spectral Domain Methods in Electromagnetics | Telecommunication Network Architectures | Superconducting Astronomical Instrumentation | Telecommunication Business Architectures and Models | Wavefield Imaging |
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| 5. Free Electives (15 EC) | ||
| In the free elective space, you can take any MSc level courses from TU Delft (and from other universities, only when taken during your enrolment in TU Delft). At most 15 EC of these can count toward your IEP (Individual Exam Programme). Some of many possibilities are listed below. |
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| Business development lab (short) | Cyber Risk Management | Digital Business | Entrepreneurship: basic course | Extra Project | I&C Architecture Design | I&C Services Design | Integrated Design of I&C Architectures | Internship | Project entrepreneurship |
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| Thesis Project (45 EC) | ||
| The thesis project is the last study unit of the programme and serves to prove that the student has acquired the academic competencies of a Master of Science. The project involves a research or design task with sufficient academic level. The project may be executed within a research group at TU Delft, or in a suitable research institute or company. The project must be carried out with a systematic approach and should include all phases of a research or design project: analysis, modelling, implementation/construction and validation/evaluation. You will execute the thesis project independently, guided by a daily supervisor and under the responsibility of a full or associate professor. | ||
WiCoS Profiles – Consistent Sets of Courses for Specialisation Directions
Your individual exam programme (IEP) should be agreed upon with your thesis professor (supervisor). Naturally, the supervisor would advise you to take certain courses so that you are better prepared for a thesis project in his/her research direction. In order to help you to understand how certain courses work together for certain research directions and guide you in making the relevant choices, please find a number of profile packages below. These profiles typically specify a number of highly recommended courses that more or less define the profile, and a larger number of additionally relevant courses. You are not required to take all these courses; it is just a shortlist of potentially relevant courses. Actually, you really have the opportunity to fill in your own IEP in a broader way than just focused on a specific profile. It is therefore important to discuss your IEP at an early stage with your (tentative) thesis supervisor and negotiate your wishes.
Profile: Terahertz Sensing
The Terahertz Sensing profile is an applied electromagnetics profile that focuses on the various theoretical and practical aspects of electromagnetic fields and radiation. The education deals with an extensive introduction to the electromagnetic theory, which is necessary in many fields of electrical engineering, such as communications, antennas, radar and microwave engineering. The most useful mathematical tools for the analysis of electromagnetic problems and antennas are explained with parallel emphasis to their application in real-world problems. The profile prepares for graduation in the Terahertz Sensing research group, which has expertise and actively conducts research activities on novel quasi optical systems, antennas and sensors for the following applications: space observation, medical imaging, security screening, next generation communications and radar front ends.
Within this profile, you will learn about the physical phenomena behind generation, guided propagation, transmission, and reception of electromagnetic waves, as well as the principles of radiation from antennas, typical antenna structures, and basic skills of antenna design.
Profile courses:
| EE4C05 | Electromagnetics |
| EE4510 | Advanced Electromagnetics |
| EE4580 | Quasi Optical Systems |
| EE4620 | Spectral Domain Methods in Electromagnetics |
| EE4730 | High Frequency Wireless Architectures |
Contact person: Prof. A. Neto (THz Sensing group)
Profile: Microwave Sensing and Radar
The radar profile focuses on education on physical and signal processing foundations of remote sensing by exploiting electromagnetic waves in a number of societal important applications such as autonomous driving, safety and security and next generation wireless telecommunication systems. It covers electromagnetic wave propagation and scattering, basic principles of electromagnetic sensors for near-, intermediate- and far-field sensing, as well as algorithms and methods that enable detection and parameter estimation of objects from measured electromagnetic fields. Special attention is given to such areas as antenna systems and radar front-ends (including 5G and beyond phased arrays and ultra-wideband antennas), waveform agility (adaptive selection of efficient sensing waveforms), signal processing algorithms for radar imaging, advanced detection, classification and tracking of different objects.
The profile covers a wide range of microwave systems from phased array radar and distributed MIMO radar systems up to automotive radar and microwave vision systems. The societal applications supported by this profile are: autonomous driving and traffic control, Earth monitoring, weather nowcast, medical imaging, and public safety and security.
Profile courses:
| EE4C05 | Electromagnetics |
| EE4565 | Propagation and Scattering of EM Waves |
| ET4169 | Radar I: From Basic Principles to Applications |
| ET4175 | Radar II: Theory and System Design |
Contact person: Prof. A. Yarovoy (MS3 group)
Profile: Physical Layer Signal Processing for Communication
This profile focuses on physical layer aspects of 5G and beyond wireless communication systems, i.e., how to transport information through a physical radio channel. It covers the fundamental issues of modulation, coding, channel estimation, equalization, and detection of the transmitted data. A particular focus is on signal processing for multi-antenna systems, such as adaptive beamforming, (blind) source separation, and Massive MIMO. Current research topics focus also on using the communication signal for localization, with applications to indoor localization, sensor networks, and satellite swarm navigation.
Profile courses:
| EE4C03 | Statistical Digital Signal Processing and Modelling |
| ET4358 | Fundamentals of Wireless Communication |
| ET4386 | Estimation and Detection |
| ET4147 | Signal Processing for Communications |
Contact persons: Prof. A.J. van der Veen (CAS group), Prof. G.J.T. Leus (CAS group). Dr. G.J.M. Janssen (CAS group)
Profile: Network Design & Management
This profile focuses on the design and evaluation of wireless communication protocols and programmable network architectures. This profile combines the study of domain specific topics in networking (protocols, performance evaluation), control (distributed algorithms, new AI methods in network management) with the study of more fundamental concepts of network science (graph theory, stochastic analysis). You will learn to apply these concepts in developing new network applications (5G, IoT) and more general in critical infrastructures (electricity grid) and e.g. network models of the human brain.
Profile courses:
| EE4C06 | Networking |
| CS4055 | High Performance Data Networking |
| ET4358 | Fundamentals of Wireless Communication |
| IN4341 | Performance Analysis |
Contact persons: Prof. Piet Van Mieghem (NAS group)
Electives: Internet-of-Things
Although vaguely defined, the Internet of Things has become a popular term to denote a society in which (physical) objects can be accessed remotely through the Internet. Be it for inferring information, or for exercising control on what these objects do. Key challenges revolve around localization, energy harvesting, wireless and programmable networks, data analytics, and all of that in a secure and reliable manner. The IoT courses listed below teach you how to address those challenges. “Seeing is believing”; that is, the courses encourage you – in the spirit of IoT – to put theory to practice by experimenting with many types of wired/wireless networks (like LoRa or mmWave) and pushing the boundaries of what is possible with state-of-the-art technology.
Please note that the list below is not part of a profile similar to those listed above. It only suffices to provide an overview of courses related to an IoT theme. You can e.g. take those courses as additional specialisation courses or as free electives.
| Ad-hoc Networks | Cellular Networking - Architectures & Services | Cellular Networking - Radio Access Networks | High Performance Data Networking | Internet of Things Seminar | Introduction to UWB technology, systems and applications | Measuring and Simulating the Internet | Network Security | Networking | Performance Analysis | Sensor Signal and Data Processing | Smartphone Sensing | Wireless Communication | Wireless Networking |