Student Info > Masters & Ph.D. > Qualifying Exam Syllabi
Signal & Image Processing (SIP)
In the Fall quarter 2012, the SIP Group will offer the qualifying exam in the following two formats. A student taking the quals has the option to take either format. It should be noted that Format I will not be offered after this quarter.
Format I:
Three SIP faculty will be examining students in four different SIP areas as listed below. The students should specify which 3 of the 4 areas they want to be covered in their exam and the available schedule during the exam week as soon as possible.
Linear Systems Theory
C. Phillips, J. Parr, and E. Riskin, Signals, Systems, and Transforms (3rd edition), Chapter 2-7, 9-12.
Convolution
Fourier Transforms
Continuous and Discrete Time Systems
Finding system inputs/outputs, system properties
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Stochastic Processes
Y. Viniotis, Probability & Random Proc. for Electrical Engineers, McGraw Hill, 1998.
Random Variables and Probability
Probability fundamentals - one and multiple random variables, expectations, characteristic functions, independence/uncorrelatedness
Classification of random processes - 2nd order characterization (correlation, power spectral density), ergodicity, stationarity
Filtering by LTI systems
Special Processes - Markov Chains/Processes, Gaussian Processes
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Digital Signal Processing
A.V. Oppenheim, R.W. Schafer, J.R. Buck, /Discrete Time Signal Processing,/ (2nd edition) Prentice Hall 1999,
Or equivalently
A.V. Oppenheim, R.W. Schafer, /Discrete Time Signal Processing,/ (3rd edition) Pearson 2010.
Chapter 7: Filter Design Techniques
Chapter 8.4-8.9: The Discrete Fourier Transform
Chapter 9: Computations of Discrete Fourier Transform
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Digital Image Processing
R.C. Gonzales and R.E. Woods, /Digital Image Processing,/ (3rd edition) Prentice Hall, 2008.
Chapter 2: Digital Image Fundamentals
Chapter 3: Intensity Transformations and Spatial Filtering
Chapter 4: Filtering in the Frequency Domain
Chapter 8: Image Compression
Chapter 9: Morphological Image Processing
Chapter 10: Image Segmentation
Format II:
Format II is the new UWEE SIP group qualifying exam format being offered fall quarter 2012 and will be the only format offered into the future. The exam is given only to students in the UWEE Ph.D. program. The following list indicates what is required to pass this exam and several contingencies.
- The student does a significant research project under the guidance of an advisor.
- The student writes up, entirely on their own without direct text contributions of the advisor, the results of the research project as a paper of between 10-25 pages. The research paper should be given to the committee at least 2 weeks prior to the actual exam.
- The student presents the results via an oral exam to a committee consisting of the advisor and one other person.
- The secondary person can be either EE faculty, EE adjunct, EE affiliate, or other scientist who would qualify for serving on a Ph.D. exam committee later. The person is selected by the advisor and the student, and should be someone from the research area, perhaps a collaborator.
- The oral exam should consist of a 45-50 minute presentation, and leave time for questions. It is recommended that the advisor/student schedule a 1.5 hour slot for this exam.
- The examiners may also invite others to the oral part of the exam and may allow for questions from the non-examiners, but the questions by the examiners should be in private.
- The two-person committee will evaluate the student's work, the written report, and the oral presentation. Based on this evaluation, they write a report to the SIP Quals Committee for that quarter.
- The SIP Quals Committee for the student consists of all SIP professors excluding the two-person committee members. The pass/fail decision is by the majority vote of the SIP Quals Committee (see below for more information on failing).
- The report is also sent to the UWEE graduate student coordinator and that goes on the student’s file.
- The report must address:
- A grade of pass or fail
- The quality and independence of the research
- The quality of the written report (note that student may be allowed to improve it if that's the only problem)
- The quality of the oral presentation
- Judgment of the student's ability to go on to pursue dissertation research based on this sample and other work so far
- A statement by the advisor on whether or not he/she wants to keep working with the student and the reasons why. If the student is moving to another advisor, this should be noted.
- It is required for a student to complete their qualifying exam by the end of their second year in the Ph.D. program. If a student does not do this, the advisor may request an extension for up to one year.
If the student fails the exam, then the student may take the exam one additional time. If the student fails the exam twice, then the student will be asked to leave the UWEE Ph.D. program. For the purposes of this time of transition from Format I to Format II, if a student previously failed the exam in Format I and then decides to take the second exam in Format II, then they only have one chance to pass the exam in Format II.
