EDITOR’S FOREWORD

Abstract

Dr. Philippe Jean Pierre, President of the Regional Committee for Innovation of Reunion Island, officially opened the fourth edition of the Radio and Antenna Days of the Indian Ocean (IEEE RADIO 2016) that was held at Hotel Le Récif, Saint-Gilles Les Bains, Reunion Island from 10th to 13th October 2016. The conference was organized by the Radio Society (Mauritius) and it was jointly sponsored by the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Society (APS) and Université de La Réunion. In addition, IEEE RADIO 2016 was technically co-sponsored by Union Radio Scientifique Internationale (URSI), IEEE Region 8 and IEEE France Section. The local organizing committee consisted of researchers from CentraleSupélec, France, Université de La Réunion and University of Mauritius.IEEE RADIO 2016 is the fourth of a series of conferences, covering the fields of antennas and propagation, organized in the Indian Ocean region. The idea behind the organization of the RADIO international conference originated at the start of this decade following discussions with engineers and researchers from countries of the Indian Ocean region as well as from other parts of the world. It was unanimously acknowledged that there was an urgent need to initiate a platform that would provide engineers and researchers of the Indian Ocean region opportunities to share knowledge in the field of radio frequency engineering with their international peers. IEEE RADIO 2016 gathered participants from over twenty countries coming from different regions of the world including Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe, Middle-East and North America, and we can confidently say that we have succeeded in our goal.The conference featured fourteen oral sessions on state-of-the-art research themes including antenna design, bio-electromagnetics, computational electromagnetics, devices and circuits, metamaterials and applications, radio astronomy, remote sensing and wireless sensor networks. Invited talks were delivered by Prof. Tapan Sarkar from Syracuse University, USA, Prof. Qing Liu from Duke University, USA and Prof. Monaï Kraikriksh from King Mongkut’s Institute of Technology, Ladkrabang, Thailand. A special session, organized by Dr. Eric Mokole, Vice-Chair of IEEE APS Special Interest Group on Humanitarian Technology (SIGHT), was dedicated to humanitarian activities and projects in the Indian Ocean.All accepted papers that were effectively presented during the conference were submitted to the IEEE Xplore Digital Library. And, in line with the previous editions, a call to extended contributions for publication as a volume in the IoP Conference Series: Materials Science and Engineering (MSE) was made. All of the twenty full papers that were submitted were then peer-reviewed, revised according to the reviewers’ comments and ultimately fourteen papers were accepted for publication in this volume.This fourth edition of the IoP Conference Series: MSE dedicated to selected papers presented at IEEE RADIO 2016 is representative of the scientific content and quality of the RADIO international series of conferences.EditorVikass Monebhurrun