Professor Robert Henderson elected Royal Society of Edinburgh (RSE) Fellow

Professor Henderson is among 75 new fellows selected to join the RSE for their individual excellence and thought leadership in their respective fields, across the sciences, arts, business, professions, and the third and public sectors.

Founded in 1783 for ‘the advancement of learning and useful knowledge’, the RSE plays a role in advising policymakers and aims to inspire the next generation of innovative thinkers.

Professor Robert Henderson is a Professor of Electronic Imaging in the School of Engineering at the University of Edinburgh and Fellow of IEEE. He obtained his PhD in 1990 from the University of Glasgow. From 1991, he was a research engineer at the Swiss Centre for Microelectronics, Neuchatel, Switzerland. In 1996, he was appointed senior VLSI engineer at VLSI Vision Ltd, Edinburgh, UK where he worked on the world’s first single chip video camera. From 2000, as principal VLSI engineer in STMicroelectronics Imaging Division he developed image sensors for mobile phone applications.

He joined the University of Edinburgh in 2005, designing the first SPAD image sensors in nanometer CMOS technologies in the MegaFrame and SPADnet EU projects. This research activity led to the first volume SPAD time-of-flight products in 2013 in the form of STMicroelectronics FlightSense series, which perform an autofocus-assist now present in over 2 billion smartphones. He benefits from a long-term research partnership with STMicroelectronics in which he explores medical, scientific and high speed imaging applications of SPAD technology. In 2014, he was awarded a prestigious ERC advanced fellowship.

Professor Robert Henderson commented,

The success of my engineering career highlights the mutual benefits of transitioning between industry and academia. I hope that my story can inspire the next generation to pursue this rewarding, cross-sector journey.

Sir John Lazar CBE FREng, President of the Royal Academy of Engineering, said,

This year’s cohort will be joining a community of over 1,700 top engineers and innovators in the UK and around the world. Together, we ensure that bright ideas are supported, scaled and shared, turning ambition into innovation and innovation into impact. We aim to strengthen education, skills and inclusion to inspire and equip the engineers of today and tomorrow.

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