Nebraska Engineering alumnus and former electrical engineering professor Donald C. Cox, Harald Trap Friis Professor Emeritus at Stanford University, was awarded the 2025 Arno Penzias Award for Contributions to Basic Research in Radio by the Radio Club of America.
The award recognizes Cox’s pioneering work in radio science and wireless communications, honoring a career that helped lay the foundation for the world’s modern mobile technologies.
Cox grew up in the Nebraska communities of Dunning and Minatare before earning his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in electrical engineering from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln, graduating with distinction in 1959 and 1960. After serving in the U.S. Air Force and contributing to the advanced DynaSoar re-entry aircraft project, he completed his Ph.D. at Stanford and joined Bell Laboratories where he became a key figure in the development of the first cellular telephone system.
He helped lead major advances in digital wireless communications at Bell Communications Research (Bellcore) and collaborated with Nobel Laureates Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson on groundbreaking millimeter-wave and satellite communication experiments. Cox went on to a distinguished academic career at Stanford before returning to UNL in 2012 as a visiting professor of electrical engineering.
Throughout his distinguished career, Cox received some of the highest honors in his field, including the IEEE Alexander Graham Bell Medal, the IEEE Third Millennium Medal, and an honorary Doctor of Science degree from UNL.
