About

Academic biography

Leonard MacEachern is an Associate Professor and Chair in the Department of Electronics at Carleton University. His research has developed across RF and optical interfaces, data conversion, low-power and biomedical electronics, wearable systems, intelligent hardware, detector readout, and the theory and tools that connect physical signals to reliable decisions.

His early work combined computational optimization with RF CMOS devices, oscillators, frequency conversion, and radio architectures. At Carleton, this expanded into optical-link models and predistortion, broadband and distributed circuits, ADCs and timing systems, biomedical acquisition, and supervised research across analog, RF, FPGA, and embedded systems. GestureLogic carried part of that work into wearable products and a patent portfolio. Current research returns to the circuit edge through short-haul interconnects, adaptive conversion, spiking and quantized hardware, AI-assisted design, and MALTA-family detector electronics.

Research perspective

The recurring task is to identify what information an application must preserve, build a model that respects physical constraints, place correction or computation where it changes the useful outcome, and retain enough observability to know when the model or calibration is no longer valid.

Appointments and education

MacEachern completed master's research in computer vision and genetic algorithms and doctoral research in RF CMOS devices, circuits, and architectures. He joined Carleton's Department of Electronics in 2002, served as Associate Chair, Graduate, from July 1, 2012, to June 30, 2016, and became Department Chair in July 2024.

Short biography

Leonard MacEachern is an Associate Professor and Chair in the Department of Electronics at Carleton University. He works on analog and mixed-signal integrated circuits, high-speed optical and electrical interfaces, data conversion, neuromorphic and quantized hardware, and detector electronics. His research connects physical models, correction and calibration, hardware implementation, and observable system evidence.