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Richard Candell (Fed)

Project Leader (Industrial Wireless Systems)

Dr. Richard Candell brings over two decades of wireless systems engineering experience, specializing in research, design, and evaluation of wireless communication systems. His work spans both commercial and defense applications, where he has contributed significantly to secure and reliable wireless technologies. As a lead systems engineer, Dr. Candell developed strategies for spread spectrum interference cancellation and performance evaluation in satellite ground stations and mobile phased array transceivers. His patents cover successive interference cancellation and transmission burst detection for spread-spectrum satellite communications. He earned a Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Burgundy, France, and BS and MS degrees in Electrical Engineering from The University of Memphis.  He joined the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in 2014.  At NIST, Dr. Candell leads the Industrial Wireless Systems research laboratory, focusing on industrial wireless network performance in mobile robotics, manufacturing, and safety applications. He actively participates in IEEE societies as a Senior Member, including the Industrial Electronics Society, Instrumentation and Measurement Society, and the Robotics and Automation Society. Dr. Candell’s contributions extend to the Guide to Industrial Wireless Systems Deployments (NIST AMS 300-4), and he chairs the IEEE P3388 Wireless Performance Assessment and Measurement Working Group and the NIST Industrial Wireless System technical interest group.

 

Awards

Impacts

2024 William P. Slichter Award for spearheading a multi-year initiative to develop a precision channel-sounding apparatus, measure channel impulse responses at various industrial sites, and disseminate measurement data and channel models extensively used by wireless product developers and referenced by researchers. This resulted in numerous publications and several international collaborations with corporations such as Intel, Yokogawa, Emerson Automation and Boeing. His chairmanship of the IEEE P3388 standardization effort and organization of NIST/IEEE industrial wireless workshops within the Industrial Electronics Society have fueled growth and interest in this important research domain. 

2024 Bronze Medal Award for the development and optimization of wireless time-sensitive networking scheduling techniques that accommodate reliability protocols found extensively in industrial environments. Collaborating with industry partners, the group developed precision measurement capabilities, designed experiments, and developed award-winning solutions to protect critical traffic while accommodating non-critical traffic in industrial networks. Based on this work, the collaborating partner, Intel, influenced the IEEE 802.11 standard allowing ubiquitous support to industrial applications.

2019 Bronze Medal for developing innovative measurement methods, a state-of-the-art test bed, and extensive first-in-class measurement data sets that led to a comprehensive Guide to Industrial Wireless Systems Deployments.

IEEE Standard for the Performance Assessment of Industrial Wireless Systems (IEEE 3388-2025), a radio-frequency (RF) reference environment model, test methodology, evaluation process, and detailed signal specifications for the performance testing of industrial wireless networks.

Research

Best Paper, 19th IEEE International Conference on Factory Communication Systems (WFCS 2023)

Best Paper, 17th IEEE International Conference on Factory Communication Systems (WFCS)

Best Paper, 2020 Product Life-cycle Management Conference, Rapperswil, Switzerland.

News

Selected Publications

Industrial Wireless Systems: Radio Propagation Measurements

Author(s)
Richard Candell, Catherine A. Remley, Jeanne T. Quimby, David R. Novotny, Alexandra Curtin, Peter B. Papazian, Galen H. Koepke, Joseph Diener, Mohamed T. Hany
Radio frequency (RF) propagation measurements were conducted at three facilities representing a cross-section of different classes of industrial environments...

Guide to Industrial Wireless Systems Deployments

Author(s)
Richard Candell, Mohamed T. Hany, Kang B. Lee, Yongkang Liu, Jeanne T. Quimby, Catherine A. Remley
This document is intended to be a practical guide used by engineers and managers facilitating them to go through the process of defining the objectives of their...

Wireless User Requirements for the Factory Workcell

Author(s)
Karl Montgomery, Richard Candell, Yongkang Liu, Mohamed Hany
Wireless communication is becoming crucial to advanced manufacturing. Industry 4.0 and Smart Manufacturing depend on networked industrial automation systems...

Publications

Selected Data and Software Publications

Data and Software Publications

Grating Lobes and Spatial Aliasing in Sparse Array Beampatterns

Author(s)
Peter Vouras, Mohamed Hany, Richard Candell, Sudantha Perera, Kate Remley, Carnot Nogueira
Calculated beam pattern in Fourier space of a unitary input given two sparsely sampled synthetic aperture arrays: 1. a regularly spaced array sampled at 2*lambda, where lambda is the wavelength of the

Microwave oven interference measurements at 2.4 GHz

Author(s)
Candell Richard, Jing Geng
The 2.4 GHz ISM band is shared by Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Wireless HART, ISA100.11a, and several other industrial wireless systems. This band also includes microwave ovens which produce interference that
Created February 20, 2019, Updated January 30, 2026
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