DARPA names Gabriel deputy director

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has selected Kaigham "Ken" Gabriel to serve as its new deputy director, the agency announced.

Gabriel most recently was founder, chairman and chief technology officer at Akustica Inc., a semiconductor company that commercializes micro electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) for consumer electronics products.

From 1992 to 1997, he served at DARPA, where he started the agency’s MEMS program, after which he became director of the Electronics Technology Office.

He also has worked for AT&T Bell Labs in the Robotic Systems Research Department; was a visiting associate professor at the Institute of Industrial Science at the University of Tokyo; and spent a year as a visiting scientist at the Naval Research Laboratory.

Gabriel also is the cofounding executive director of the MEMS Industry Group.

He holds a Ph.D. in electrical engineering and computer science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.