We are living in the information age and wireless communication networks provide the critical infrastructure for anytime, anywhere connectivity to information. Advances in computing, communication and sensing technologies are enabling unprecedented new ways in which information can be gathered, processed and shared wirelessly. However, the rapid proliferation of a dazzling array of networks of heterogeneous wireless communication devices poses immediate and significant technical challenges. One of the biggest challenges is the efficient use of the shared and essentially limited radio frequency spectrum over which wireless devices communicate. On the one hand, wireless technology is racing ahead and enabling a broad array of wireless networks, including cellular, ad hoc, mesh, local area, personal and sensor networks, supporting an equally rich array of multimedia applications such as voice, data, images, and video. On the other hand,  despite the celebrated successes of Shannon's paradigm for point-to-point communication, network information theory is still not fully developed. As a result there are significant gaps in our basic understanding of the design and implementation of large-scale wireless networks.  Since its inception in 1997, the Wireless Communications Research Laboratory at the University of Wisconsin-Madison has been investigating a wide range of problems in the basic theory and practical design strategies for wireless communication systems and networks. The interdisciplinary research in our group draws on tools from a variety of areas, including communication and information theories, statistical signal processing, wireless channel modeling,  multiuser communications, and physics of propagation.