OCEANS Conferences 2021 – Where are we now?
John Watson, OES Vice-President for OCEANS So here we are, very close to OCEANS 2021 San Diego – Porto. Some features make this conference and…
From the Vice President for Workshops & Symposia (September 2021)
Fausto Ferreira, Vice President for W&S As you will see, it has been a busy summer for OES Workshops & Symposia! While the COVID-19 pandemic…
VPTA Column (September 2021)
Venugopalan Pallayil, Vice President for Technical Activities, IEEE OES OES colleagues, Greetings from Singapore. I have been home (Singapore) bound for almost two years now.…
From the President (September 2021)
Christopher Whitt, OES President We are on the cusp of our return to in-person meetings with the hybrid OCEANS 2021 San Diego-Porto just around the…
Chapter News (June 2021)
Submit Chapter news to Beacon Co-Editors and OES Chapter Coordinator Argentina Chapter OES special session on ARGENCON 2020 Reported by Gerardo Acosta, Argentina Chapter Chair…
Obituary on Dr. Ferial El-Hawary, IEEE OES AdCom member, IEEE Fellow and Life member
Adapted by your Editors from the Halifax Saltwire.com obituary for Ferial Ferial El-Hawary , age 78, of Halifax, passed away peacefully with family at her…
From the OES BEACON Editors (June 2021)
Harumi Sugimatsu and Robert Wernli Welcome to the June 2021 issue of the Beacon. Are you tired of meeting virtually as your Beacon editors are…
From the President (June 2021)
Christopher Whitt, OES President There is so much happening in your society in 2021! You’ll find this issue of the Beacon full of new activities…
VPTA Column (June 2021)
Venugopalan Pallayil, Vice President for Technical Activities, IEEE OES The COVID-19 vaccination program is progressing in many countries. Nevertheless, the impact of pandemic is continuing…
Reminder: Call for OES Distinguished Lecturers – Jan 2022 to Dec 2025
Nominations close on July 31, 2021 Venugopalan Pallayil, Vice President for Technical Activities, IEEE OES The IEEE Oceanic Engineering Society (OES) invites nominations for OES…
After a Tough Year, We’re Ready for More Connection
Brandy Armstrong, VP of Professional Activities, vp-professional-activities@ieeeoes.org 2021 is moving fast, can you believe it’s almost summer? While vaccinations role out and in person meetings…
From the Vice President for Workshops & Symposia (June 2021)
Fausto Ferreira, Vice President for W&S Since the last Beacon, a lot has been happening in my portfolio. While the COVID-19 pandemic still affects our…
From the OES Secretary (June 2021)
Marinna Martini, OES secretary Let me open this piece by saying, we are human, and as humans we need personal contact with each other to…
From the Journal Editor’s desk: IEEE Journal of Engineering Early Access Papers (June 2021)
Mandar Chitre, Journal Editor-in Chief Congratulations to the authors of our most recently approved papers for the IEEE JOE. The following papers were published as…
The first IEEE OES distinguished lecture for This Year on 3 March 2021
Ocean Acoustic Signal Processing—A Bayesian Approach James V. Candy, IEEE OES distinguished lecturer The first IEEE OES distinguished lecture for this year was delivered…
Polar Oceans Technical Committee Report
Andreas Marouchos, Chair Polar Oceans Technical Committee Focus back on Polar research and technology The Polar Oceans Technology Committee (POTC) supports the work addressing challenges…
A Blast from the Past! . . . In Honor of Ferial
Bob Wernli – Beacon Co-Editor-in-Chief and Stan Chamberlain Ferial’s obituary is in this issue, but because of her amazing support of the IEEE and OES,…
Who’s who in the IEEE OES (June 2021)
Diane DiMassa Who’s Who? I have no idea. So I did what everyone does, I “googled” it. The Miriam dictionary website tells me – a…
Strathclyde SBC Talks at NAOME – Amazon Web Services
Jake Walker & Iliya Valchev The IEEE OES Strathclyde SBC (Student Branch Chapter) was delighted to invite Michele Sancricca – Head of WW Technology…
IEEE OES UNIZG SBC Activities
Nadir Kapetanović, Igor Kvasić, Anja Babić, Ivan Lončar Despite the challenging time that we’re faced with, IEEE OES University of Zagreb Student Branch Chapter (UNIZG…
Report on Indian Ocean Blue Economy Summit
– Webinar on Blue Economy in the Indian Ocean region towards United Nations Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainability (2021-2030)- held on May 6, 2021…
OES Conference Calendar (2021-2022)
Stephanie Kemna, OES Calendar Coordinator OCEANS Global OCEANS 2021 San Diego – Porto In-Person & Virtual, September 20-23, 2021 Town & Country Resort, San Diego,…
Chapter News March 2021
Submit Chapter news to Beacon Co-Editors and OES Chapter Coordinator Hong Kong Chapter Hong Kong IEEE CE/OES Joint Chapter holds the YE20 Conference for students…
Who’s who in the IEEE OES (March 2021)
Hari Vishnu, Editor-in-Chief of Earthzine Some of you know me as the Editor-in-Chief of Earthzine (earthzine.org), or as one of the YP-BOOST awardees for 2019-2020,…
First Call for OES Distinguished Lecturers – Jan 2022 to Dec 2025
Nominations close on July 31, 2021 Venugopalan Pallayil, Vice President for Technical Activities, IEEE OES The IEEE Oceanic Engineering Society (OES) invites nominations for…
Nick is a Visiting Fellow at the UK National Oceanographic Center, Southampton His nomination was endorsed by the Underwater Acoustics Technology Committee. He had worked as a Research Associate and Lecturer at University of Birmingham and has been working as a Research Scientist at the Applied Research Laboratory, University of Texas, Austin. He has also served as a Program Officer at the Office of Naval Research Global. He is a senior member of IEEE (OES) and a Fellow of Acoustical Society of America (ASA). Nick has also been serving as Assoc. Editor for IEEE JoE and JASA. He is widely acknowledged for his expertise are seabed acoustics, parametric array modeling, sonar beamformer, underwater signal processing.
Maurizio Migliaccio (M’91-SM’00-F’17) is Full professor of Electromagnetics at Università di Napoli Parthenope (Italy) and was Affiliated Full Professor at NOVA Southeastern University, Fort Lauderdale, FL (USA). He has been teaching Microwave Remote Sensing since 1994. He was visiting scientist at Deutsche Forschungsanstalt fur Lüft und Raumfahrt (DLR), Oberpfaffenhofen, Germany. He was member of the Italian Space Agency (ASI) scientific committee. He was member of the ASI CosmoSkyMed second generation panel. He was e-geos AdCom member. He was Italian delegate of the ESA PB-EO board. He was Member of South Africa Expert Review Panel for Space Exploration. He serves as reviewer for the UE, Italian Research Ministry (MIUR), NCST, Kazakhstan and Hong Kong Research board. He lectured in USA, Canada, Brazil, China, Hong Kong, Germany, Spain, Czech Republic, Switzerland and Italy. He was Italian delegate at UE COST SMOS Mode Action. He is listed in the Italian Top Scientists. He is an IEEE Trans. Geoscience and Remote Sensing AE, International Journal of Remote Sensing AE, and was IEEE Journal of Oceanic Engineering AE Special Issue on Radar for Marine and Maritime Remote Sensing, IEEE JSTARS AE of the Special Issue on CosmoSKyMed, Member of the Indian Journal of Radio & Space Physics Editorial board. His main current scientific interests cover SAR sea oil slick and man-made target monitoring, remote sensing for marine and coastal applications, remote sensing for agriculture monitoring, polarimetry, inverse problems for resolution enhancement, reverberating chambers. He published about 160 peer-reviewed journal papers on remote sensing and applied electromagnetics.
He has developed various types of Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUVs) and related application technologies including navigation methods, a new sensing method using a chemical sensor, precise seafloor mapping methods, a precise seabed positioning system with a resolution of a few centimeters, a new sensing system of the thickness of cobalt-rich crust; and more. He has shown, by using these technologies that AUVs are practicable and valuable tools for deep-sea exploration.
Donna Kocak has had an outstanding career in defense and scientific projects developing and applying solutions in subsea optics, imaging and robotics. She graduated with an M.Sc in Computer Science in 1997 from the University of Central Florida; an MBA in 2008 from the University of Florida; and M.Sc in Industrial Engineering in 2011 from the University of Central Florida. She is currently a Senior Scientist, Advanced Concepts Engineering, and Fellow at the Harris Corporation in Melbourne, Florida, where she has developed novel optical imaging and communication solutions for under-sea defense and scientific projects. Prior to 2008 Donna Kocak was Founder and President of Green Sky Imaging, LLC (GSI) who developed laser/video photogrammetry software for underwater inspection and survey. Her earlier career positions were with Naval Training Systems Center, Florida; Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institution, Florida; eMerge Interactive; and the Advanced Technologies Group in Florida.
John Potter has a Joint Honours degree in Mathematics and Physics from Bristol University in the UK and a PhD in Glaciology and Oceanography from the University of Cambridge on research in the Antarctic, for which he was awarded the Polar Medal in 1988. John has worked on polar oceanography, underwater acoustics, ambient noise (including imaging), marine mammals, communications, IoUT, autonomous vehicles and strategic development. He has 40 years’ international experience working at the British Antarctic Survey in the UK, NATO in Italy, SIO in California, NUS in Singapore and most recently at NTNU in Norway. John is a Fellow of the IEEE and MTS, an Associate Editor for the IEEE Journal of Oceanic Engineering, IEEE OES Distinguished Lecturer, PADI Master Scuba Diver Trainer & an International Fellow of the Explorer’s Club.
Dr. James V. Candy is the Chief Scientist for Engineering and former Director of the Center for Advanced Signal & Image Sciences at the University of California, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. Dr. Candy received a commission in the USAF in 1967 and was a Systems Engineer/Test Director from 1967 to 1971. He has been a Researcher at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory since 1976 holding various positions including that of Project Engineer for Signal Processing and Thrust Area Leader for Signal and Control Engineering. Educationally, he received his B.S.E.E. degree from the University of Cincinnati and his M.S.E. and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical Engineering from the University of Florida, Gainesville. He is a registered Control System Engineer in the state of California. He has been an Adjunct Professor at San Francisco State University, University of Santa Clara, and UC Berkeley, Extension teaching graduate courses in signal and image processing. He is an Adjunct Full-Professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Dr. Candy is a Fellow of the IEEE and a Fellow of the Acoustical Society of America (ASA) and elected as a Life Member (Fellow) at the University of Cambridge (Clare Hall College). He is a member of Eta Kappa Nu and Phi Kappa Phi honorary societies. He was elected as a Distinguished Alumnus by the University of Cincinnati. Dr. Candy received the IEEE Distinguished Technical Achievement Award for the “development of model-based signal processing in ocean acoustics.” Dr. Candy was selected as a IEEE Distinguished Lecturer for oceanic signal processing as well as presenting an IEEE tutorial on advanced signal processing available through their video website courses. He was nominated for the prestigious Edward Teller Fellowship at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. Dr. Candy was awarded the Interdisciplinary Helmholtz-Rayleigh Silver Medal in Signal Processing/Underwater Acoustics by the Acoustical Society of America for his technical contributions. He has published over 225 journal articles, book chapters, and technical reports as well as written three texts in signal processing, “Signal Processing: the Model-Based Approach,” (McGraw-Hill, 1986), “Signal Processing: the Modern Approach,” (McGraw-Hill, 1988), “Model-Based Signal Processing,” (Wiley/IEEE Press, 2006) and “Bayesian Signal Processing: Classical, Modern and Particle Filtering” (Wiley/IEEE Press, 2009). He was the General Chairman of the inaugural 2006 IEEE Nonlinear Statistical Signal Processing Workshop held at the Corpus Christi College, University of Cambridge. He has presented a variety of short courses and tutorials sponsored by the IEEE and ASA in Applied Signal Processing, Spectral Estimation, Advanced Digital Signal Processing, Applied Model-Based Signal Processing, Applied Acoustical Signal Processing, Model-Based Ocean Acoustic Signal Processing and Bayesian Signal Processing for IEEE Oceanic Engineering Society/ASA. He has also presented short courses in Applied Model-Based Signal Processing for the SPIE Optical Society. He is currently the IEEE Chair of the Technical Committee on “Sonar Signal and Image Processing” and was the Chair of the ASA Technical Committee on “Signal Processing in Acoustics” as well as being an Associate Editor for Signal Processing of ASA (on-line JASAXL). He was recently nominated for the Vice Presidency of the ASA and elected as a member of the Administrative Committee of IEEE OES. His research interests include Bayesian estimation, identification, spatial estimation, signal and image processing, array signal processing, nonlinear signal processing, tomography, sonar/radar processing and biomedical applications.
Kenneth Foote is a Senior Scientist at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. He received a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from The George Washington University in 1968, and a Ph.D. in Physics from Brown University in 1973. He was an engineer at Raytheon Company, 1968-1974; postdoctoral scholar at Loughborough University of Technology, 1974-1975; research fellow and substitute lecturer at the University of Bergen, 1975-1981. He began working at the Institute of Marine Research, Bergen, in 1979; joined the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in 1999. His general area of expertise is in underwater sound scattering, with applications to the quantification of fish, other aquatic organisms, and physical scatterers in the water column and on the seafloor. In developing and transitioning acoustic methods and instruments to operations at sea, he has worked from 77°N to 55°S.
René Garello, professor at Télécom Bretagne, Fellow IEEE, co-leader of the TOMS (Traitements, Observations et Méthodes Statistiques) research team, in Pôle CID of the UMR CNRS 3192 Lab-STICC.
Professor Mal Heron is Adjunct Professor in the Marine Geophysical Laboratory at James Cook University in Townsville, Australia, and is CEO of Portmap Remote Ocean Sensing Pty Ltd. His PhD work in Auckland, New Zealand, was on radio-wave probing of the ionosphere, and that is reflected in his early ionospheric papers. He changed research fields to the scattering of HF radio waves from the ocean surface during the 1980s. Through the 1990s his research has broadened into oceanographic phenomena which can be studied by remote sensing, including HF radar and salinity mapping from airborne microwave radiometers . Throughout, there have been one-off papers where he has been involved in solving a problem in a cognate area like medical physics, and paleobiogeography. Occasionally, he has diverted into side-tracks like a burst of papers on the effect of bushfires on radio communications. His present project of the Australian Coastal Ocean Radar Network (ACORN) is about the development of new processing methods and applications of HF radar data to address oceanography problems. He is currently promoting the use of high resolution VHF ocean radars, based on the PortMap high resolution radar.
Hanu Singh graduated B.S. ECE and Computer Science (1989) from George Mason University and Ph.D. (1995) from MIT/Woods Hole.He led the development and commercialization of the Seabed AUV, nine of which are in operation at other universities and government laboratories around the world. He was technical lead for development and operations for Polar AUVs (Jaguar and Puma) and towed vehicles(Camper and Seasled), and the development and commercialization of the Jetyak ASVs, 18 of which are currently in use. He was involved in the development of UAS for polar and oceanographic applications, and high resolution multi-sensor acoustic and optical mapping with underwater vehicles on over 55 oceanographic cruises in support of physical oceanography, marine archaeology, biology, fisheries, coral reef studies, geology and geophysics and sea-ice studies. He is an accomplished Research Student advisor and has made strong collaborations across the US (including at MIT, SIO, Stanford, Columbia LDEO) and internationally including in the UK, Australia, Canada, Korea, Taiwan, China, Japan, India, Sweden and Norway. Hanu Singh is currently Chair of the IEEE Ocean Engineering Technology Committee on Autonomous Marine Systems with responsibilities that include organizing the biennial IEEE AUV Conference, 2008 onwards. Associate Editor, IEEE Journal of Oceanic Engineering, 2007-2011. Associate editor, Journal of Field Robotics 2012 onwards.
Milica Stojanovic graduated from the University of Belgrade, Serbia, in 1988, and received the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from Northeastern University in Boston, in 1991 and 1993. She was a Principal Scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and in 2008 joined Northeastern University, where she is currently a Professor of electrical and computer engineering. She is also a Guest Investigator at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. Milica’s research interests include digital communications theory, statistical signal processing and wireless networks, and their applications to underwater acoustic systems. She has made pioneering contributions to underwater acoustic communications, and her work has been widely cited. She is a Fellow of the IEEE, and serves as an Associate Editor for its Journal of Oceanic Engineering (and in the past for Transactions on Signal Processing and Transactions on Vehicular Technology). She also serves on the Advisory Board of the IEEE Communication Letters, and chairs the IEEE Ocean Engineering Society’s Technical Committee for Underwater Communication, Navigation and Positioning. Milica is the recipient of the 2015 IEEE/OES Distinguished Technical Achievement Award.
Dr. Paul C. Hines was born and raised in Glace Bay, Cape Breton. From 1977-1981 he attended Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, graduating with a B.Sc. (Hon) in Engineering-Physics.