ORA's Robert S. Hilbert Memorial Optical Design Competition is Open.  The competition, which honors the memory of Bob Hilbert, former president and Chief Executive Officer of ORA, a long-time OSC Industrial Affiliate, recognizes excellence in optical design projects completed by students.  To participate, students can enter an optical design class assignment or thesis work that uses CODE V or LightTools. Awards totaling $4,000 will be granted. The entry deadline is in June and the winners will be announced in July. 

Since the competition began in 2000, there have been a good number of winners from OSC:  Dewen Chen in 2009, Rob Bates in 2008, Joshua Jin Kim in 2007, Kevin O'Shea in 2006, Craig Pansing in 2005, the team of Regis Tessieres and Melanie Laurent in 2004, and Scott Ellis in 2000.  Thanks, ORA, for making this great opportunity available to optics students.

BRO Offers Free Software Tutorial to OSC Grad Students.  Once again, the good people at Breault Research Organization (an OSC Industrial Affiliate company founded by former student Bob Breault, OSC PhD 1979, who always remembers our current students with something nice) can accept up to twelve OSC graduate students into their ASAP tutorial in early January at no charge.  Thank you, BRO, for including our graduate students in your tutorial.

Augmented Reality Head Mounted Display.  P.I.  Hong Hua.  Sponsor:  SA Photonics.  August 19, 2009 to January 25, 2010.  $21,000.

Bio-Inspired Optics: Offering Physical and Technological Insights in Color and Structure (BIOOPTICS.  PI:  Stanley Pau.  Sponsor:  Harvard University (Sub-AFOSR)  September 30, 2009 to September 29, 2010.  $875,000.

Diffuser BRDF Measurement.  P.I.  Stuart Biggar.  Sponsor:  ITT Space Systems.  June 1, 2009 to November 30, 2009.  $66,782.

Integrated Waveguide Optical Isolators.  P.I.  Palash Gangopadhyay and Ramakrishna Voorakaranam.  Sponsor:  TIPD LLC (Sub-Army).  July 27, 2009 to October 31, 2011.  $25,000.

Quantitative Assessment of the Benefits and Risks of Clinical PET/CT and SPECT/CT Imaging.  P.I.  Matthew Kupinski and Eric Clarkson.  Sponsor:  NIH.  September 30, 2009 to August 31, 2011.  $544,545.

Scalable Array Packaging for Optoelectronic Components.  P.I.  Nasser Peyghambarian.  Sponsor:  NSF.  September 1, 2009 to August 31, 2011.  $500,000.

Team OSC Wins UA's Club Olympics.  This year, for the first time, our students participated in UA's Homecoming events by competing in Club Olympics against thirty-seven other teams from all over campus -- and they won.  Photos of the events are posted on the SOCk (Student Optics Chapter) Web site at http://sites.google.com/site/uasock/  Our students had quite a remarkable week.  On Monday, Team OSC took first place in the Obstacle Course, a challenging route complete with whip cream pies and a a slip 'n' slide.  On Tuesday, Team OSC again took first place in the Spelling Bee Dunk: for every word they spelled correctly, a Bobcat member got dunked.  On Wednesday, Team OSC dropped down to second place with Human Foosball, UA's largest foosball game.  On Thursday, Team OSC had an off day and did not place in the Mud Tug O' War, a classic Homecoming tradition (Editor's Note: If they had to lose at something, this was probably a good choice).  On Friday, Team OSC rebounded nicely and took second place in Wilbur's Purrrfect Cake Decorating Contest, a special celebration for his 50th birthday.  Nice work, students!  Congratulations on your win!

Recommended Reading.  When you have a  moment, check out Idle Diffractions: Musings on the Past, Present, and Future of Optics, a fascinating blog by Kevin Thompson, OSC PhD 1980.  Kevin's posts spotlight optical design, emerging optical technologies, industry hot topics, and optics history.  He covers such subjects as the Large Binocular Telescope, solar energy technology, rare optics books (he donated a collection of antique books to us some years ago), virtual reality (with photos by Jannick Rolland, another OSC alumn), our antique optics collection (John Greivenkamp and Kevin were classmates) and the possibility of a Keplerian telescope appearing in a Jan Brueghel painting some five years before Kepler reported it.  Kevin is with ORA, Optical Research Associates (the company that sponsors the Robert S. Hilbert Memorial Optical Design Competition mentioned above) and is a long-time OSC Industrial Affiliate representative.  He participated in our 2009 Fall Industrial Affiliates Workshop last week.  His colleague at ORA, Diane Lieu, brought the blog to our attention -- thank you Diane!

Bob Parks Receives ASPE's Lifetime Achievement Award.  At their recent annual meeting, the American Society for Precision Engineering presented Bob Parks with their coveted Lifetime Achievement Award.  The citation reads:  "For his contributions to optical design, fabrication and metrology.  Bob has been a staff member in large and small companies as well as academia, has been active in optical standards work and was a member of the team that investigated the Hubble Telescope.  He is a past President of ASPE and is the 'father' of the ASPE Spring Topical Meetings first held at the Westward Look Resort in Tucson."  ASPE focuses on the research, design, development, manufacture and measurement of high accuracy components and systems.   Its members represent a variety of technical areas including mechanical, electrical, optical and industrial engineering, materials science, physics, chemistry, mathematics and computer science.  Congratulations Bob

The Art of Radiometry by James M. Palmer and Barbara G. Grant (OSC MS 1989).  SPIE Press.  ISBN:  9780819472458.  Vol:  PM 184.  393 pages.  Hardcover.  It's due out on December 15.  To check out the table of contents, read the first chapter, and order now for holiday delivery, please visit http://spie.org/x648.html?product_id=798237  Here's what SPIE has to say:  The material from this book was derived from a popular first-year graduate class taught by James M. Palmer for over twenty years at the University of Arizona College of Optical Sciences. This text covers topics in radiation propagation, radiometric sources, optical materials, detectors of optical radiation, radiometric measurements, and calibration. Radiometry forms the practical basis of many current applications in aerospace engineering, infrared systems engineering, remote sensing systems, displays, visible and ultraviolet sensors, infrared detectors of optical radiation, and many other areas. While several texts individually cover topics in specific areas, this text brings the underlying principles together in a manner suitable for both classroom teaching and a reference volume that the practicing engineer can use. The level of discussion of the material is suitable for a class taught to advanced undergraduate students or graduate students. Although this book is not a theoretical treatment, the mathematics required to understand all equations include differential and integral calculus.  This text should be foremost in the toolkit of the practicing engineer or scientist working on radiometric problems in areas of optical engineering, electro-optical engineering, systems engineering, imagery analysis, and many others, allowing the technical professional to successfully apply radiometric principles in his or her work.