2018 Class of Distinguished Lecturers, Data Science DL and the New Distinguished Industry Speaker Program Announced

SPS Announces 2018 Class of Distinguished Lecturers, the Signal Processing Data Science Distinguished Lecturer and the New Distinguished Industry Speaker Program.

The IEEE Signal Processing Society (SPS) announced the 2018 Class of Distinguished Lecturers for the term of 1 January 2018 to 31 December 2019, which are noted below.  In addition, a special Signal Processing Data Science Distinguished Lecturer has also been named to explicitly address the areas of Signal Processing and Data Science for the same term. The IEEE SPS Distinguished Lecturer Program provides a means for Chapters to have access to well-known educators and authors in the fields of signal processing to lecture at Chapter meetings. While many IEEE Societies have similar programs, the SPS provides a substantial amount of financial support for the Chapters to take advantage of this service.

Five colleagues were honored with the appointment of Distinguished Lecturer and they are: Rick Blum (Lehigh University), Kevin Bowyer (University of Notre Dame), Geert Leus (Delft University of Technology), Marco Lops (University of Cassino and Southern Lazio), and Wing-Kin (Ken) Ma (The Chinese University of Hong Kong).  The colleague awarded with the Signal Processing Data Science Distinguished Lecturer position is Patrick Wolfe (Purdue University).

For 2018, the Society approved the creation of the new Distinguished Industry Speaker (DIS) Program.  The program provides means for chapters to have access to individuals who are recognized experts with a background in industrial applications in the signal processing area and are well versed in the ongoing issues/activities in industry, to lecture at Chapter meetings.  Distinguished Industry Speakers will supplement the regular Distinguished Lecturer (DL) Program and will closely mirror the DL Program.  The main difference and goal of the Distinguished Industry Speakers Program is to educate and interact with Society members about topics that are of primary importance to industry and the signal processing community-at-large.  The speakers will focus their presentations on industrial applications of interest to practicing engineers, stress practical issues and/or activities in industry.  The Distinguished Industry Speakers will be available to all SPS Chapters, as are DLs.  While many IEEE Societies have similar programs, the SPS provides a substantial amount of financial support for the Chapters to take advantage of this service.

Five colleagues were honored as the first Distinguished Industry Speakers and they are: Alfonso Farina (Leonardo Company), Ton Kalker (Xperi Corporation), Thomas Marzetta (Nokia Bell Labs), Tao Mei (Microsoft research Asia), and Michael Picheny (IBM).

Chapters interested in arranging lectures by the Distinguished Lecturer and/or Distinguished Industry Speaker can obtain information from the Society’s website or by sending an e-mail message to sp.info@ieee.org.