Annual Report of the Technical Committee on Physical Acoustics 2003---2004

Annual Report of the Technical Committee on Physical Acoustics
2003-- 2004

Well, another successful year has gone by for the Physical Acoustics Technical Committee. Although funding issues continue to dominate discussions, our sessions at ASA meetings continue to be filled with interesting speakers, important topics, and attentive audiences.

The Fall meeting was held in Austin, Texas. The big special session for Physical Acoustics (and co-sponsored by Biomedical Ultrasound/Bioresponse to Vibration) was the lifetime achievement session to honor David Blackstock for his work in nonlinear acoustics, organized by Mark Hamilton. Needless to say, this session was a huge success. The room was filled past capacity level, from the beginning to the end of the session. We want to give special thanks to the speakers, who put such a great effort into making this session so wonderful. From pictures of David, to his impact on nonlinear acoustics, it was a great way to introduce the work of a living legend in Physical Acoustics to the audience. The consensus is that Physical Acoustics should continue to celebrate the works of "living legends" with more celebration sessions. Suggestions for such celebration sessions should be directed to a member of the technical committee.

In addition to the Blackstock special session, Physical Acoustics held sessions in thermoacoustics and resonators, bubbles and particles, outdoor propagation, and acoustic landmine detection. All sessions were well-attended. Special thanks go to the organizers, TPOM representatives, and chairs. Thank you for a job well done!

The ASA celebrated its 75th year anniversary meeting in New York. Because of the anticipated number of people attending, the ASA asked each technical committee to limit the number of special sessions. Physical Acoustics held two special sessions. The Robert E. Apfel memorial session was organized by Larry Crum and Ron Roy, with help by many of Apfel's students and colleagues. There was obvious respect and admiration for Bob Apfel, the person, and his work. Nancy Apfel was in attendance, and the room was filled to capacity. The speakers made up a who's who in Acoustics: Lawrence Crum, Andrea Prosperetti, Ronal Roy, Christy Holland, Car Everbach, Werner Lauterborn, and Phil Marston, to name just a few. One of Bob's last great efforts, starting ARLO, is now becoming a strong adjunct to JASA.

Jim Sabatier organized a special session entitled Recent advances in buried landmine detection." It was a huge success, covering a full day of invited and contributed talks. The invited talks were especially interesting, even for audience members not familiar with the field. It has been suggested that sessions such as buried landmine detection might be suitable as topical meetings', whereby the subject is discussed at length by a few experts, with moderated panel discussions to address issues and answer questions from the audience. Topical meeting sessions such as SonoFusion have been very successful in the past. If you are interested in having a topical meeting, please forward your request to a technical committee member.

Because of the special circumstances for the 75th year anniversary, Physical Acoustics and Biomedical Ultrasound/Bioresponse to Vibration shared their open meeting on Thursday night. The meeting went well, and it was decided to combine the two open meetings again, possibly during the Hawaii meeting. Thanks to the students who brought in refreshments!

Physical Acoustics takes special pride in acknowledging our award recipients: Phil Marston was awarded the Silver Medal in Physical Acoustics at the Austin meeting. Phil joins an elite list of innovators and achievers who have made Physical Acoustics a strong component of the ASA. New Fellow certificates were presented to Steve Kargl and Tom Matula at the Austin meeting. At the New York meeting, Mike Bailey was awarded the R. Bruce Lindsay Award. Mike received his award during a special celebration day award ceremony on Wednesday morning. The previous evening, Robin Cleveland and David Chambers were presented Fellow certificates. Congratulations to our new Fellows, Lindsay Award recipient and Silver medal award recipient!

I would like to take time to acknowledge the Physical Acoustics Summer School (PASS), which is held biannually, most recently 20-27 June. It brings together experts in various fields related to physical acoustics. Topics taught at this year's summer school included nonlinear acoustics, solid state properties, transducers, measurements, bubbles, medical acoustics, molecular acoustics, and thermoacoustics, all geared towards graduate students. Not only do the students learn something about other fields, they also meet other students (future colleagues!) and learn something of each others' research.

I wish to also acknowledge members of Physical Acoustics who volunteer their services on various committees: Robert Bonzo' Keolian serves on the Medals and Awards committee; Steve Garrett serves on the Membership Committee; Phil Marston serves on the Books committee, and Sameer Madanshetty serves on ASACOS. Associate editors also deserve accolades; their hard work helps keep JASA the premier journal for physical acoustics publications. Current and recent members serving as associate editors include Sean Wu, Mark Hamilton, Martin Ochmann, Richard Raspet, Ron Roy, Andrew Szeri, and Louis Sutherland. We also want to acknowledge associate editors of ARLO, including Mark Hamilton, Steve Kargl, Tom Matula, and Keith Wilson.

Finally, it is a pleasure to acknowledge PA members who are active in leadership roles in the ASA. Mark Hamilton is vice-president of the ASA, and the editor-in-chief is Alan Pierce. Members of the Executive Council include Anthony Atchley, Ron Roy, and Vic Sparrow. Thanks to everyone who helps make the PATC a joy!