I am a physicist formerly employed at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), where I started in January, 1981 and retired in November, 2008. My main professional interests have been in astronomy, astrophysics, and atmospheric physics. During my 11 years in the radio astronomy group at JPL, worked on chemical and radiative transfer models of the outer planet atmospheres, and observation & analysis of outer planet atmospheres & magnetospheres and their plasma environments, including radio observations using the facilities of the Deep Space Network. From 1994 through January, 2002, I worked on the Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) project, in charge of developing algorithms to compensate for the presence of Earth's atmosphere between the orbiting infrared imagers and the surface being imaged (we were officially known as the Atmospheric Corrections Team, which I always thought was inferior to Atmospheric Compensation Team, if only because the atmosphere is not wrong, it's just there; we were really compensating for it, not correcting it). We used the MODTRAN radiative transfer package as a kernel for the atmospheric correction code. In January 2002, I went back into the astronomy business, as part of the Infrared Astronomy Group, and simultaneously as part of the staff for the Center for Long Wavelength Astrophysics. Most of this time was spent working on the implementation of an algorithm to enhance the resolution of infrared & submillimeter Spitzer Space Telescope images, by compressing the point spread function (PSF) of the telescope by about a factor of three (a task made more difficult by the fact that Spitzer launched with a stressed secondary mirror, which deformed the PSF into an unusual triangular shape). In late 2012, through early 2013, I have returned as a part time consultant in the Infrared Astronomy Group, still working on resolution enhancement for Spitzer images.

I earned B.S. (1978) and M.S. (1985) degrees in physics, both from the Physics Department at California State University at Los Angeles, beginning my career at JPL while still a graduate student. Prior to that, I served 4 years in the U.S. Air Force, graduating from the Defense Language Institute in 1972, where I passed my exit examinations in both Russian & French. Aside from a professional career in astronomy, I am also an amateur astronomer, and have enjoyed long affiliations with the Los Angeles Astronomical Society (where I have served as President and as a member of the Board of Directors) and Mount Wilson Observatory (where I have been a tour guide and session director for the 60-inch telescope for over 30 years).

I have also been a rated tournament chess player since 1968, with a United States Chess Federation rating currently ranging erratically throughout the 1900s (my lifetime peak in the mid 1980s was 2154, but maintaining a rating that high is real work, at least for me). My main claims to chessic fame are perhaps a perfect score on 4th board of the 1984 U.S. Amateur Team Championship (west), a few "Best Industrial Team" trophies and one 3rd place team, a couple of club championships and the Class A prize in the 1978 Monterey International Open. If you are a real fan of my personal chess history, you can visit my USCF member profile page.

I also like to collect books, mostly physics, math & general science books, chess & history books, especially military history. I have a few hundred books published before 1900, ranging back to my oldest book, printed in 1698. My joint library with my wife currently counts about 3000 books, roughly 800 of them devoted to chess specifically.

I am also an experienced public speaker on astronomy and global warming. I have for many years been delivering talks for amateur astronomy clubs, schools, civic organizations, and private groups. If you are interested in hearing about the wonders of the universe, or just about any topic in astronomy, let me know.