New England Section of OSA: Ballot 2014-15
President Elect
Peter Goldstein
Peter is an optical engineer at Philips Color Kinetics in Burlington, MA. He has an extensive background in LEDs and illumination, working with traffic signals, airfield lighting, and architectural lighting. He received his B.S. in Optical Sciences and Engineering from the Optical Sciences Center at The University of Arizona. He enjoys working on illumination design techniques, software algorithms, and numerical optimization and has published several papers in these areas. Peter is currently a Councillor.
Treasurer
Groot Gregory
Groot Gregory is the LightTools Product Manager at Synopsys (formerly Optical Research Associates). Previously, he has worked at Lambda Research Corporation, Optikos Corporation and the University of Rochester's Laboratory for Laser Energetics. Groot’s interests in optics include optical design and analysis software, and design and deployment of optical instrumentation. Groot is a member of the OSA, SID and a Fellow of SPIE. Groot is a past chair of OSA’s OPN advisory committee. He currently serves OSA as a column editor for OPN, is a member of the Membership and Education Services Council, OSA Industry Council and is a member of the External Relations Committee. He is a Senior Editor for the journal Optical Engineering, a member of the SPIE Awards committee and conference chair for the SPIE Novel Optical Systems and Optimization conference and the Optics Education and Outreach conference. He has served the local section as program chair, publications chair, president and treasurer, and has co-chaired past Conversaziones. Groot received degrees in Physics, Mathematics and Optics from the University of Rochester and is a licensed aircraft mechanic.
Secretary
Mike Zollers
Mike Zollers is a Sr. Illumination Engineer at Synopsys, Inc. in Marlborough, MA. He has worked extensively in the field of exterior automotive lighting, LED illumination, color science, and illumination software. Mike has previously worked for Fraen Corporation, Optical Research Associates, Guide Corporation, and Hella Lighting Company. He received his B.S. in Applied Optics and B.S. in Mathematics from Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology. He is a past council member and past president of the NES/OSA, and is heavily involved in their optics outreach activities.
Councilor
Katherine Calabro
Katherine joined Synopsys as a R&D engineer after completing her PhD in Biomedical Engineering at Boston University. Her thesis work centered around improved mathematical and computational models for use in Reflectance Spectroscopy in turbid media. This background has been leveraged in her work at Synopsys where she is a developer for the illumination simulation software package LightTools. She received her BS and MS in Engineering Science at Pennsylvania State University, doing theoretical electromagnetic research applied to lithography and diffraction gratings. Katherine is a member of OSA and SPIE, a previous president for the BU OSA/SPIE student chapter, and a council member for NES/OSA for the past four years.
Barbara Darnell
Barbara’s extensive optical Sales & Marketing and Project Management experience includes Director of Sales and Marketing for Jenoptik, Jena, Germany and Hilger Crystal, Kent, England. She is currently Chair of the SPIE Education Outreach Grants Sub-Committee. She is a Past President of NESOSA, has chaired NESOSA’s Conversazione on Defense Optics in 2005 and organized the Optics Demonstrations for the Cambridge Science Festival in April 2009. She has a BA in Chemistry from NYU, a Diploma in Chocolate from the Callebaut School in Belgium, and serves on the Board of the Newton (MA) Civic Pride Committee.
Bruce Horwitz
Bruce received his doctorate in Optics from the University of Rochester in 1976 and spent over twenty-five years in R&D and new product development activities, functioning at various times as an individual contributor, program manager, department manager at Itek Optical Systems and as Vice President of Research and Development for MicroE Systems. After leaving MicroE, Bruce was Director of Optical Technology for AXSUN Technologies before founding TechRoadmap Incorporated in 2000, a company providing Director of Intellectual Property services on an outsource basis to small and mid-sized companies. Bruce has been a member of the NES/OSA since moving to Massachusetts in 1976 and has served the section at various times as councillor, president, and most recently as the 2013-2014 secretary.
Sam Petuchowski
Sam is a physicist who practices law - as a partner with the Boston law firm of Sunstein Kann Murphy & Timbers. He specializes in patent portfolio prosecution and development, with a focus on quantitative areas such as medical devices, analytical instruments, optical and high-energy technologies, etc. Sam received a Ph.D. in atomic and molecular physics from the University of Illinois, and, for over a dozen years, developed instrumentation and conducted astrophysical research at NASA Goddard. He joined the Optical Society in the 70s. His particular expertise lies in structuring patent portfolios for technology-intensive clients and other creative people. Sam is also currently serving NES/OSA as a Councilor.
Karen Twietmeyer
Karen is the Principal Optical Engineer at QD Vision Inc. in Lexington, where she develops quantum dot filled optics for high color gamut displays, as well as metrology systems for measuring these optics in a high volume production environment. She has also held positions at 3M, where she worked on high efficiency air-cavity backlights for displays; at MediSpectra Inc., where she developed a fluorescence-based instrument for diagnosis of pre-cancerous cervical lesions; and CiMatrix, where she worked on high speed bar code scanners. Her degrees include a BSEE from MIT, an MSEE / electro-optics from Tufts University, and a PhD in optics from the University of Arizona, where her dissertation work was to design, build, and demonstrate a polarization based imaging laser ophthalmoscope for the early diagnosis of retinal diseases.
She has also mentored women of color in engineering through MentorNet, which is one of the larger mentoring groups for women and underrepresented minorities in engineering.
