Bradley, Geman appointed Distinguished Professors

by Elizabeth Luciano, Chronicle staff

eoscientist Raymond Bradley and mathematician Donald Geman were appointed Distinguished Professors on Wednesday following approval by the Board of Trustees at its meeting at the Dartmouth campus.

     The designation recognizes the professors for outstanding academic distinction. They were recommended for the honor by interim Chancellor Marcellette G. Williams and interim provost Charlena Seymour.

     "Professors Bradley and Geman represent the very best of the University, not just in terms of intellect, but also in terms of looking at long-standing issues in innovative and inventive ways," said Seymour. "The fact that the University has such vigorous and internationally esteemed researchers in such diverse fields is a testament to the breadth of excellence at the University."

     Bradley is a paleoclimatologist who has studied a range of global climatic changes including the phenomenon of global warming and its implications. He testified last year before Congress on the increasing greenhouse emissions and their potential climatological impact. Throughout the years, he has focused his research on several regions including the high Canadian Arctic, the Rocky Mountains, the Loess province of China, the Bolivian Andes, and Mount Kilimanjaro. He received his doctorate from the University of Colorado, Boulder, and has been a member of the faculty here since 1974. He has served as head of the Geosciences Department since 1993. Bradley is being cited for his "outstanding achievements as a research scholar, his national and international reputation...and his potential for continued excellence as a scientist," says Seymour. He has garnered more than $7 million in grant funding from agencies such as the National Science Foundation, the U.S. Department of Energy, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. He has written more than 100 journal articles and book chapters, and is the author of nine books including the well-regarded textbook, "Paleoclimatology: Reconstructing Climates of the Quaternary."

     Geman is internationally known for his research in image processing and computer vision, a high-profile research area. He has made several major contributions to the fields of probability theory and image analysis that span more than two decades. In 1984, he published a joint article with his brother, Stuart, which revolutionized the area of image analysis and established him as a world leader in the field. These contributions were groundbreaking and contributed to the further development in the field. He is credited as being one of the fathers of the methodology commonly used in image processing. Geman received his Ph.D. from Northwestern University in 1970 and joined the faculty here the same year. In recent years, Geman has turned his attention to "high-level image analysis." The ultimate goal of this line of research is to devise ways in which computers can mimic the performance of the human eye/brain connection in detecting and classifying objects in the visual field. He is a fellow of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics and has been recognized by the American Society for Information and Technology as one of its most frequently cited scientists.