Page 57 - Volume 8, Issue 4 - Winter 2012

noise computer program of the US Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), used exclusively to compute high- way traffic noise and noise barrier effectiveness on all federal- ly-funded highway projects in the US.
After leaving BBN in 1971, he worked at Battelle Institute in Frankfurt, Germany for five years, conducting both theo- retical and experimental investigations into the feasibility of using acoustic radar to measure wind shear at airport run- ways (a common cause of accidents at landings). Thereafter, Ulrich joined Mueller BBM, originally founded as “Mueller BBN,” and continued his work in solving many key noise and vibration control problems. His expertise in working out complete, analytical solutions by employing his vast knowl- edge of calculus, provided elegant solutions that are more generally applicable than numerical approximations. His
mathematical work was acknowledged among experts and earned him a high degree of respect. He took a very active part in the European Acoustic Standard Writing Committees in the field of outdoor sound propagation, an activity which extended into his retirement.
On weekends and holidays, Ulrich enjoyed trips with his family to cultural and historic sites far and near his chosen home town of Munich, cycling, hiking, and cross-country skiing in Upper Bavaria, priding himself in exhausting his Siberian Husky dogs. He was also an avid wind surfer. Ulrich was a Fellow of the Acoustical Society of America and a Distinguished International Member of Institue of Noise Control Engineering (INCE)/USA.
Istvan L. Ver
Dah-You Maa
1915—2012
Dr. Dah-You Maa (Ma, Dayou), a mem- ber (academician) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), and a pro- fessor at Institute of Acoustics, Chinese Academy of Sciences (IACAS) passed away peacefully in Beijing Hospital on 17 July, 2012.
Born in Beijing on 1st of March
1915, Dah-You Maa obtained his B.Sc.
from Peking University in 1936. In 1937,
he went to the University of California,
Los Angeles (UCLA) and began his grad-
uate studies with Professor Vern O.
Knudsen. The following year, when
Professor Knudsen was on sabbatical
leave, Maa continued his research with
Professor Frederick V. Hunt at Harvard
University. Within his first two years
research resulted in two journal publications: “Distribution of Eigentones in a Rectangular Chamber at Low Frequency Range” as a result of his research with Professor Knudsen, and “Analysis of Sound Decay in Rectangular Rooms,” which he co-authored with Professor Hunt and fellow classmate Leo Beranek. Both papers, published in the Journal of the Acoustical Society of America (JASA) in 1939, established a new chapter in the development of fundamental theories of room acoustics.
Professor Maa obtained a Master degree in 1939 and Ph.D. degree in 1940 at Harvard University. He was elected a fellow of Acoustical Society of America (ASA) in 1943. In May 2012, Maa was awarded Honorary Fellowship by the ASA and became one of the 19 Honorary Fellow recipients since the establishment of the Society.
After obtaining his Ph.D. from Harvard, Maa returned to China to serve his country, teaching at National Southwest Associated University in Kunming in those very difficult days during World War II. He returned to Peking after the war, and
in the US, Maa’s
in 1946 at the age of 31, he founded and became the first Dean of the Engineering College at Peking University. In 1956, Professor Maa took part in the formula- tion of “The national visionary plan for the science and technology development for the years between 1956 and 1967” and put forward strong recommendations for an acoustics research center to be established within the Institute of Electronics, Chinese Academy of Sciences (IECAS). He then served as a director of the center for a number of years. Between 1956 and 1958, Professor Maa established the first ever comprehensive acoustic research centre in China which consisted of a number of large-scaled acoustic laboratories includ-
ing the anechoic chamber, the reverberation chambers, insula- tion chambers and underwater acoustic laboratories. In 1978, he was appointed Head of the Physics Department and Deputy Acting Dean of the Graduate School of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, where he served for seven years. During his lifelong career in education he taught courses in physics, electronics, electrical engineering, and acoustics.
Professor Maa accomplished remarkable work through- out his career including contributions to speech analysis, synthesis and recognition technology, and theories and experiments in noise control, nonlinear acoustics and infra- sonics. Many of his pioneering contributions in research areas such as the theory and application of micro-perforated absorbers (MPA), active noise control in ducts and rooms, theory and experiments of high-intensity standing waves, and development of the theory of turbulent jet noise and its control, are all well known to the acoustics community. He has received numerous academic honors, national science awards, and prizes for his innovations and advanced contri- butions to the industrial enterprise. He was elected a member
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