Page 59 - Summer 2015

NEWS from the Acoustical Society Foundation Fund
The Medwin Prize in Acoustical Oceanography
Some history from the Acoustical Society Foundation archives: the Medwin Prize in Acoustical Oceanogra- phy (AO) was established in 2000 from a generous gift from Herman and Eileen Medwin to recognize a per- son for the effective use of sound in the discovery and understanding of physical and biological parameters and processes in the sea. The Medwin prize includes a certificate and a stipend of $2,000.
According to Andone Lavery, current AO Technical Committee Chair, the prize is a particular honor be- cause it encourages young scientists (nominees must be under 45 years old), and the winner, selected from as many as five nominees each year, is required to give an hour-long lecture at the Spring ASA meeting. This al- lows the audience to get an in-depth understanding of the investigator’s technical work, more than in a typi- cal short ASA presentation. The 2015 prize winner was Karim G. Sabra of the Georgia Institute of Technology and his topic was “Monitoring Deep Ocean Tempera- tures Using Low-Frequency Ambient Noise.”
Herman Medwin was a pillar of the ASA and a staunch supporter of the Foundation. He was President of ASA (1991-1992) and founder of the AO Technical Com-
mittee. Hank also had a passion since he was 10 years old for playing the violin, and this passion came full circle in ASA. He single-handedly organized the Tokyo String Quartet concert at the 1994 Spring ASA meeting. The quartet played four sets of instruments: their own Stradivarius instruments and the violins of three pres- ent-day luthiers and had the audience guess which set was the Stradivarius instruments. The proceeds from this concert were used to create ASA’s Video Fund.
Hank is remembered fondly for his erudite textbook, for the gracious time he spent with students, for his leadership at ASA, and for the support provided to the Foundation for the Medwin Prize. We continue to encourage and seek funds that can be used to support the Society and recognize outstanding members of our profession.
Carl Rosenberg
Chair, Acoustical Society Foundation Board
Correction: The Spring 2015 issue of Acoustics Today in- correctly listed the winner of the Rossing Prize for 2014 as Uwe Hansen (Indiana State University, Terre Haute, IN); the prize was actually awarded to Colin H. Hansen (Adelaide University, Adelaide, Australia).
Mission of the Acoustical Society Foundation Board:
To support the mission of the ASA by developing financial resources for strategic initiatives and special purposes.
ASFF For more information, contact: Carl Rosenberg at crosenberg@acentech.com
Book Review
Continued from page previous page
ceptual restoration, the term “restoration” is confusing. My understanding of restoration from cognitive psychology de- scribes the recovery from depleted cognitive resources fol- lowing exerted cognitive effort (e.g., attention restoration); I do not know how homophonic induction is restorative in this sense. Had the book initially explained the definition of restoration, it would have helped. Then again, perhaps this term will be understood by the audience for which this chapter is intended. On the other hand, the text on continu-
ity is interesting; we know that continuity is a general cog- nitive principle that applies to speech and reading, but I had never considered it acoustically.
Despite these issues, a number of concepts, such as pitch and virtual pitch, the definition and measurement of criti- cal-band filters, coloration, and modulation, were clearly ex- plained and, thus, informative to an interdisciplinary/novice audience who may wish to incorporate acoustics into their research.
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