Melville (NY), 8 October 2015--Allan D. Pierce, Professor Emeritus at Boston University, has been named recipient of the Acoustical Society of America (ASA) Distinguished Service Citation for his excellent service to the Acoustical Society of America, and especially for his 15 years of service as Editor-in-Chief. The Distinguished Service Citation is awarded to a member of the ASA in recognition of outstanding service to the Society. The award will be presented at the 170th meeting of the ASA on 4 November 2015 in Jacksonville, Florida.
"A large portion of my time during my latter years has been spent in serving professional societies, especially the Acoustical Society of America. I owe a great deal to the Acoustical Society of America. It has given me the opportunity to meet many people who have similar interests; it has published the journal that has been my principal source of research stimulation since my earliest years as a researcher; and it has provided a long-term forum for the exchange of ideas with people who I admire and respect. I consider it a privilege to have served the Society and, in so doing, to have helped further the goals and mission of a profession that I believe is important" said Pierce.
Allan Pierce received a Ph.D. in Physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He served as professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the Georgia Institute of Technology, and The Pennsylvania State University before joining Boston University in 1993.
Dr. Pierce's interests lie in the propagation of sound in the atmosphere and in the ocean, vibrations of complex structures, diffraction of sound around corners and curved bodies, propagation of sonic booms in the atmosphere, physical and acoustical properties of ocean sediments that contain mud, physical and biological mechanisms that contribute to the generation of sound by insects, microelectromechanical systems for the reception of sound, generation of low frequency sound by large nuclear explosions, explanation and measurement of noise generation by commercial devices, such as electric transformers, decay of vibrations of large structures by the radiation of electromagnetic waves, quantum-mechanical aspects of the forces between large molecules and crystals, theoretical foundations of computational methods in vibrations and acoustics, and formulation of fundamental theories in vibration and acoustics.
Allan Pierce is a Fellow of the Acoustical Society of America and a Life Fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME). He received the Gold Medal of the Acoustical Society of America, the Gold Medal of the Acoustical Foundation of India, the Per Bruel Gold Medal for Noise Control and Acoustics, ASME, the ASA Silver Medal in Physical Acoustics, and the ASA Rossing Prize in Acoustics Education.
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The Acoustical Society of America (ASA) is the premier international scientific society in acoustics devoted to the science and technology of sound. Its 7000 members worldwide represent a broad spectrum of the study of acoustics. ASA publications include the Journal of the Acoustical Society of America--the world's leading journal on acoustics, Acoustics Today magazine, books, and standards on acoustics. The Society also holds two major scientific meetings per year. For more information about the Society visit our website, http://www.acousticalsociety.org