Joseph A. O'Sullivan

Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering
Research Associate, Electronic Systems and Signals Research Laboratory
Publications Editor, IEEE Transactions on Information Theory
Secretary, Faculty Senate

Work Address

Department of Electrical Engineering
Campus Box 1127
Washington University
St. Louis, MO 63130
(314) 935-4173
Fax: 935-4842

E-mail addresses

jao@ee.wustl.edu
jao@essrl.wustl.edu
jao@saturn.wustl.edu
j.osullivan@ieee.org
and several others

Home Address

7321 Northmoor
St. Louis, MO 63105
(314) 727-3880

Personal Information

Nicknames: Jody, Dr. O
Wife: Christina L. Carr O'Sullivan
Son: Joseph Daniel O'Sullivan

Brief Biography

Dr. Joseph A. O'Sullivan received his B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering, in 1982, 1984, and 1986, respectively, all from the University of Notre Dame. In 1986, Dr. O'Sullivan joined the Department as a Visiting Assistant Professor, in 1987 he became an Assistant Professor. Currently, he is an Associate Professor. He has been a Research Associate in the Electronic Systems and Signals Research Laboratory since its formation in 1986. His doctoral thesis at Notre Dame was in the area of nonlinear control theory and optimization theory. Presently his research interests are in information theory, estimation theory, and applications to problems in magnetic recording, radar, and image processing.

His work in radar includes methods for image formation and radar target recognition. With funds from Rome Laboratory and the Office of Naval Research, he is developing algorithms for joint target tracking and recognition. Aspects of these algorithms have potential use in several applications including air traffic control. These efforts have led to studies on the recovery of images from noisy data. New algorithms have been developed for incorporating constraints, including smoothness constraints, in image estimation. In magnetics, Dr. O'Sullivan works with Drs. Ronald Indeck and and Marcel Muller on the development of advanced signal processing techniques for increasing the capacity of magnetic recording systems.

Dr. O'Sullivan is a senior member of the IEEE and a member of SPIE and Eta Kappa Nu. He is currently publications editor for the IEEE Transactions on Information Theory. He is active in the St. Louis Section of the IEEE, where he is a past chairman; he is also the faculty advisor for the IEEE student branch at Washington University.

Selected Recent Publications

D. G. Porter, J. A. O'Sullivan, R. S. Indeck, and M. W. Muuller, "Physically Based Information Science of Magnetic Recording II. Physical Sources of Medium Noise," IEEE Trans. Magn., to appear 1994.

J. A. O'Sullivan, D. G. Porter, R. S. Indeck, and M. W. Muller, "Recording Medium Properties and Capacity Bounds," Journal of Applied Physics, vol. 75, pp. 5753-5755, May 1994.

J. A. O'Sullivan and M. I. Miller, "Almost Sure Convergence for Functions of Random Branching Processes," submitted to IEEE Trans. Inform. Theory, 1993.

J. A. O'Sullivan, D. G. Porter, R. S. Indeck, and M. W. Muller, "Physically Based Information Science of Magnetic Recording I. Information Capacity of a Medium Model," IEEE Trans. Magn., vol. 29, pp. 4036-4038, Nov. 1993.

J. A. O'Sullivan, P. Moulin, D. L. Snyder, and D. G. Porter, "An Application of Estimation Theoretic Radar Imaging," International Journal of Imaging Systems and Technology, vol. 4, pp. 256-264, 1992.

P. Moulin, J. A. O'Sullivan, and D. L. Snyder, "A Method of Sieves for Multiresolution Spectrum Estimation and Radar Imaging," IEEE Transactions on Information Theory, pp. 801-813, March 1992.

M. I. Miller and J. A. O'Sullivan, "Entropies and Combinatorics of Random Branching Processes and Context-Free Languages," IEEE Trans. Inform. Theory, pp. 1292-1310, July 1992.

D. L. Snyder, T. J. Schulz, and J. A. O'Sullivan, "Deblurring Subject to Nonnegativity Constraints," IEEE Trans. Signal Processing, pp. 1143-1150, May 1992.

D. L. Snyder, J. A. O'Sullivan, and M. I. Miller, "The Use of Maximum-Likelihood Estimation for Forming Images of Diffuse Radar-Targets from Delay-Doppler Data," IEEE Trans. Inform. Theory, vol. 35, pp. 536-548, May 1989.

P. Moulin, J. A. O'Sullivan, and D. L. Snyder, "A Sieve-Constrained Maximum-Likelihood Method for Target Imaging," in Radar and Sonar II, F. A. Grunbaum, et al., Eds. New York: Springer-Verlag, 1992, pp. 95-122.

M. I. Miller, D. R. Fuhrmann, J. A. O'Sullivan, and D. L. Snyder, "Maximum-Likelihood Methods for Toeplitz Covariance Estimation and Radar Imaging," in Advances in Spectrum Analysis and Array Processing, Vol. II, S. Haykin, Ed. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1989, pp. 145-172.

J. A. O'Sullivan and D. L. Snyder, "High Resolution Radar Imaging Using Spectrum Estimation Methods," in Signal Processing Part II: Control Theory and Applications, F. A. Grunbaum, et al., Eds. New York: Springer-Verlag, 1990, pp. 335-346.

Last Modified August 17, 1995. Comments or questions to my e-mail above.