Nominations may also be made by petition of not less than 25 voting Section members, received by the Section Secretary (aromaniuk@ieee.org) by August 22, or exactly 28 days after this announcement is made. Only Fellows, Life Fellows, Senior members, Life Senior Members, Members and Life Members of IEEE of the Baltimore Section are eligible to hold office. The election ballots will be sent out in early September and should be received by the Nominations Committee no later than November 30, 2008.

The guidelines for the Section’s elections can be found in Article VIII-Nominations and Elections of the Elections of the Section's Bylaws:

http://www.ewh.ieee.org/r2/baltimore/Bylaws/Final_Nov2001.pdf

Thank you for participating in the 2009 Elections.

Nominations Committee for 2009 Officers:

Boris Gramatikov (Chair) - bgramat@jhmi.edu

Jeff Friedhoffer (Principal Coordinator and Internet)

Vil P. Arafiles (Ballots, counting and stats)

Jay Gamerman (Member)

Alan Pressman (Member)

2. Fundraising to Support Engineers Week Activities

The Associated Societies is putting together a fund raised for Engineering Week activities. The event will be at the ESB building in Baltimore. It will probably be a Trivia game type event. The anticipated date is Friday, February 6, 2009.

3. GOLD/WIE Summer Picnic

What: 2nd Annual GOLD/WIE Summer Picnic

When: Sunday, August 3, 2008 @ 1pm

Where: The Waterloo Park

6951 Old Waterloo Road, Elkridge, MD

The pavilion is to the right when you enter the park

http://www.co.ho.md.us/gis/gisdocs/07_waterloopark.pdf

Please join us at the 2nd annual GOLD/WIE summer picnic. All are welcome to come. It's a great time to catch up with old friends, meet new ones and network with our local IEEE community. See you there!

P.S. Check out our new Baltimore women's engineering group on Facebook: Baltimore IEEE WIE. Open discussion forums and Information about upcoming events will be posted here.

4. Women in Engineering

Women in Engineering ProActive Network (WEPAN) is announcing the recipients of its 2008 Awards in the attached press releases. More information about WEPAN is available at http://www.wepan.org.

5. New IEEE Systems Journal

The IEEE Systems Journal publishes peer-reviewed technical papers dealing with many shared aspects and attributes of systems and system-of-systems across the many domains and applications, in particular: complexity, dynamics, integration, interoperability, adaptability, completeness, effectiveness, modeling, analysis, simulation, engineering, science, human factors, management, operations, communications, applications, ethics, education, and much more. The journal seeks papers which address solution to problems of national and global significance.

Typical domains include: disaster response, energy, environmental monitoring and control, exploratory exploration (space, terrestrial, underwater), global earth observation & prediction, Earth science, human health and life science, medical systems and applications, autonomous vehicles and systems, intermodal transportation systems, logistics, manufacturing and factory automation, agricultural systems, biological applications, communications, national defenses security, organizational internal, privacy & security, social and political systems, socio-economic (including trade & banking systems), educational systems, and many others in which the system perspective is fundamental.

Typical disciplines, processes, and skills include: automation & control, decision making and optimization, management of large-scale systems, control and automation, mission assurance, modeling and simulation, nanotechnology in system-of-systems, self-configuration and adaptation, product life cycle, regulatory compliance, reliability & availability, safety maintainability, quality, risk management, scholarship of systems engineering, systems engineering processes, systems-of-systems, and many other related to the analysis, design, implementation, and maintenance of complex systems.

The IEEE Systems Journal in intended to stimulate awareness, appreciation and utilization of systems thinking and the supporting systems engineering disciplines. This journal aims to be an archival publication for professional from industry, researchers, educators, and students, who are sharing a strong interest in complex systems and the system thinking perspective.

This journal will publish also special issues on hot topics with the systems thinking perspective. The following special issues are in progress: GEOSS: Creating a Global System of Systems, Grid Resource Management, Resilience Engineering, System Research on Service Systems, and Biometric Systems.

http://www.systemsjournal.org

Editor-in-Chief: Prof. Mo Jamshidi, the University of Texas, San Antonio, TX, USA, isj@wacong.org

6. Call for Papers - Special Issue on Biometrics Systems

IEEE Systems Journal

Special Issue on Biometrics Systems

The increasing needs for security as well as medical diagnosis make biometrics more and more valuable world-wide, as theory, technologies, design methodologies, and applications are concerned.

To create a biometric system various issues need to be studied in an integrated way: from sensing to measurement procedures, from signal analysis and interpretation to quality assessment, from feature extraction to classification and analysis, from knowledge creation to extraction, from algorithms to data structure, from computational complexity to system performance, from system engineering to software engineering, from privacy to social implications, and much more. Integration and cooperative combination are another key aspects if biometrics systems and applications.

This special issue is directed to collect original papers that address any aspect of the design, implementation and application of biometrics systems, by focusing on a system-level perspective. The detailed call for papers is available at:

http://www.dti.unimi.it/~piuri/pages/ISJ-SpecialIssueBiometricsSystemsCFP.pdf

The submission deadline is January 15, 2009. Acceptance notification is expected by April 15, 2009 and publication in August 2009.

Guest Editors of this special issue are: Vincenzo Piuri, University of Milan, Italy; Jie Tian, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China; and Evangelia Micheli-Tzanakou, Rutgers University, USA.

Questions about the special issue should be directed to Prof. Vincenzo Piuri (vincenzo.piuri@unimi.it).

7. Call for Papers - Special Issue on Biometric Instrumentation and Measurement

IEEE Transactions on Instrumentation and Measurement

Special Issue on Biometric Instrumentation and Measurement

Biometrics is a growing and important applications area receiving significant interest as a result of the criticality and the social impact of its applications. In addition, the increasing worldwide interest in security makes biometrics even more valuable and desirable, from many perspectives including its theory, technologies, design methodologies, and applications. The constituencies that may benefit from this ever growing field include academia, industry, government, and the general public.

To create a biometric system various issues need to be studied in a comprehensive and integrated way: from sensing to measurement procedures, from signal analysis and interpretation to quality assessment, from feature extraction to classification and analysis, from knowledge creation to extraction, and much more. Integration and cooperative combination are other key aspects of biometrics applications.

This special issue is focused on publishing original papers that address instrumentation and measurement aspects of the design, implementation and applications of biometrics. The detailed call for papers is available at:

http://www.dti.unimi.it/~piuri/pages/TIM-SpecialIssueBiometricIMCFP.pdf

The submission period is February 15 - March 1, 2009. Notification of final acceptance is expected by June 30, 2009 and publication in December 2009.

Guest Editors of this special issue are: Fabio Scotti, University of Milan, Italy; David Zhang, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong; Evangelia Micheli-Tzanakou, Rutgers University, USA.

Questions about the special issue should be directed to Dr. Fabio Scotti (fabio.scotti@unimi.it).

8. International Symposium on Applied Sciences

The First International Symposium on Applied Sciences in Biomedical and Communication Technologies (ISABEL'08) will be held in Aalborg, Denmark, on October 25-28. You can find more information at the website:

http://isabel2008.es.aau.dk/

9. Baltimore Region Conferences

The following conferences are planned for Maryland, Washington, DC, and Northern Virginia. This list can be used for planning purposes and also represents potential volunteering opportunities.

2008 10th IEEE Conference on E-Commerce Technology and the 5th IEEE Conference on Enterprise Computing, E-Commerce and E-Services (CEC/EEE)

21 Jul - 24 Jul 2008

Doubletree Hotel- Crystal City

Arlington, VA, USA

http://cec2008.cs.georgetown.edu/index.html

2008 IEEE International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering

(CASE 2008)

23 Aug - 26 Aug 2008

Marriott Key Bridge

Arlington, VA, USA

http://www.ieee-case.org

2008 Second IEEE International Conference on Biometrics: Theory, Applications and Systems (BTAS)

29 Sep - 01 Oct 2008

Hyatt Regency Crystal City

Washington, DC, USA

http://www.cse.nd.edu/BTAS_08

2008 IEEE International Symposium on Modeling, Analysis & Simulation of Computer and Telecommunication Systems (MASCOTS)

07 Sep - 10 Sep 2008

Tremont Suite Hotels

Baltimore, MD

http://www.mascots-conference.org/

2008 IEEE 25th Symposium on Mass Storage Systems and Technologies (MSST)

22 Sep - 25 Sep 2008

Sheraton Inner Harbor

Baltimore, MD, USA

http://www.storageconference.org

2008 3rd International Conference on Malicious and Unwanted Software (MALWARE)

07 Oct - 08 Oct 2008

Hilton Alexandria Mark Center

Alexandria, VA, USA

http://isiom.wssrl.org

2008 IEEE Workshop On Signal Processing Systems (SIPS)

08 Oct - 10 Oct 2008

Radisson Hotel Reagan National Airport

Arlington, VA, USA

2008 37th IEEE Applied Imagery Pattern Recognition Workshop (AIPR 2008)

15 Oct - 17 Oct 2008

Cosmos Club

Washington, DC, USA

http://www.aipr-workshop.org/

2008 IEEE 58th Annual Broadcast Symposium (BTS)

15 Oct - 17 Oct 2008

The Westin Hotel

Alexandria, VA, USA

http://www.ieee.org/bts/symposium

2008 IEEE Biomedical Circuits and Systems Conference - Intelligent Biomedical Systems (BioCAS)

20 Nov - 22 Nov 2008

Location: TBD

Baltimore, MD, USA

http://www.biocas2008.org

2009 IEEE Applied Power Electronics Conference and Exposition - APEC 2009

15 Feb - 19 Feb 2009

Marriott Wardman Park Hotel

Washington, DC, USA

http://www.apec-conf.org

2009 Conference on Lasers and Electro-Optics (CLEO)

02 Jun - 04 Jun 2009

Baltimore Convention Center

Baltimore, MD, USA

http://www.i-leos.org

2009 International Quantum Electronics Conference (IQEC)

June 2-4, 2009

Baltimore Convention Center

Baltimore, MD, USA

http://www.i-leos.org

2009 IEEE Pulsed Power Conference (PPC)

28 Jun - 02 Jul 2009

Renaissance Mayflower Hotel

Washington, DC, USA

http://web.ece.missouri.edu/ppc2009

2011 IEEE AUTOTESTCON

September 19-22, 2011

Baltimore Convention Center

Baltimore, MD, USA

http://www.autotestcon.com

2009 IEEE 59th Annual Broadcast Symposium (BTS)

14 Oct - 16 Oct 2009

The Westin Hotel

Alexandria, VA, USA

http://www.ieee.org/bts/symposium

CISS’09 – 43rd Conference on Information Sciences and Systems

18-20 March 2009

Baltimore, MD.

Info:

Barbara Sullivan

ECE Dept, Johns Hopkins Univ.

3400 N Charles St., Baltimore, MD 21218 USA.

ciss@jhu.edu

Tel: 1-410-516-7033; FAX: 1-410-516-5566

http://ciss.jhu.edu

10. Continuing EE Education

We are re-running this request for interest in a continuing education program. This program will be in the format of seminars focused on a particular topic of interest. The seminars may run either during the week after work hours or possibly on Saturday. The idea for the program is described below.

Name of project: Continuing EE Education (“CEEE”)

Goal: A section-level program aimed at:

Updating the IEEE members on new developments in the EE field.

Familiarizing engineers with basic new tools, products and techniques as well as giving them the initial knowledge and skills to use them.

Inviting representatives from different vendors to present leading novel products.

Giving tutorials in new areas.

Helping IEEE fellow members become more competitive, especially in times of uncertain jobs, off-shoring and salary stagnation.

Facilitating networking.

Broadening the horizon of each IEEE member.

Fostering collaboration between members of different societies as well as generation of new ideas (“cross-pollination” element).

The program should be open to all IEEE members, including students. It is meant to be a cross-societies initiative, i.e. should not be limited to narrow topics serving the interests of a single chapter only. Emphasis should be placed on meeting with experienced experts from different fields. Critical comparisons between different solutions of EE problems are expected to be made, and trends should be discussed.

Potential topics of interest could include, but are not limited to:

Software tools:

Programming languages

Compilers

Real-Time Operating systems

Debuggers

Emulators

Hardware tools:

Novel electronic components

Single-Board Computers (SBC)

Embedded solutions

FPGAs

Printed circuit board design (schematics capture, layout)

Circuit simulation (PSPICE)

Portable devices

Signal and image processing (examples, tools, help)

Wireless devices:

Theory

Standards

Available OEM products

Trends

Internet-based methods and devices:

Standards

Available tools

Web Page Design

Contemporary design tools (like AutoCad and Solid Works)

Reliability and Compliance issues

We plan to invite qualified speakers from academia, industry and governmental institutions. The speakers will be professionals who can give first-hand information and share front-line experience on the technology, methods and tools being presented.

We plan to organize 2-4 meetings annually. Each meeting is planned to last for 2 hours or more. We could meet on weekdays, or on Saturdays.

Please send us your suggestions and preferences regarding topics, time and place of meetings, the name/acronym of the program etc.

Boris Gramatikov

Baltimore Section

Bgramat@jhmi.edu