Michael Grant

---

VIVA Affiliation

Research Assistant
2001 - 2005

Degrees

Ph.D. Electrical Engineering, University of Virginia
M.E. Electrical Engineering, University of Virginia
B.S. Electrical Engineering, Old Dominion University

Biographical Sketch

Michael Grant served as co-investigator for NASA-Langley’s Global Positioning System (GPS) remote sensor activities in the inter-Agency Soil Moisture Experiments 2003 (SMEX-03) Program. Mr. Grant's prior NASA-Langley Project Positions and Experience include: (1) Gas and Aerosol Monitoring Sensorcraft (GAMS) Project Systems Engineer for aircraft experiment design and development (1999-2000). He also worked as the Electrical and Software Engineer for on-board science data processing (1996-2000). (2) Clouds and Earth's Radiant Energy System (CERES) Project, Electrical Engineer for electrical subsystem design and testing oversight (1992-1997). (3) Measurement of Air Pollution from Space (MAPS) Experiment, Electrical and Software Engineer for Shuttle experiment data downlink design and hardware modification (1990-1993). (4) Shuttle Infrared Leeside Temperature Sensing (SILTS) Experiment on the Columbia Orbiter. Michael was the Electrical Engineer for hardware modification, pre-flight testing, and post-flight data retrieval (1987-1992).

Research Interests

Grant's areas of research included image feature extraction and classification in medical, airborne, and satellite imagery, with feature classification accomplished using supervised (e.g. Bayesian) and unsupervised (e.g. fuzzy c-means) methods. Michael recently explored a quantitative method for determining lung functionality using a combination of standard proton (H-1) and hyperpolarized Helium-3 magnetic resonance image sets, with the goal of developing an innovative and efficient medical image processing method to assist medical personnel in patient diagnosis. His Ph.D. work focused on the use of Global Positioning System (GPS) satellite signals to augment visual imagery for identifying vegetation types and soil moisture levels in land-use and agricultural applications.

Selected Publications

• M. S. Grant and S. J. Katzberg, "Combined GPS reflected signal and visual imagery for unsupervised clustering and terrain classification," IEEE Southeast Conf., Greensboro, NC, March, 2004.
• M.S. Grant and R. D. Williams, "Statistical processing for gastric slow-wave identification," Med. Biol. Eng. & Comput., July 2002, p. 432.
• M.S. Grant, "Real-time digital signal processing enables a reduced-cost atmospheric remote sensorcraft," AIAA 17th Digital Avionics Systems Conf., Bellevue, Washington, Nov. 1998.
• M.S. Grant, "A succinct naming convention for lengthy hexadecimal numbers," NASA Tech. Memo. 113131, Oct. 1997.
• M.S. Grant, "Shuttle payload data interleaver design," NASA-Langley Research and Technology Highlights, 1992.