Hall of Visitors : 2002

Hans-Peter Seidel Afiliation : Computer Graphics Group, Max-Planck-Institut fur Informatik Address: Max-Planck-Institut fur Informatik, Im Stadtwald, 66123 Saarbrucken, Germany Phone: +49 681 9325-401 Fax: +49 681 9325-499 E-mail: hpseidel@mpi-sb.mpg.de Research area : geometric modeling, mesh reduction, visualization of complex medical and engineering data, 3D image analusis and virtual reality. Period of visit : June 2002

Hans-Peter Seidel is the scientific director and chair of the computer graphics group at the Max-Planck-Institut Informatik and a professor of computer science at the University of Saarbruecken, Germany. He is an adjunct professor of computer science at the University of Erlangen, Germany, and at the University of Waterloo, Canada. The Saarbruecken computer graphics group has been newly established in 1999 and currently consists of three faculty, 16 researchers, and 5 PostDocs.

Before joining the Max-Planck-Institut in 1999, Seidel has been on the faculty of the University of Erlangen, Germany, from 1992-1999, where he has been co-director of the graduate center on 3D Image analysis and -synthesis and co-chair of the federal research center (Sonderforschungsbereich) Model-based analysis and visualization of complex scenes and sensor data. Previously, he had been on the faculty of the University of Waterloo, Canada, from 1989-1992. Seidel received his PhD in mathematics and his habilitation in computer science, both from Tuebingen University, in 1987 and 1989, respectively.

Seidel's current research interests include computer graphics, geometric modeling, freeform curves and surfaces, surface reconstruction, efficient polygonal meshes, mesh reduction, multiresolution modeling, image synthesis, global illumination computations, image-based and hardware-accelerated rendering, visualization of complex medical and engineering data, 3D image analysis and -synthesis and foundations of virtual reality.

Gabriel Taubin Afiliation : IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Address: IBM T. J. Watson Research Center P.O.Box 704, Yorktown Heights, NY 10598 Phone: (914)-784-7095 Fax: (914)-784-7667 E-mail: taubin@us.ibm.com Research area : Computational Geometry, Computer Graphics, Geometric Modeling, 3D Photography and Computer Vision. Period of visit : June 2002

Gabriel Taubin is a Research Staff Member at the IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center. He joined IBM in 1990 as member of the Exploratory Computer Vision group, from 1996 to 2000 he was manager of the Visual and Geometric Computing Group, during the 2000-2001 academic year he was on sabbatical as Visiting Professor of Electrical Engineering at the California Institute of Technology. After his sabbatical he was a member of the Visual Technologies Department, and in September 2002 became a member of the Pervasive Computing Solutions Department. He earned a Ph.D. degree in Electrical Engineering from Brown University, and a Licenciado en Ciencias Matematicas degree from the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina. He was named IEEE Fellow for his contributions to the development of three-dimensional geometry compression technology and multimedia standards.

His main research interests fall into the following disciplines: Applied Computational Geometry, Computer Graphics, Geometric Modeling, 3D Photography, and Computer Vision. For the last few years his main line of research has been related to the development of efficient, simple, and mathematically sound algorithms to operate on 3D objects represented as polygonal meshes, with an emphasis on technologies to enable the use of 3D models for Web-based applications. He made significant theoretical and practical contributions in several areas: 3D capturing and surface reconstruction, modeling, compression, progressive transmission, and display of polygonal meshes, and mesh signal processing. The 3D geometry compression technology that he developed with his group is now part of the MPEG-4 standard, and integral part of the IBM HotMedia product.