Advanced Technology
Charles A. Primmerman - Biography
Dr. Charles A. Primmerman is Associate Head of the Advanced Technology Division at MIT Lincoln Laboratory. He is responsible for programs in applied-optics technology, laser radar, solid-state-laser development, high-energy-laser beam control, laser propagation, and advanced sensors.
Dr. Primmerman joined MIT Lincoln Laboratory as a staff member in 1975. He performed pioneering research in adaptive optics, including directing the first closed-loop thermal-blooming-compensation experiments with a high-energy laser. He has authored over 60 publications, including four that were selected for a 1994 SPIE volume on seminal papers in adaptive optics.
In 1985, Dr. Primmerman became Leader of the High-Energy-Laser Beam Control and Propagation Group at MIT Lincoln Laboratory. He directed major field experiments involving laser propagation and atmospheric compensation from the ground to space. A highlight of this research was the first demonstration of adaptive-optics using a laser guidestar, for which Dr. Primmerman was co-recipient of the SPIE Technology Achievement Award in 1993 and was elected a Fellow of the Optical Society of America in 1998. In 1995, he founded the MIT Lincoln Laboratory biodefense program and served as program manager for this effort until 1999.
Dr. Primmerman has had several assignments on loan to government organizations. During 1984–1985, he was on loan to the newly formed Strategic Defense Initiative Organization (SDIO), where he helped to initiate and organize projects in high-energy-laser beam control. From 1999 though 2001, he was on loan to the Defense Department in Washington, D.C., as an Intergovernmental Personnel Act (IPA) appointee. His first assignment was at the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) as Special Assistant to the Director of the Advanced Systems Concepts Office. In 2000, he was appointed Director of the High-Energy-Laser Joint Technology Office (HEL JTO), which had been recently formed within the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD). For his work in setting up and organizing the HEL JTO, he was awarded the Office of the Secretary of Defense Medal for Exceptional Public Service.
In 2002, Dr. Primmerman returned to MIT Lincoln Laboratory to become Leader of a newly constituted Directed Energy Group. Dr. Primmerman was promoted to Assistant Head of the Aerospace Division in July 2003, to Associate Head of the Sensor Systems Division in November 2004, and to his current position in February 2007.
Dr. Primmerman holds an AB degree in physics from Duke University and SM and PhD degrees, both in nuclear engineering, from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
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