Paolo Focardi

Paolo Focardi (Senior Member, IEEE) received the M.Sc. degree in electronic engineering and the Ph.D. degree in computer science and telecommunication engineering from the University of Florence, Florence, Italy, in 1998 and 2002, respectively. From 1999 to 2000, he was involved in the Shuttle Radar Topography Mission in collaboration with the Italian Space Agency, Rome, Italy. In 2001, he visited the NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), Pasadena, CA, USA, where he was involved in the development of an accurate electromagnetic model of THz detectors. In 2002, he joined the staff of JPL and became a Staff Engineer in 2014. From 2004 to 2009, he was involved in a project to remotely detect human vital signs that in 2009 led to the creation of a start-up company, Advanced TeleSensors Inc., Pasadena. In 2008, he supported the development of the A1 and A2 antennas for JUNO and then he joined the RF Team, developing the instrument reflector antenna for Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP). In 2009, he joined the Spacecraft Antennas Group, JPL, and in 2010, he started the design of the feed horn assembly for SMAP and was able to model the entire spacecraft in order to get very accurate predictions of the radiation pattern. He is currently responsible for the design and delivery of the NISAR feed assembly. He is involved in analytical and numerical methods in electromagnetism for the analysis and design of RF circuits and antennas. He has authored or coauthored Chapter 8 of the Space Antenna Handbook (Wiley, 2012), another chapter of Handbook of Modern Reflector Antennas and Feed Systems for Space and Ground Applications (Artech House, 2013), and over 40 publications in the most renowned national and international journals. He serves as a reviewer of many renowned national and international journals.