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The Provisional Patent Application has been considered by some as among the most important developments in domestic patent practice in recent memory. This "informal" patent application not only provides a delay of an additional full year until a regular patent application is required, but also effectively extends the term of the patent by one year.

Mr. Ziolkowski graduated with Honors from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee with a Bachelors of Science in Electrical Engineering. He received his Juris Doctorate from Marquette University Law School in 1993 where he was a member of the Marquette Law Review. He is admitted to practice in the State of Wisconsin, the United States Patent & Trademark Office, and the Seventh and Federal Circuits of the U.S. Federal Courts.

Mr. Ziolkowski is the current Chairman of the Intellectual Property Section of the Milwaukee Bar Association and is a member of the IEEE, the Wisconsin Intellectual Property Law Association, the American Intellectual Property Law Association, and the Intellectual Property Sections of the Wisconsin Bar and the ABA.

He has worked as an electrical and software engineer designing an asynchronous diagnostic communication system at Caterpillar, Inc. Prior to that, he had a military security clearance for his position at Eaton Corp. where he designed and wrote code, and integrated real-time software in a modular application system.

While Mr. Ziolkowski practices in all areas of intellectual property procurement, protection and enforcement, he concentrates on patent preparation, prosecution, and counseling. Mr. Ziolkowski has successfully prosecuted patent applications worldwide.

The Milwaukee Section of IEEE has a new Chapter. The official name is the Electromagnetic Compatibility Chapter. Most will recognize the abbreviated name as the EMC Chapter.

Formation of the EMC Chapter is based on the numerous engineering design pressures placed on industry and the ability to manage this information. Specifically, the EMC and Medical Device Directives of the European Union and closer to home the on-going changes with the FCC - Code of Federal Regulations and the FDA - CDRH EMC policies. Industry Canada and Japan are also developing EMC regulations.

The agenda of the September 16^th meeting will focus on Officer elections and objectives for future meetings. There will be no technical presentations. If you are interested in serving as an officer or would like to learn more about the field of EMC and Compliance Engineering, please feel free to join us.

Dr. Battocletti is currently working in four different areas:

1. Nerve Regeneration enhancement by Pulsed Magnetic Field stimulation, with Melissa Macias, Ph.D., Dennis Maiman, M.D., Ph.D., and Carl Sutton, M.D., Ph.D. Dr. Sutton started this research about 10 years ago.
2. Modeling of the Conductance Catheter in the aorta and esophagus, with Douglas Hettrick, Ph.D., Department of Anesthesiology at the Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW). Finite element analysis (FEA) of the electric field is set up in cylindrical coordinates. The FEA software was created with the help of Thomas Knox, M.S., of the Neurosurgery Department at MCW.
3. Rapid Analysis and Reporting of Dummy Crash Data, with David Skrade, M.S., MCW Neuroscience Lab. About 150 channels of information are recorded in each test. Heretofore, filtering and graphing of the data have been done on two different platforms, FORTRAN and QuattroPro, which consumes a lot of time in the transfer of data. The speaker has expanded the FORTRAN filter program to include Graphics (PLOT88, by Plotworks, Inc.), which reduces the time of creating graphs from a couple of weeks to one hour.
4. Database construction and analysis of Dual X-Ray Absorptiometry (DXA) Bone Mineral Content, with Michael Schlick, M.S., MCW Neuroscience Lab. This is being done in conjunction with studies conducted at the Auto Crash Lab at VAMC. The database uses FILEMAKER.

Dr. Battocletti received his B.S.E.E. in 1947 from the University of Detroit, his M.S.E.E. in 1949 from Northwestern University, and his Ph.D. in 1961 from the University of California at Los Angeles. Currently an Adjunct Professor in the College of Engineering, Marquette University, he has taught electrical engineering at Loyola University of Los Angeles (1951-1962) and Marquette University (1963-1966). He has worked at Motorola, Douglas Aircraft, Hughes Aircraft, Servomechanisms, and Badger Meter. Dr. Battocletti joined the Medical College of Wisconsin in March 1970, where he did research in Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) measurement and imaging of blood flow. He was also employed by the Veterans Administration Medical Center (VAMC) from 1978 to 1995. Now he is employed half time as a Professor in the Department of Neurosurgery at MCW. Other areas of research at MCW and VAMC have been magnetic stimulation of nerves and muscles, and measurement of bone mineral content using Phosphorus NMR Spectroscopy.

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Good manners will open doors that the best education cannot.

Sarah A. Vickman, (Dr. Lisa Milkowski, Dr. Robert Crockett, Brian Stemper), Rapid Prototyping Center , Milwaukee School of Engineering

Three-dimensional construction of organ replicas would be helpful in surgical planning and as teaching aids for students of anatomy and pathology. Currently there is no cost-effective method of constructing models of organs from a medical image, such as a CT or MRI scan. Computer software based on a segmentation algorithm is being developed to distinguish the boundaries of anatomical structure in a medical image. A model is then built using rapid prototyping technology.

Rebecca J. Zick, (Dr. Lisa Milkowski, Dr. Robert Crockett, Mr. Brian Stemper) Rapid Prototyping Center, Milwaukee School of Engineering

Physical models are extremely common and useful in the teaching of anatomy. However, human bone replicas show only the exterior overall structure of bone and none of the minute interior tissues and structures. These structures are illustrated to students of anatomy only through drawings. Rapid Prototyping technology, together with medical images, could be used to build cross-sectional models of the interior structures of bone. Bones replicated in this manner could also be used to simulate mechanical properties of bone.

Mr. Wagner, a 28-year veteran at WEPCO, is a Customer Communications Liaison. He has been part of the Y2K Program Management Office since it was formed in 1997. His presentation is an overview of the Year 2000 program at Wisconsin Electric.

George Hanson of the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee is the new Chapter Chair of the Antennas & Propagation/Electron Devices/Instrumentation and Measurement/Microwave Theory & Techniques Societies, replacing Jim Richie.

Partial Content:

Additional Information is available at:
http://www.ieee.org/regional/section/rock_river

As I make final preparations for the last three Section/Chapter meetings of 1998 I find it hard to believe that I have been Section Chairman for the last year and a half. In reviewing our Section activities during this period I feel pleased with what has been achieved in terms of regular Section/Chapter meetings, short courses, and the various other activities including the International Machines and Drives Conference.

Last year our Section membership started to increase, reversing a four-year decline in IEEE membership both locally and nationally. Unfortunately, along with the success there has also been failure - the most significant being my inability to recruit members who are willing to assist in organizing Section activities. Although there are probably a few executive committee members who would attribute the lack of volunteers to the fact that I work them too hard, I would like to think there are many other reasons. If this is in fact true, then you should know that you will be electing a new Section Chair in November for the 1999 Section year. Chances are that the next individual in the office will be somewhat less demanding, so now is your chance to volunteer your services. Requirements for any of the positions available are fairly simple: a) show up for at least three meetings per year, and b) be willing to do something constructive for the Section. If you would like to volunteer or discuss the matter in more detail then contact me at (414) 547 0121 (work) or (414) 790 0127 (home), or simply introduce yourself to me at the next Section meeting and indicate that you are interested in helping organize Section activities.

As I recall, the last revision was dated sometime in the early 1970's. A special thanks, then, to Frank Bonk (Past Section Chairman) for starting the process approximately four years ago and to everyone else involved in the task. Although the local revision process itself was fairly simple, the same cannot be said about the approval process after it left the Section. Our newsletter editor will not allow me enough space to go into details here, but if you are interested you can stop me at the next meeting and I will explain. In retrospect, it is all rather amusing.

Both the Section Education Chair (Professor Glenn Wrate) and our PES Chapter Chair (Chris Nelson) were busy over the summer organizing a short course on symmetrical components. By all accounts the course was very successful and I would like to take this opportunity to thank both Glenn and Chris for organizing the course, and also Professor David Yu for teaching it. If all goes well we will have another short course on FORTRAN 90 to offer this fall. Watch for the announcement in the IEEE Informer.

The first meeting of the newly formed Electromagnetic Compatibility Chapter will take place at our regular Section/Chapter meeting in September. Since Jim Blaha (of L. S. Compliance, Inc.) performed much of the work involved in forming this Chapter, he has been appointed Interim Chapter Chair. The election of Officers for the various other Chapter positions will be conducted at the initial meeting in September. Congratulation to all those involved in the formation of the Electromagnetic Compatibility Chapter.

Sincerely,

Peter J. McKenny
Chairman, Milwaukee Section

WASHINGTON, Aug. 11, 1998 -- The IEEE Chicago/Rockford Consultants' Network will host the 10th IEEE-USA National Consulting Workshop on Oct. 17 in Schaumburg, IL.

The workshop is designed for practicing or aspiring consultants in the electrotechnology and information-technology fields. Expert consultants will explain their secrets and give practical how-to information on such topics as the following:

• getting started;
• employed full-time, consulting part-time;
• finding clients;
• financial aspects, fee setting, taxes;
• 30 years consulting experience: a perspective;
• the changing consulting arena and the Internet;
• intellectual property; and
• networking and referrals.

The workshop will be held from 8:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. at the Chicago Marriott-Schaumburg on 50 N. Martingale Rd. (Directions: From the I-90, go south on 53, exit at Higgins Rd., west 2 blocks, then left or south on Martingale).

The registration fee is $65 for IEEE members and $75 for non-IEEE members, minus a discount of $10 for early registrations received by October 9. Registration includes continental breakfast, refreshments at breaks, lunch, and copies of the speakers' handout materials. A special room rate of $88 for the night before or after is available by calling the hotel reservation line at 847-240-0100 by Sept. 17.

For more information on IEEE-USA consultants' workshops, see the Web site at http://www.ieeeusa.org/usab/BUSINESS/workshop.aicn.html. To register, send check (payable to IEEE) or credit card info, along with member number if applicable, to Dr. Gary L. Blank 847-464-4081 (fax); or P.O. Box 70155, Plato Center, IL 60170.

Mr. Roderick Ebben of Milwaukee Electric Tool Corporation will speak on "Performance Curves of a Series DC Motor Predicted Using Parametric Finite Element Analysis."

This talk will describe a procedure that uses finite element analysis to predict the performance curves of a typical series DC motor. A number of different analyses are made with parametric variations of current and rotor position. The computed torque-speed and current-speed curves are shown to agree closely with the measured curves.

Did you finally get that master's you've been working on? Are you considering a graduate degree? What is your advanced degree worth these days, anyway?

IEEE-USA's Workforce Committee recently released figures showing the 1998 average beginning salary offers for engineers and computer scientists. IEEE-USA bases its information on surveys that the National Association of Colleges and Employers conducts annually. Here's a summary of starting salary offers for electrical, electronics and computer engineers:

Master's degree candidates (by curriculum):

Doctoral degree candidates (by curriculum):