Lou Sutherland—The man and his work

Abstract

Lou Sutherland is one of the longest serving members of the international acoustics community and one of the most prolific. In a career lasting over 60 years, his main areas of research have involved studies of human and structural response to noise, sonic boom and blast, but his contributions to the fields of acoustics and vibration have been much more diverse and have included topics such as atmospheric absorption, aircraft noise measurement and modeling, low-frequency noise, and acoustic testing. He has been active in standards organizations and as a result of his services has been elected as a Fellow in several professional societies. As a consultant, Lou had the ability to break down complex problems into simple components that could be understood and solved, often using limited available data and simple theoretical models. Lou is still active as a consultant and continues to influence people with his ideas. As a long-term colleague, the author will examine some of his major contributions and share s...