Faculty
FacultyCV
Back
Overview
Dr. Alan Van Nevel is the associate provost for research for the Naval Postgraduate School. In this role he assists with the administration of research activities at NPS, with the goal of accelerating the development of new technology to impact warfare concepts and capabilities.
Prior to joining NPS, Alan was the chief scientist and strategy officer for the Research Department for the Naval Air Warfare Center, Weapons Division (NAWCWD). The Research Directorate mission is to create and prevent technical surprise through exploring relevant, new or emerging areas of science, creating advanced technologies and capabilities, and applying new technologies and capabilities to Navy needs.
Previously, Alan served as the Director of Research from April 2016 until February 2022. In the director role, he developed a new NAWCWD approach to S&T leadership of NISE funding. He served as the lead for the autonomy portfolio, developing new technologies in control theory, applied mathematics, and collaborative systems .
Prior to becoming the Director of Research in April 2016, Alan served as the division head for the Weapons Guidance division. The Weapons Guidance division mission is to provide multi-spectral, multi-disciplined engineering expertise for all aspects of weapons guidance systems and warfighter environments; inclusive from initial research and development to battlespace performance.
Up until August 2013, Alan served as branch head for Guidance Engineering. The Guidance Engineering branch head duties included hiring, staffing, project planning and oversight for a diverse group of scientists and engineers working on weapon systems. He was in that role from Jan 2012 to Aug 2013 Alan’s first positions at NAWCWD were in the research department, initially as a post-doctoral researcher and principal investigator before becoming the branch head in Nov 2001 for the Image and Signal Processing group, responsible for branch research activities.
In 1990, Alan completed his B.S. degree in physics at Truman State University, going on to the University of Missouri-Columbia, completing his M.S. and Ph.D. in physics in 1993 and 1996. Since August 1996 he has been employed at China Lake. He is a 2012 graduate of the Federal Executive Institute Leadership in a Democratic Society program, and completed the Navy Senior Leadership Seminar at the Naval Postgraduate School in June 2018
Alan’s hobbies include soccer, rugby, tropical fish, and pinball and arcade machines. He helps to run monthly scholastic chess tournaments in the community. Alan is the local high school soccer referee instructor and assessor, as well as an active official. He is also certified as a level 2 soccer goalkeeper coach.
Prior to joining NPS, Alan was the chief scientist and strategy officer for the Research Department for the Naval Air Warfare Center, Weapons Division (NAWCWD). The Research Directorate mission is to create and prevent technical surprise through exploring relevant, new or emerging areas of science, creating advanced technologies and capabilities, and applying new technologies and capabilities to Navy needs.
Previously, Alan served as the Director of Research from April 2016 until February 2022. In the director role, he developed a new NAWCWD approach to S&T leadership of NISE funding. He served as the lead for the autonomy portfolio, developing new technologies in control theory, applied mathematics, and collaborative systems .
Prior to becoming the Director of Research in April 2016, Alan served as the division head for the Weapons Guidance division. The Weapons Guidance division mission is to provide multi-spectral, multi-disciplined engineering expertise for all aspects of weapons guidance systems and warfighter environments; inclusive from initial research and development to battlespace performance.
Up until August 2013, Alan served as branch head for Guidance Engineering. The Guidance Engineering branch head duties included hiring, staffing, project planning and oversight for a diverse group of scientists and engineers working on weapon systems. He was in that role from Jan 2012 to Aug 2013 Alan’s first positions at NAWCWD were in the research department, initially as a post-doctoral researcher and principal investigator before becoming the branch head in Nov 2001 for the Image and Signal Processing group, responsible for branch research activities.
In 1990, Alan completed his B.S. degree in physics at Truman State University, going on to the University of Missouri-Columbia, completing his M.S. and Ph.D. in physics in 1993 and 1996. Since August 1996 he has been employed at China Lake. He is a 2012 graduate of the Federal Executive Institute Leadership in a Democratic Society program, and completed the Navy Senior Leadership Seminar at the Naval Postgraduate School in June 2018
Alan’s hobbies include soccer, rugby, tropical fish, and pinball and arcade machines. He helps to run monthly scholastic chess tournaments in the community. Alan is the local high school soccer referee instructor and assessor, as well as an active official. He is also certified as a level 2 soccer goalkeeper coach.
NPS Experience
- 2023 - current: Associate Provost
Other Experience
- 2022 - 2023 Chief Scientist and Strategy Officer (DP-5, GS-1310-15) Research Department, NAWCWD , Naval Air Warfare Center, Weapons Division
- 2022 - 2013 Supervisory Research Physicist (NM-5, GS-1310-15) Branch Head for Guidance Engineering , Naval Air Warfare Center, Weapons Division
- 2016 - 2022 Director (NM-5, GS-1310-15) Research and Intelligence Department, NAWCWD, Naval Air Warfare Center, Weapons Division
- 2013 - 2016 Supervisory Research Physicist (NM-5, GS-1310-15) Weapons Guidance Division, Naval Air Warfare Center, Weapons Division
- 2010 - 2013 Research Physicist (DP-5, GS-1310-15) Academic Coordinator, NAWCWD , Naval Air Warfare Center, Weapons Division
- 2008 - 2013 Adjunct Faculty, ERAU Worldwide China Lake, CA, Embry Riddle Aeronautical University Worldwide
- 2001 - 2010 Supervisory Research Physicist (DP4, GS-1310- 13-15) Head, Image and Signal Processing Branch , Naval Air Warfare Center, Weapons Division
- 1997 - 2001 Research Physicist (DP-3, GS12-13) Computational Sciences Division, Naval Air Warfare Center, Weapons Division
- 1996 - 1997 Postdoctoral Research Scientist Computational Sciences Division, Naval Air Warfare Center, Weapons Division
Research Interests
ATR, image exploitation, signal processing
Teaching Interests
Physics, pattern recognition, automatic target recognition, image exploitation
Scholarly Work
Publications
- Book Chapters
- Van Nevel, A. J., DeFacio, B., & Neal, S. P, (1996). An application of wavelet signal processing to ultrasonic nondestructive evaluation. Springer US Boston, MA.
- Conference Proceedings
- Van Nevel, A. J, (2010). Geometric diffusion as a classifier.
- Fergurson, E. W., Flenner, A., Hewer, G., Murata, Y., Ooi, G. T., Pai, S. H., Schwartzwald, D., & Van Nevel, A. J, (2006). Locating Peaks in Proteomic Mass Spectral Data Using the Morel-Helmholtz Principle.
- Mahalanobis, A., & Van Nevel, A. J, (2003). A collaborative network of correlation filters for object recognition.
- Mahalanobis, A., & Van Nevel, A. J, (2002). Performance of multidimensional algorithms for target detection in ladar imagery.
- Van Nevel, A. J, (2001). Automatic registration of sequential ladar imagery.
- Van Nevel, A. J, (2001). Image registration: a key element for information processing.
- Mahalanobis, A., Kumar, B. V., & Van Nevel, A. J, (2001). Three-dimensional correlation filters for orientation invariant recognition.
- Mahalanobis, A., Kumar, B. V., & Van Nevel, A. J, (2001). Volume correlation filters for recognizing patterns in 3d data.
- Van Nevel, A. J, (2000). Texture classification using level set features.
- Van Nevel, A. J., & Creusere, C. D, (1999). Intelligent bandwidth compression.
- Van Nevel, A. J, (1998). Texture synthesis via matching first and second order statistics of a wavelet frame decomposition.
- Hewer, G., Kenney, C., Peterson, L., & Van Nevel, A. J, (1997). Applied partial differential variational techniques.
- Van Nevel, A. J, (1997). Texture classification using wavelet frame decompositions.
- Defacio, B., Kim, S., & Van Nevel, A. J, (1994). Applications of squeezed states: Bogoliubov transformations and wavelets to the statistical mechanics of water and its bubbles.
- DeFacio, B., & Van Nevel, A. J, (1993). Department of Physics and Astronomy Missouri University Columbia, Missouri 65211, USA.
- Defacio, B., Van Nevel, A. J., & Brander, O, (1993). Double simple-harmonic-oscillator formulation of the thermal equilibrium of a fluid interacting with a coherent source of phonons.
- DeFacio, B., Van Nevel, A. J., & Brander, O, (1992). DOUBLE SIMPLE-HARMONIC-OSCILLATOR FORMULATION.
- Journal Articles
- Van Nevel, A. J, Image Registration.
- Mahalanobis, A., & Van Nevel, A. J, (2006). Integrated approach for automatic target recognition using a network of collaborative sensors. APPLIED OPTICS, 28(45), 7365-7374.
- Mahalanobis, A., Muise, R. R., Stanfill, S. R., & Van Nevel, A. J, (2004). Design and application of quadratic correlation filters for target detection. IEEE Transactions on Aerospace and Electronic Systems, 3(40), 837--850.
- Kenney, C. S., Manjunath, B., Zuliani, M., Hewer, G. A., & Van Nevel, A. J, (2003). A condition number for point matching with application to registration and postregistration error estimation. IEEE Transactions on Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence, 11(25), 1437--1454.
- Van Nevel, A. J., & Mahalanobis, A, (2003). Comparative study of maximum average correlation height filter variants using ladar imagery. Optical Engineering, 2(42), 541--550.
- Van Nevel, A. J, (2001). Three-dimensional correlation filters for orientation invariant recognition. Automatic Target Recognition, (11), 51.
- Creusere, C. D., & Van Nevel, A. J, (1999). Automatic target recognition directed image compression. Journal of aircraft, 4(36), 626--631.
- Van Nevel, A. J., Peterson, L., & Kenney, C, (1999). Image Processing for LADAR Automatic Target Recognition.
- Van Nevel, A. J., DeFacio, B., & Neal, S. P, (1999). Information-theoretic wavelet noise removal for inverse elastic wave scattering theory. Physical Review E, 3(59), 3682.
- Hewer, G., Van Nevel, A. J., Kuo, W., & Peterson, L, (1997). Optical Flow of Small Objects Using Wavelets, Bootstrap Methods, and Synthetic Discriminant Filters.
- Editorial Materials
- Du, E., Ives, R., Van Nevel, A. J., & She, J, (2010). Advanced Image Processing for Defense and Security Applications.
- Ph.D. Thesis
- Van Nevel, A. J, (1996). Wavelet-based noise removal for ultrasonic non-destructive evaluation.