Dr. Jason D. Schmidt

Dr. Jason Schmidt is a Senior Scientist at MZA Associates Corp in the Dayton, Ohio office. Prior to joining MZA, Dr. Schmidt was an Assistant Professor of Electro-Optics at the Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT). During his time at AFIT, Dr. Schmidt was the primary faculty member in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering working in the area of advanced adaptive optics (AO) and laser propagation research. While at AFIT, he successfully advised a total of 11 Masters students and 5 Ph.D. students and was responsible for the AFIT AO laboratories. While at AFIT, he received the Air Force Office of Scientific Research Young Investigator Award and was the first Air Force officer to do so. Also during this time, but independent from his AFIT duties, Dr. Schmidt authored a book entitled Numerical Simulation of Optical Wave Propagation with Examples in MATLAB which has been published through SPIE Press. Prior to his teaching position at AFIT, Dr. Schmidt was stationed at Kirtland Air Force Base where he worked at the Starfire Optical Range, directing satellite tracking tests and analyzing live-test AO system data. Dr. Schmidt holds a B.S. in Physics from Marquette University, M.S. in Physics from The Ohio State University, and Ph.D. in Electro-Optics from the University of Dayton.