Merrill M. Hessel, Ph. D.

Dr. Hessel is President of MerAl productions where he provides consulting services including strategic planning, system analysis and Web Site Design and Design of computer applications. In 1990, he was partner in V.R. software where he has used many computer languages (C++, Java, xBase, Visual Basic and others) to develop commercial applications. Video Productions, Streaming Videos,  Web site development and computer system consulting is the focus of his current activities.

He Hosts and produces a bi-monthly Cable Television show "Computers for Intelligent Adults", produces a monthly show "Observing Technology" has produced one-half hour video productions for cable television. "Greatest Fire Investigation Tool of the 20th Century",  "Emergency we are Being Attacked", Puppy Raisers for Blind".  He also conducted a workshop for Television Producers & Technicians on how to setup computers for video capture and editing as well as a demonstration of special video effects such as green screen use in productions, color correction, transitions. He helped establish a and leads a Digital Video User group, http://www.dvug.org which is a Special Interest Group of the Capital PC User Group www.cpcug.org . He is on the Board of Directors of Montgomery Community Television and the CPCUG.

Dr. Merrill M. Hessel received an Engineering degree from Cornell University and was a design engineer for three years at E. I. du Pont de Nemours. He received a Ph. D. in Physics at Columbia University and was an Associate Professor of Physics at Fordham University.

He joined the National Institute of Standards and Technology (formerly the National Bureau of Standards) a major government agency in 1972 where he held various research, supervisory, and executive level positions. He was Deputy Director of a $20M 120 staff research organization within NIST and a Division Chief of a $4M 30 person research organization. Dr. Hessel received the agency's Bronze medal for outstanding physics research and technical management and the Silver medal for formation and management of an industry-government effort focused on standardization of digital data exchange between computers. In 1996 he retired from this institution and became President of MerAl Productions.

Dr. Hessel has chaired several computer task groups for implementation of computer standards and policies in a major government technical organization. In 1986-87 Dr. Hessel was selected as a White House President's Commission Exchange Executive and spent one year at the executive level of The Boeing Company. During that year he was a Boeing employee and reported directly to the Vice President for computing where he headed a corporate wide task force of 60 people. The task force encompassed six Boeing major operating companies and developed a comprehensive plan for migrating from the existing computing environment to the digital data driven paradigm of the 1990's. Dr. Hessel was a member of the Board of Directors of PDES Inc. from 1987 to 1992 ,a multi-million dollar consortium of large corporations such as Boeing, Lockheed Martin, IBM, Northrup Grumman, etc. whose mission was the development of the STEP standard to enabling enterprise integration and interoperability for member companies

In 1989 he chaired an industry-government panel to review the Modernization program of the National Weather Service (NWS). The purpose of this panel was to provide a report and recommendations to the Secretary of Commerce, OMB and Congress on the $500 million Advanced Weather Interactive Processing System. This include an analysis of the Computer Systems, Next Generation Radars, Automated Surface Observing Systems, deployment, technical risk, cost drivers, schedules, staffing and management issues.

Dr. Hessel started programming computers in 1957 with the IBM 650 and has significant experience with a variety of mainframe, micro and minicomputers. He had been president of the Capitol Area Public Domain Computer Users group (CAPDUG) for many years, wrote numerous articles for the monthly CAPDUG newsletter, taught courses in programming and database development and reviewed over 2000 public domain software packages. He has taught business professionals throughout the United States and Canada for "The Center for Advanced Professional Education" on microcomputers, computer policy, and implementation of computers in small and large private sector and industrial organizations.