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Question 6 transcript:
"Just how smart dolphins are. We were on a test where we were testing our sonar and we 'pinged' and it turns out that there were some dolphins near by. So they 'pinged' back at us. And we said, that this wasn't something that we were expecting and so we changed the signal and basically went, 'ping ping' and the dolphins went 'ping ping'! We soon found out that we didn't actually know at the time though what it was, and then the observers on deck said, no there's dolphins here. And that was suprising - how smart they are. The problem that poses though is that we want to develop a system that they can't mimic because we're looking for signals and if a dolphin emits the signal that's one of ours, we're going to think that there's a target there, and we won't know the time, and everything's going to be off. So a recent challenge for us is to design a signal that can't be mimiced. And that's a topic of hot research right now, to try to figure out how we can design a signal that the dolphins can't copy."

1. How did you first become interested in science?
2. What is the focus of your research and why did you choose this field of study?
3. What have been some of the recent discoveries in obstacle avoidance and navigation?
4. How do you use acoustics to detect and avoid underwater obstacles?
5. What challenges have you faced in studying obstacle avoidance?
6. What has most surprised you about avoiding obstacles and navigating?
7. What skills are important in your area of research?
8. What are the opportunities in ocean engineering? Can people without PhD's participate in some way in this type of research?
9. What is the greatest impact/relevance of your research?
10. What continues to inspire you about your work?
11. What advice would you give a high school student who expressed an interst in pursuing a career in your field?