About Me

I live in Billerica, Massachusetts with my wife Elsa.

I’m a Web developer, working primarily in Drupal.

I was once a laser physicist, a biophysicist, and a semiconductor manufacturing engineer — but not all at the same time.

I have a parrot named Ptolemy. (He thinks the world revolves around him.)

I like to write, either for my Mechanical Robot Fish blog or in places like news.ycombinator (username: mechanical_fish).

My rotating list of hobbies includes: Baking, banjo, electronics, sound engineering, and sailing. One of these days I’ll get around to piano, pool, woodworking, and vegetable gardening.

Find Me:

Software Skills

  • Drupal, the open-source social software system, running on Linux/Apache/MySQL/PHP
  • Ruby and Rails
  • PHP, Ruby, Javascript, jQuery, CSS, HTML/XHTML, SQL, Git/Subversion/CVS, Emacs Lisp, Linux and Mac OS X system administration.
  • In earlier days: Perl, Oracle and PL/SQL, Tcl, LabVIEW, the Open Architecture Community System.

Work History

  • Principal Developer, Literate Devices, Inc, Billerica, MA (December 2007 – present)

    • Design, development, and deployment of web sites, primarily in Drupal.
    • Custom Drupal module development.
    • Drupal theming, including CSS and Javascript.

  • Research Scientist, Science Research Laboratory, Inc., Somerville, MA (March 2006 – October 2007)

    • Conceived, designed, and executed optical and electrical experiments on high-power semiconductor lasers in order to improve their operating lifetime.
    • Wrote software in Ruby, Java, LabVIEW, and VBScript for acquisition and analysis of laser data.
    • Designed cooling and monitoring subsystems for a laser diode testing facility; directed machinists and technicians during assembly and operation of the facility.
    • Co-authored funding proposals and reports.

  • Research Fellow, Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA (March 2003 – March 2006)

    • Studied tumor blood vessels and drug diffusion using novel optical techniques.
    • Assembled, configured, and maintained two-photon microscopy systems.
    • Wrote software in Java, LabVIEW, and C for image acquisition and analysis.
    • Trained and assisted microscope users.
    • Co-authored, reviewed, and edited journal articles and NIH grants.

  • Product Engineer, Agilent Technologies, Semiconductor Products Group, Newark, CA (Dec 2000 – March 2003)

    • Invented, designed, implemented, and maintained a Web-accessible software system (built with Oracle, Linux and Perl) for the capture, storage, retrieval, and display of RF test data and the automated evaluation and rework of semiconductor wafers; used this system to support 20–30 engineers at fabs in the U.S. and Malaysia. This software remains in production at Agilent (now Avago Technologies) and has processed more than 1 billion parts to date.
    • Diagnosed processing problems to improve yields during the manufacturing ramp of the Film Bulk Acoustic Resonator (FBAR).

  • Software Developer, ArsDigita Corporation, Cambridge, MA (April 2000 – November 2000)

    • Developed Oracle-backed Web sites for client companies, using the Open Architecture Community System.
    • Taught Web programming to beginning students.
    • Co-authored a chapter in a software textbook; wrote documentation.

  • Graduate Research Assistant, Department of Electrical Engineering, Cornell University (October 1995 – March 2000)

    • Conducted extensive, hands-on semiconductor process development at the Cornell Nanofabrication Facility.
    • Assembled and programmed computer-integrated test systems for measuring and analyzing electrical, optical, and RF-noise characteristics of lasers.
    • Developed analytical models of ring laser asymmetry and bistability.

Education

  • Cornell University, Ithaca, New York

    • Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering, May 2000
    • Thesis: Bistability and Unidirectionality in Triangular Ring Diode Lasers
    • Adviser: Dr. Joseph Ballantyne
    • Semiconductor Research Corporation Graduate Fellowship
    • National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship

  • Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio

    • Bachelor of Science in Physics, summa cum laude
    • National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship

Publications

  • C. Ji, M. F. Booth, A. Schremer, and J. M. Ballantyne, “Characterizing relative intensity noise in InGaAsP-InP triangular ring lasers”, IEEE J. Quantum Electronics 41: 925–931 (2005).
  • F. Winkler, S. V. Kozin, R. T. Tong, S-S Chae, M. F. Booth, I. Garkavstev, L. Xu, D. J. Hicklin, D. Fukumura, E. di Tomaso, L. L. Munn, and R. K. Jain, “Kinetics of vascular normalization by VEGFR2 blockade governs brain tumor response to radiation: Role of oxygenation, angiopoietin-1, and matrix metalloproteinases”, Cancer Cell 6: 553–63 (2004).
  • D. G. Duda, D. Fukumura, L. L. Munn, M. F. Booth, E. B. Brown, P. Huang, B. Seed, and R. K. Jain, “Differential transplantability of tumor-associated stromal cells”, Cancer Res. 64: 5920–4 (2004).
  • R. K. Jain and M. F. Booth, Commentary: “What brings pericytes to tumor vessels?”, J. Clin Invest. 112: 1134–6 (2003).
  • M. F. Booth, A. Schremer, and J. M. Ballantyne, “Spatial Beam Switching and Bistability in a Diode Ring Laser”, Appl. Phys. Lett 76: 1095–7 (2000).
  • D. G. Busch, S. Gao, R. A. Pelak, M. F. Booth, and W. Ho, “Femtosecond desorption dynamics probed by time-resolved velocity measurements”, Phys. Rev. Lett. 75: 673–6 (1995).
  • R. G. Beck, M. F. Booth, D. E. Farrell, J. P. Rice, and D. M. Ginsberg, “Torque magnetometry: a new probe of dimensionality in high-Tc superconductors”, Phil. Mag. B 65: 1373–9 (1992).
  • D. E. Farrell, R. G. Beck, M. F. Booth, C. J. Allen, E. D. Bukowski, and D. M. Ginsberg, “Superconducting effective mass anisotropy in Tl2Ba2CaCu2Ox”, Phys. Rev. B 42: 6758–6761 (1990).