Jane Simmons
Jane Marie Simmons (September 24, 1963 – August 25, 2021) was an American researcher in optical networks. She was the author of the book Optical Network Design and Planning (2008; 2nd ed., Springer, 2014).[1]
Education and career
[edit]Simmons was originally from Middletown Township, New Jersey, where she was born on September 24, 1963. As a high school student, she was recognized nationally in the Presidential Scholars Program.[2] She majored in electrical engineering at Princeton University, graduating summa cum laude in 1985.[1] After working for three years in the software industry,[2] she continued her studies in electrical engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, receiving a master's degree in 1990 and completing her Ph.D. in 1993.[1] Her doctoral dissertation, End-to-end reliable communication in data networks, was supervised by Robert G. Gallager.[2]
She joined Bell Labs in the mid-1990s, and started her work on optical networks there.[1] After leaving Bell Labs, she became chief network architect for the all-optical backbone network of the Corvis Corporation,[3] and founded Monarch Network Architects in 2003.[1]
She served as editor-in-chief of the Journal of Optical Communications and Networking from 2017 to her death in 2021.[1]
Recognition
[edit]Simmons was named as an IEEE Fellow in 2011, "for contributions to optical network architecture and algorithms".[1]
Optica established the Jane M. Simmons Memorial Speakership, an award supporting an invited speaker at the annual Optical Fiber Communication Conference, in memory of Simmons in 2021.[4]
References
[edit]- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Saleh, Adel A. M.; Iannone, Patrick P.; Chan, Vincent W. S. (25 August 2021), "In Memoriam: Jane M. Simmons, 1963 - 2021", Newsroom: Obituaries, Optica, retrieved 2026-07-15; also posted by IEEE Communications Society, September 20, 2021, and published in the Journal of Optical Communications and Networking, doi:10.1364/JOCN.443866
- 1 2 3 Simmons, Jane Marie (1993), End-to-end reliable communication in data networks (Ph.D. thesis), Massachusetts Institute of Technology, hdl:1721.1/3322; see biography, page 210
- ↑ Conversations on Gender Equality: Jane M. Simmons, Springer Nature, retrieved 2026-07-15
- ↑ Jane M. Simmons Memorial Speakership, Optica, retrieved 2026-07-15
External links
[edit]- Jane Simmons publications indexed by Google Scholar