This article discusses the development of self-report functional outcomes instruments in two years of a three-year large-scale national research project on the rehabilitation of adults with visual impairments. It describes the history of the effort, the process involved, and the methods used in establishing the instruments’ reliability, validity, and responsivity and the results of intermediate analyses of the data.

This survey of the current status of the specialized field of orientation and mobility instruction—based on 317 questionnaires returned by the administrators of agencies and schools serving blind persons, day-school programs, hospitals, and residential schools for other handicapped persons—collected data on the number of specialists employed, the present and future need for specialists, desired level of training, starting salaries, and other duties. The authors conclude that because of the current and expected levels of employment in this field and the recruitment preferences of administrators, university-level training of orientation and mobility specialists should be expanded.

Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) renderings in 3D provide additional target information when compared to 2D by separating out features overlaid in height. However, the required 2D SAR aperture, when Nyquist sampled, necessitates large scanning times that would be impractical for most realistic collections. This research has developed a novel volumetric approach to sparse aperture 3D SAR imaging, which is applicable to bistatic SAR near-field geometries, a generalization of far-field cases. This approach is first demonstrated in simulation and then applied to a measured scene containing a model vehicle target, producing sub-Nyquist sampled 3D SAR renderings.

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