In Memoriam: Giovanni Picardi, 1936-2015

Giovanni Picardi, Professor Emeritus at the “La Sapienza” University in Rome, Italy, passed away on August 17, 2015, at the age of 78 years. All who have had the privilege to share his scientific and professional commitments knew Giovanni as “the Prof”.

After graduating in electrical engineering in 1960, he taught cybernetics and information theory at the University of Perugia. He became professor at “La Sapienza” in 1975, where he worked until his death – Working with both the Italian Space Agency and the European Space Agency as member of the science team of many missions.

Professor Picardi played a pivotal role for all radars developed be the Italian Space Agency since the X-SAR program in 1994. He also played a leading role for the orbital radars on the Mars Express, Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and Cassini planetary missions.

His talent and steadfast commitment led to a number of innovative radar systems that can study the surface and subsurface of worlds such as Mars and Titan; as well as systems for the advanced and innovative Italian COSMO-SkyMed X-Band radar system for Earth observations.