Nicola was educated in physics at the University of Nottingham, UK, and conducted her PhD thesis research at the University of Surrey, UK, solving canonical problems of eddy-current nondestructive evaluation analytically using perturbation theory, the Wiener-Hopf method and an adapted form of the geometrical theory of diffraction. The latter piece of work was published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society. Nicola moved to the USA in 1999 to join Iowa State University’s Center for Nondestructive Evaluation as a research scientist, and joined the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at Iowa State University as an Associate Professor in 2006, obtaining tenure and promotion to the rank of Professor in 2012 and becoming a Fellow of the UK Institute of Physics in 2013. Nicola’s research interests include nondestructive evaluation and materials characterization using eddy-current, four-point probe, capacitive and microwave sensors, and broadband dielectric spectroscopy applied, variously, to structural steels, metal powder, electrical insulation polymers and polymer-based composites. Nicola enjoys teaching courses in electronic properties of materials and eddy current nondestructive evaluation to senior undergraduates and graduate research students in engineering, for whom she hopes that this book will be helpful. She credits the late R. Bruce Thompson for supporting the writing of this book in its early stages, and her husband John R. Bowler for helping to envision it.
