Michael Thompson

Biography

Michael holds a bachelor’s degree with honours in electrical engineering and a doctorate in coastal engineering from the University of Queensland, Australia where he has since tutored for university courses (machine learning and digital signal processing).

Michael’s expertise is in artificial intelligence algorithms, coastal engineering and computer vision. He founded a tech startup business (Shoretech), related to his Ph.D. research on coastal monitoring.

During his Ph.D. Michael focused on novel methods for measuring wave-breaking in the surf zone and measuring swash kinematics, where the leading edge of water at the shoreline causes a lot of beach erosion. He also investigated how glare from sunlight reflects off the ocean surface, and how that affects cameras and surf lifesavers observing the coast. Michael continues some of this work part-time through Shoretech.

Brought up going to church in a Christian family, Michael started to consider the reality of the Gospel in high school. Through high school he faced many pushbacks towards his Christian beliefs in science classes, and this challenged him to dig deeper into the evidence for the Christian faith. He found overwhelming evidence in history for Jesus and His miraculous Resurrection. Through CMI resources and others, he found convincing evidence for the inerrancy of the Bible, especially Genesis which is often discredited. Michael has since been passionate about evangelism and apologetics, helping others overcome blockers to belief in Jesus. For this reason, after finishing his Ph.D., Michael joined Creation Ministries International (Australia) in Brisbane, Queensland, as a speaker, writer and researcher.

Publications:

Thesis:

1. Thompson, M., 2024. Investigating the use of Computer Vision Techniques for Analysing the Surf Zone and Swash Zone. PhD Thesis, School of Civil Engineering, The University of Queensland. doi.org/10.14264/d27898f

Journal Papers:

2. Thompson, M.E., Atkinson, A., Watterson, E., Naderi, N., Loehr, H., Baldock, T.E.. A camera based method for assessing surf amenity of submerged nearshore structures in a wave basin by quantifying wave breaking. Ocean Eng. 286(2):115606, 2023.. doi.org/10.1016/j.coastaleng.2022.104190
3. Thompson, M.E., Matson, B.J., Baldock, T.E., 2022. A globally verified coastal glare estimation tool. Coast. Eng. 177, 104190. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.coastaleng.2022.104190
4. Thompson, M., Zelich, I., Watterson, E., Baldock, T.E., 2021. Wave Peel Tracking: A new approach for assessing surf amenity and analysis of breaking waves. Remote Sens. 13(17), 3372. https://doi.org/10.3390/rs13173372.

Conference Papers:

5. Watterson E., Thompson, M., Gainza, J., Loehr, H., 2022. Technology-Driven Approach to the Modelling And Design of Artificial Surf Reefs. In proceedings of the International Conference on Coastal Engineering 2022, online, 4–9 December.
6. Thompson, M.E., Watterson, E., Baldock, T.E., 2021b. Detailed Assessment of Surf Amenity over Reef and Sand Bottom Surf Breaks using Wave Peel Tracking. In proceedings of the Australasian Coasts & Ports 2021 Conference, Christchurch, New Zealand, 11–13 April 2022.
7. Thompson, M., Watterson, E., Baldock, T., 2020. Assessment of Surf Amenity using Computer Vision with Convolutional Neural Networks to Track Wave Pockets. In proceedings of the 22nd Australasian Fluid Mechanics Conference AFMC2020, Brisbane, Australia, 7–10 December 2020. https://doi.org/10.14264/767544c.