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North Dakota State U wins NASA's Great Moonbuggy race
Huntsville, AL - Team Fargo from North Dakota State University won the college-level competition in the eleventh annual running of NASA's Great Moonbuggy Race. The school's team also won the 2003 competition.
In the race, staged at NASA's U.S. Space & Rocket Center, students design human-powered vehicles and test them on a simulated lunar surface. The competition was inspired by the first lunar rovers, created more than forty years ago. Each vehicle must fit into a storage cube that is four feet on each side. It must be light enough for its riders, one male and one female, to carry and be quick and easy to set up.
The prize for best engineering design went to Utah State University (Logan, UT).
Students race paper snowboards in Energy Challenge
Winter Park, CO - Students raced down snow-covered slopes on snowboards made of paper in the final leg of the Energy Challenge, a national collegiate competition that encourages students to design and build full-scale projects out of paper materials.
Sponsors of this year's Energy Challenge were the U.S. Department of Energy, the Institute of Paper Science and Technology at Georgia Institute of Technology (Atlanta, GA), National Renewable Energy Laboratory (Golden, CO) and Never Summer Snowboards (Denver, CO).
A team from Miami University (OH) built and rode the winning snowboard. Team members were Margaret Huseman, Ben Van Lear, Colleen O'Donnell, Michael Loufman and Joel Hahn. Thirteen teams representing schools from Maine to California competed.
The Energy Challenge is designed to increase interest in science and engineering and to teach concepts of energy use and waste reduction in the pulp and paper industry, the second most energy-intensive industry in the U.S.
The snowboard race was the sixth annual Energy Challenge. In previous competitions, students constructed thermal-insulated packages to protect a raw egg dropped twenty feet onto a hard surface; raced paper kayaks; navigated a paper sail made from 100 pounds of wood chips, and in 2003, created and rode hang gliders with paper wings on the Outer Banks of North Carolina near Kitty Hawk.
Duke students win awards for assistive devices
Durham, NC - Three student teams in a biomedical engineering course at Duke University's Pratt School of Engineering have won national awards for devices they created for people with disabilities.
Shin Yeu Ong and Shin Rong Ong developed several envelope-stuffing devices for workers with cerebral palsy. The team of Diana Hsu and Elizabeth Strautin Schwartz made a supportive head-neck brace that attaches to the wheelchair of a man with quadriplegia. The teams tied for first place in the NISH (formerly National Industries for the Severely Handicapped) Workplace Technology scholarship competition.
Irene Tseng and Derek Juang won the student design contest sponsored by the Rehabilitation Engineering and Assistive Technology Society of North America (RESNA). Their project was a shoulder-steered tricycle for a boy with TAR syndrome, which results in very short arm length.
All three projects were created for a course called Devices for People with Disabilities, started in 1996 by bioengineering professor Larry Bohs with funding from the National Science Foundation. To date, fifteen student teams have won national awards for projects developed for the class.
Cal State LA students named ONR scholars
Los Angeles, CA - Three Cal State LA civil engineering undergrads will participate in an Office of Naval Research (ONR) grant project conducted by Cal State LA civil engineering professor Mark Tufenkjian. The students are Valerie Nevarez, Jonathan Janer and Michael Soto.
Over the next three years, the students, all CE majors, will assist Tufenkjian and engineers at the Naval Facilities Engineering Service Center (NFESC) in Port Hueneme, CA with seafloor engineering research.
ONR scholars enter the program as freshmen or sophomores and continue through their senior year. They receive a salary and a stipend to cover tuition, books and research-related travel. A ten-week summer internship at NFESC is included.
This year ONR awarded eleven grants. Professor Tufenkjian is the only grant recipient from the western U.S. and the only CE professor. The award of $594,253 is the largest grant ever received by Cal State LA's CE department.
Teams from around the world compete in ICPC
Prague, Czech Republic - Students from St. Petersburg Institute of Fine Mechanics and Optics in St. Petersburg, Russia, took first place in the International Collegiate Programming Contest (ICPC, icpc.baylor.edu) organized by Association for Computing Machinery (ACM, www.acm.org). The contest is sponsored by IBM (Armonk, NY).
KTH-Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden; Belarusian State University, Minsk, Belarus; Perm State University, Perm, Russia and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Boston, MA were also in the top five. Seventy-three teams from Europe, Africa, the Middle East, Latin America, North America, Asia and the South Pacific competed in the world finals. IBM has sponsored the contest since 1997.
"The contest affords IBM the opportunity to attract a diverse group of students from around the world, as well as here in the U.S. That said, I would love to see even more HBCUs and Hispanic serving schools in the U.S. participate in the ACM ICPC in the year ahead," says Margaret Ashida, director of corporate university relations for IBM.
The 2005 ICPC will be held in Shanghai, China.
Cal State LA team wins Westec manufacturing challenge
Los Angeles, CA - Cal State LA won first place in the university category at the Westec 2004 Manufacturing Challenge, an annual manufacturing competition where engineering students design and manufacture products for judging by manufacturing professionals.
Cal State LA's winning project, a recumbent tricycle design, beat entries from seven other schools. Members of the Cal State LA team were Jose Cardenas, Brendan Chua, Aaron Kausen, Jeff Kay, Shant Mardirosian and Juan Pena. The team advisors were technology faculty Paul Liu, Virgil Seaman and Jai Hong.
The Westec Advanced Productivity Exhibition, a major trade show, is co-sponsored by the Society of Manufacturing Engineers, the American Machine Tool Distributors Association and the Association for Manufacturing Technology.
NJIT's EOP wins SHPE, NSBE awards
Newark, NJ - Laurence Howell, executive director of the Educational Opportunity Program (EOP) at New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT, www.njit.edu), has been named minority engineering program director of the year by the National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE, www.nsbe.org).
Carlomagno Ontaneda, assistant director of NJIT's EOP, has been honored as educator of the year by the Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers (SHPE, www.shpe.org).
"This is the first time that two staff members from an engineering development program, both from the same university, have been recognized in the same year by these two national societies," Howell notes. "It shows that the EOP at NJIT is not only a success but a national leader in higher education."
Howell was cited by NSBE as a "major contributor to NJIT's consistently high ranking in graduating African American and Hispanic engineers." SHPE praised Ontaneda for "promoting Hispanic education in the engineering, science and math disciplines."
Howell received his Golden Torch award during NSBE's gala in Dallas, TX, and Ontaneda was given his award at a SHPE banquet in Chicago, IL.
NJIT's EOP is a state and university funded program that offers academic, financial, career and counselling support to underrepresented students, helping them succeed in rigorous engineering curricula. NJIT is currently welcoming some 150 incoming EOP students each year out of a total of 5,500 entering freshmen.
"This award from SHPE is a great honor to me," says Ontaneda. "It verifies that what we are doing here in EOP - helping educate students who might have been left behind - is of great national importance."
Meet the New Faces in Engineering
Alexandria, VA - Minorities and women were among the New Faces in Engineering honored during National Engineers Week this past February. Now in its second year, the New Faces program aims to boost public awareness of engineering while aiming the spotlight at outstanding newcomers in the field.
The program is sponsored by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)/ IEEE-USA and Fluor Corp, E-Week 2004 national co-chairs. All nominees are featured at www.eweek.org.
"The individuals we are recognizing in the New Faces program are excelling in their vocations and making advancements that will benefit society in the long term. I feel strongly about the importance of encouraging today's students to become great engineers so that we may celebrate their successes in years to come," says Alan Boeckmann, chair and CEO of Fluor.
These are some of this year's crop of New Faces: Carlos Garza, agricultural engineer, Melden & Hunt (Edinburg, TX); Rachel Stender, project engineer, Port of Corpus Christi (TX) Authority; Lt Lindsay Morga, machinery division officer and nuclear engineer, U.S. Navy.
Rob Firmature, industrial printer development engineer, IBM Printing Systems Division (Boulder, CO); Dominique L. Green, EE and analyst at Accenture (Reston, VA); Elizabeth Davis Kay, senior manufacturing engineer, Westinghouse Electric Co, Columbia (SC) Fuel Fabrication Facility.
Also, Jin Liu, assistant professor, EE, University of Texas - Dallas; Erin McGinnis, industrial engineer, Northrop Grumman Corp (El Segundo, CA).
"It's important to recognize that it is the profession of engineering itself that allows such a diverse group of people to excel at such a diverse range of accomplishments," says Joseph V. Lillie, chair of National Engineers Week 2004 and the IEEE's lead E-Week volunteer.
SHPE awards recognize service and technical success
Chicago, IL - At its 2004 National Technical and Career Conference, the Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers gave awards to technologists in industry, government and the military. "Their accomplishments are messages of pride and hope," says SHPE national president Diana Gomez.
These are some of the winners:
Jamie Oaxaca award: Celina Blanco-Boscan, senior project aircraft engineer, Delta Airlines.
Hispanic in technology - government: Lt Commander Eduardo R. Fernandez, executive officer, nuclear sub USS Henry M. Jackson, U.S. Navy.
Hispanic in technology - corporate: Daniel Ortega, engineer, Phantom Works division, Boeing Co.
Junipero Serra award: Alma Martinez Fallon, manager of planning and manufacturing engineering, Northrop Grumman Newport News.
Professional role model: Iliana Limon, project office engineer, Synterra Ltd.
Student role model: Jorge Alvarez, ME student, Florida International University.
Educator of the year: Carlomango Ontaneda, assistant EOP director, New Jersey Institute of Technology.
Most promising engineer: Lt Commander Edward J. Robledo, engine officer, USS Maryland, U.S. Navy.
Corporate achievement: Alma H. Rosales, director of worldwide enablement services, IBM.
Honorary member: Diane N. De Hoyos, engineer, General Motors.
Company of the year: Verizon.
William D. Smith is new president of PBQ&D
New York, NY - William D. Smith has been appointed president of Parsons Brinckerhoff Quade & Douglas, Inc (PBQ&D), PB's U.S. infrastructure arm.
As president, Smith will oversee the operations of PB's oldest and largest subsidiary company, including 3,000 employees working on 1,700 transportation and other infrastructure projects throughout the U.S. and Canada.
Smith was northwest district manager for PB, managing all the firm's ops within a ten-office region serving the northwestern U.S. and western Canada. He served as principal-in-charge for high-profile projects like the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge east span, and the extension of the Muni Metro light rail transit system in San Francisco. He also oversaw PB's role on extensions to the San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) system.
Founded in 1885, Parsons Brinckerhoff provides program management, planning, engineering and construction management services for transportation, power, buildings and environmental projects. The company employs 9,000 professionals and support staff in more than 200 offices worldwide.
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