SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING UPDATE FAIRFIELD UNIVERSITY | SPRING 2019 School of Engineering Celebrating Years SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING UPDATE | SPRING 2019 I ON THE COVER: Message from the Dean An instructor and a student use a magnifying lens to create a Printed Circuit Board (PCB) in the Electrical Engineering Lab. Photo by Joe Adams s this is my first message as Dean of Fairfield’s School of Engineering, I thought it would be helpful to provide a brief overview of my academic background. I joined Fairfield in July 2018, as (interim) dean and professor of engineering. Prior to that, I spent nine years at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University as an engineering professor and senior vice president for Academics and Research, and seven years as a professor and dean of Engineering at Manhattan College. Before that, AI spent 26 years at the University of Rochester on the Chemical Engineering faculty and as associate dean for Graduate Studies. SCHOOL OF I am both pleased and proud to join the well-respected engineering faculty at Fairfield. ENGINEERING Our School of Engineering (SOE) is relatively young; in fact, this year we are celebrating our 25th anniversary. The program came into being when Fairfield University acquired the UPDATE Bridgeport Engineering Institute in 1994, and we have come a long way in a short time. Richard Heist, PhD We believe that engineering is a “service to humanity” profession, which means that virtu- Dean ally everything engineers do is designed to help others. Couple this fundamental philosophy with the University’s Jesuit focus on service to others and social justice, and what we provide, Harvey Hoffman, PhD “We believe that in addition to a first-class engineering education, is an individual, character-building experience Associate Dean that encourages leadership development in our students. This, in part, is why we have a 100% engineering is a job placement rate for our engineering graduates. Marcia Arambulo Rodriguez MOT ’15 Just as important for our future, we have a growing cadre of applied research-involved faculty Assistant Dean ‘service to humanity’ with interests in cutting-edge areas such as Artificial Intelligence, machine learning, cybersecu- rity, data science and analytics, nano/micro materials manufacturing, advanced simulation and Jeannine (Carolan) Graf ’87 Integrated Marketing Manager profession, which analysis, and bioinformatics, to list a few. Our growing emphasis on applied research will strengthen our academic reputation and will means that virtually Nancy (Gelston) Dobos ’91 help bring about a “sea-change” in the SOE over the next decade. My belief is that the number of Designer everything engineers engineering faculty and students will increase substantially, and that there will be a stand-alone engineering building on the Fairfield campus. Send Inquiries to: do is designed to The expansion of SOE as we move into our second quarter century will strengthen STEM School of Engineering awareness on our campus and help develop a “continuum of understanding” that broadens and Fairfield University help others.” strengthens the relationship with engineering and all the other academic disciplines. 1073 North Benson Road It is an exciting time to be part of the engineering team here at Fairfield University, and I look Fairfield, CT 06824-5195 forward to our working together to continue to define our path to the future for the School of 203-254-4000 Engineering. fairfield.edu/soe Sincerely, Follow us on social media: FairfieldUniversitySOE @fairfieldu_soe Richard H. Heist, PhD @fairfieldu_soe Dean II SPRING 2019 | SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING UPDATE Contents School of Engineering 3 Student Accomplishments Fairfield Software Engineers Win 4 “Best in Show” at Global Game Jam Sky’s the Limit for NASA Connecticut 6 Space Grant Consortium Awardees School of Engineering Celebrates 8 25 Years in Stag Country Fairfield’s “STEM Guitar” Instructor Creates 10 One-of-a-Kind Axe for Charity Auction Engineering School Initiatives Strengthen 12 International Student Recruitment 14 Spring 2019 Senior Design Projects School of Engineering Faculty: 16 Dedicated to Research and Innovation SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING UPDATE | SPRING 2019 1 UNDERGRADUATE PROGRAMS B.S. in Bioengineering B.S. in Computer Science B.S. in Electrical Engineering B.S. in Mechanical Engineering STUDENT ORGANIZATIONS AND SOCIETIES 3D Printing Club American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) Biomedical Engineering Society (BMES) Engineers Without Borders (EWB) Engineering Student Society (ESS) Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE) Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) Society of Women Engineers (SWE) Tau Beta Phi (Engineering Honor Society) 2 SPRING 2019 | SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING UPDATE STUDENT ACCOMPLISHMENTS GRADUATE PROGRAMS Applied Data Science Electrical and Computer 2018-19 Inductees to NASA CT Space Grant 2018-19 Bernadette and Engineering Tau Beta Phi, Fairfield’s Awardees, Fall 2018 John Porter Scholarship Management of Technology Engineering Honor Society Russell Moore Rathin Kumar Agarwal Mechanical Engineering CLASS OF 2019 Katherine Unfried Nicholas Caratelli Peter Coffman (CE) Jovelt Dorsainvil Nimesh Das Software Engineering Joshua Dougherty (ME) Nicholas DeBiase Uyen Thy Ho (MOT) 2018-19 BEI Scholarship John Delaney CERTIFICATE Jeffrey Kramer (SE) Michael Donofrio PROGRAMS Kacper Laska (ME) Harold Corey Loke Naga Vydehi Gurram Brandon Thomas (MOT) Johnathan Menz Wei Hu Cybersecurity Mayara Miranda Katherine Unfried (BE) John Knight Data Science and Big Data Carlos Murcia Daryl Vinluan (EE) Kacper Laska Technology Jacob Musto Thuy Le CLASS OF 2020 Network Technology Mohanapriya Nithiyanantha Sukumar Yifei Li Thomas Botelho (ME) Son Pham Serena Lo Web and Mobile Application Colin Bradley (ME) Pawan Pillai Amy Caplan (BE) Development Galo Pombar Chico Emmett Godfrey (ME) Martha Rogers BEI Esai Varuni Rajapandi Brian Gozzo (ME) Scholarship Ashwini Sajjan STUDY ABROAD Keith McHugh (ME) Calvin Thomas Mahitha Thikkavarapu FOR ENGINEERS Mitchell Owen (ME) Carlos Urena Brandon Thomas University Comillas Pontifica John Weichenried (ME) Vandana Venkat Raman in Madrid, Spain Peter Wihbey (ME) Society of American Military Unversity of Ireland, Galway* Engineers (SAME) Scholarship Fairfield County ISI Engineering Scholarship Davis Doherty * The University of Ireland, Bindu Madhavi Pesaladinne Galway also offers a 4 + 1 BS/MS biomedical engineering program in conjunction with its study abroad program. Students can earn a BS from Fairfield and MS from University of Ireland, in five years. LEFT: (l-r), Milgian Moreno-Villatoro ’18, Christina Ficaro ’18, and Kacper Laska ’18, MS’19. Photo by Joe Adams SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING UPDATE | SPRING 2019 3 “The event was very high energy. I did meet a lot of new people. It was not all game developers, as people might think. There were musicians, artists, writers, and designers among many others.” Samuel Nguyen 4 SPRING 2019 | SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING UPDATE FAIRFIELD SOFTWARE ENGINEERS WIN “BEST IN SHOW” AT GLOBAL GAME JAM World records were broken as six Fairfield graduate student engineers spent an entire weekend collaborating on the design and development of a new video game at the largest Game Jam ever. ith a goal of bringing people think. There were musicians, artists, writers, and designers from all over the world together among many others.” for one exciting weekend of Both Crowley and Nguyen agreed that the hardest part creating innovative video games, of building the game was the time constraint. Describing the Global Game Jam is described hectic pace of the sleep deprived weekend, Crowley noted, by its volunteer organizers as “a “It was early morning starts all the way through until 9 p.m. hackathon focused on game development.” The 2019 non- Lots of asset designing and even more logic programming.” profit event took place from January 25 to 27 and broke all At the end of the competition, a half dozen judges with ex- Wprevious participation records with 47,000 “jammers” making pertise in game development and design individually tested 9,000 new games at 860 sites in 113 countries. out each game created at the Stamford location, and awarded Now in its 11th year, ten new countries took part for the the Fairfield University team “Best in Show.” This honor did first time in Global Game Jam 2019, including Azerbaijan, not come as a complete surprise to Nguyen, thanks to his Namibia, and Sri Lanka. The team of grad students from team’s use of complex 3D graphics for their characters, assets, Fairfield’s software engineering program participated at a loca- and animation, which he shared, “the judges said was very tion closer to home — Stamford, Connecticut. rare since it is difficult to develop.” At the start of the weekend, Game Jam organizers strategically “On top of that, even before the judging, many observers announced this year’s secret theme across virtually every time came by and asked us how long we have been doing this and ABOVE: Fairfield grad students look on zone in the world: “What Home Means to You.” And then the what courses we took,” continued Nguyen. “They were very as a judge tries out their video game. fun began; inspired by a shared love for survival-style games, surprised to find out that we had never taken any specific Photo by Dr. Adrian Rusu the software engineers from Fairfield feverishly took to their game design courses.” LEFT: Graphic from the Fairfield team’s keyboards and created a game with a story based on a map In