Four NUWC Division Newport employees share their career inspiration during speaker series presentation

By NavalUnderseaWarfareCenter DivisionNewportPublicAffairsOffice

NEWPORT, R.I

During the Naval Undersea Warfare Center (NUWC) Division Newport’s July 12 presentation of the storytelling series “The Knot: Stories from theWorkforce,”fouremployeessharedwhat influenced them at a young age to pursue theircareerpath.

With the theme “Born to Do This” as the premise Dr Lauren Freeman a senior oceanographer in Ranges, Engineering and Analysis Department; Activity Chief Information Officer (ACIO) Steve Masterson, head of the Corporate Operations Department’s Information Technology Division; andSensorsandSonarSystemsDepartment employees, Chris Carr, a technical project manager, and Dr Christin Murphy, head of the Signal Processing Algorithm DevelopmentBranch revealedtheiroriginalsources ofinspiration

‘The ocean has always been my favorite place’ Dr Lauren Freeman, a resident of Portsmouth,RhodeIsland,hasbeenfascinatedby theoceansinceshewasveryyoung Growing upinSouthernVirginianeartheChesapeake Bay,muchofherchildhoodwasspentatthe beach shesaid.

“That’swhenIfellinlovewiththeocean,” Freeman said. “I explored the sandy shorelines every day. I watched how the water movedthesandandhowthebarrierislands were being reshaped. I loved how the fish would align into a current and try to make different pathways through the sand and mudsothewaterwouldflowcertainways.”

Freeman excelled at Lafayette High SchoolinWilliamsburg,Virginia,whereshe graduated as valedictorian After applying to a dozen colleges, she accepted a scholarship from the University of Miami to study marinebiology

“HavingnevertraveledoutsideofVirginia, North Carolina, and West Virginia, it was mind-blowing to be in a big city and see palmtreeseverywhere,”Freemansaid “And unlike the Chesapeake Bay, the water was clear Youcouldactuallyseewhatwasunder thesurface.

AttheUniversityofMiami,Freemanmet people who were just as excited to learn about the ocean as she was. In her junior year,shestudiedinNewZealandandimmediately joined the scuba diving club, which becameherfavoritehobbyinMiami.That’s how she met her future husband, Simon Freeman.

“HewasthemostpassionatepersonIever met about the ocean, Freeman recalled. “We would stay up until 3 or 4 in the morningtalkingaboutseaslugsandfishbehavior and how you catch different kinds of fish if you’reonacertainsideofaneddy.”

Throughout her senior year in Miami, Lauren remained in touch with Simon, despitelivingonoppositesidesoftheglobe Whenitwastimetodecidewheretopursue herdoctoratedegree Laurenreceivedoffers from prestigious colleges Meanwhile, she wished to reunite with Simon, who also aspiredtoearnadoctorate Whenoneofthe schools, Scripps Institution of OceanographyinSanDiego,agreedtoacceptSimonas well,thedecisionbecameaneasyone

During their studies, the couple spent a month on a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration research vessel doing scientific diving and data collection, followed by shore-based research on the main Hawaiian Islands That data allowed Laurentopublishsomeofherfirstpeer-reviewedresearchpapersoncoralreefsoundscapes

“While I was doing my post-doctorate research, I realized that there were some cool features in the sound that told you whetherornotthecoralwashealthy, Freemansaid.

After their studies, the couple accepted positions at the Naval Research Laboratory in Washington, D.C., and a few years later, the Freemans looked for opportunities elsewhere They considered a return to SanDiego,butultimatelydecidedtoworkat DivisionNewport

Shortly after starting her job, Lauren wrote an 80-page proposal to the Defense AdvancedResearchProjectsAgencytostudy how marine biology can be used to detect unmannedunderwatervehicles(UUVs).

Within six months of being hired, fundingforthefive-yearPassiveAcousticDetection through Reef Ecological Soundscapes projectwasapprovedandherresearchwas underway.

“Wedoalotofpassivesensingandambient biological soundscapes,” Freeman said. The key is understanding how the biology responds to UUVs and how we can use that datatotrackUUVs.”

Freeman now leads a soundscape team forTaskforceOcean,whichisfundedbythe OfficeofNavalResearch.

“The10-year-oldLaurenwouldbepleasantlysurprisedtoknowwherehercuriosity hasledher,”Freemansaid.“It’sexcitingtobe on the edge of discovery of what’s happeningintheocean,whichhasalwaysbeenmy favoriteplacetobe.”

‘The medium changed. And we had to changewithit’

When Steve Masterson a resident of South Kingstown, Rhode Island, first was approached to speak at “The Knot under the BorntoDoThis theme,hewasn’tquite sure his story fit the bill. Raised in Richmond, Rhode Island, he originally wanted tobeanarchitectorgointographicdesign.

“Being a CIO (chief information officer), being a computer engineer, they just weren’t mainstream professions,” he said. “They were professions, they just weren’t mainstream.”

A child of the 1980s Masterson fell squarelybetweentwogenerations Generation X and the Millennials and this mini-generation, those born between 1977 and1983,camewithitsownmonikercoined byauthorSarahStankorbin2014:Xennials

“We’re described as having an analog childhood and a digital adulthood, and we had to transition that at arguably the worst time of our lives,” Masterson said. “We’re alreadytransitioningalotofstuffasteenagers Wegrewupwithrotaryphonesandwe hadcellphonesinhighschoolandcollege.”

Video games were a big part of Masterson’s childhood, and as the computer age ramped up in the early 1990s, his interest waspiqued Hecreatedwebpagesandweb content, did some coding and admittedly downloaded video games illegally to his stepfather’sexpensivePC

“Itwasforeducation,soitwasreallyOK,” Mastersonjoked.“ButIhadtolearnhowto covermytracks.”

When it came time to go to college, Masterson, a member of a family with humblemeans knewhewasa“stateschool kid” and chose University of Rhode Island, whereheinitiallymajoredincivilengineering Thateducationalgoallastedalltheway until orientation, when it “poured buckets”overthecourseofthosefewdaysinthe summerof1998.

At that orientation, an instructor explained to the incoming students the benefits of being a civil engineer, including field work and facing the elements For Masterson,thosecommentsreallyhithome thoughnotinagoodway.

“IknowforafactIdon’tlikethat,because I’m experiencing that right now. That’s not for me,” Masterson said. “I immediately wenttotheBursar’sOfficeandchangedmy major.”

Afterspeakingwithafriend,hesettledon computerengineering

“A very well-thought decision to change my major during orientation, but it worked out, joked Masterson, who celebrated 21 yearsatDivisionNewportinJune

HiscareerstartedintheCombatSystems Department before a brief stint as a deputy department head in the Sensors and Sonar SystemsDepartment.In2021,hebecamethe head of Information Technology Division andtheACIOforthecommand.

Mastersonservedastheprojectmanager responsibleforthedevelopmentandlaunch of Division Newport’s Rapid Innovation Center “We architected it, and we built it,” hesaidofthespacethatopenedin2014 “Iwantedtobeanarchitectandadifferent mediumemerged,andthat’smystory,that’s the Xennial’s story The medium changed. Andwehadtochangewithit.”

‘You know what? I want to work for the DepartmentofDefense’

ChrisCarr,aresidentofNewport,Rhode Island,grewupinasmallSouthernCaliforniadeserttownnestledbetweentwoU.S.Air Forcebases,andbothofhisparentsservedin that branch of the military His mother was anairtrafficcontroller,hisfatheramember ofthespecialweaponsrecoveryteam.

“I was born living the military life, Carr said.

Theporchofhisboyhoodhomeprovided afront-rowseattoviewthetestingofaircraft or missile defense systems While that provided a level of entertainment, there wasn’t much else to do in the community of Acton, which then had a population of roughly 5,000 people So Carr spent much of his youth playing video games (and still does).

By the time he finished high school and began to chart a career path, he wanted to bring together his two passions video gamesandthemilitary

“I’m going to go to school and I want to make MILSIM (military simulation) video gamesfortheU.S.military,”Carrsaid.

He attended a community college and knocked out a number of his core classes though when he reached his first coding course, Carr ran into trouble, struggling to figure out how to get a certain program to work.Afriendarrivedtohelpjustbeforethe assignment was due and, after examining it forjustfiveminutes,solvedtheissue That’s when Carr knew computer programming wasn’tinhisfuture.

He changed his major to mechanical engineeringandwasacceptedto11schools. To choose, he created an NCAA Tournament-stylebracketandflippedacoin,eliminatingoneschoolatatime.

“I eventually landed on Cal State Northridge,”hesaid

Luck must have been on Carr’s side, because he was presented a career-defining opportunity. He was part of a team that designed from the ground up a working unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). The Carnard-styleaircraftcouldidentifytargets onthegroundandcommunicatethatinformation back to a ground station, allowing it to be actionable intelligence for the U.S. military. The Cal State Northridge students took their aerial project to a competition at a Navyairbasetoseehowitstackedupagainst UAVsfromotherschools

“It was really cool, and that was one of the points where I was like, ‘You know what?IwanttoworkfortheDepartmentof Defense,’”Carrsaid

Thatdidn’thappeninitiallyasCarr’sfirst joboutofcollegewasperformingengineering tasks for a recreation vehicle company But he was persistent, sending out 400 resumes over the course of six months, and one of those landed in the hands of Al Armstrong, head of Division Newport’s Surface and Aviation Systems Engineering Branch.

Carrwasofferedajobandmadethemove from Southern California to Southern New England.Oneofhisfirstbigassignmentswas performinghumansystemintegrationwork for the Littoral Combat Ship Anti-SubmarineWarfarePackagein2014.

He showed the audience a picture of himself sitting in a kiddie pool on the deck oftheUSSFreedom(LCS-1)smokingacigar

“That was the moment I decided this job is pretty cool,” Carr said “I think I’m going tostickaround.”

‘Foralittlegirlwithaplasticbucket,itwas atreasuretrove’

Dr Christin Murphy, a resident of Portsmouth,RhodeIsland,doesn’tremember how old she was when she fell in love withtheocean,butsherememberswhereit happened onasmall,rocky,seaweed-coveredbeachontheedgeofLongIslandSound, near where she grew up in East Northport, NewYork

“For a little girl with a plastic bucket, it was a treasure trove,” Murphy said. “I wantedtodiscovereveryorganismalongthe shore.Irememberflippingoverrockstofind hermit crabs, picking up periwinkle snails and poking their little trap doors, plucking the thistle threads on mussels and picking upbarnaclesthatwouldclosethemselvesup tightuntilyouputtheminabucketofwater andcouldcoaxthemout.

Murphyrecognizedpatternsonthebeach. She learned that the organisms that seal themselvesupwerefoundfurtherfromthe water and more mobile animals appeared close to the water. She also discovered egg cases,bones,andshellfragmentsofanimals that lived in deeper waters. Those animals remainedoutofreachuntilMurphyearned herdivingcertificationatage14

On a high school trip to Costa Rica, Murphy conducted field research for the firsttime.Sinceitwasn’tpartoftheclassshe wastaking,shebeggedherteacherstoallow hertocountfishonacoralreef “Ihadnoideahowtodoareefsurvey,but I thought if I read enough books I would figureitout,”Murphysaid.

Murphyknewshewantedtobeamarine biologist since she was 5 years old, so her mainconsiderationwhenchoosingacollege was getting to conduct hands-on field research.

“New College of Florida was the perfect place for me,” Murphy said. “Their under- graduate educational philosophy was built uponindependentresearch.”

The best advice Murphy received in collegewasfromherundergraduateadvisor whomsheassistedonastudyofmanatees

“I was so enamored with his work that I told him that I wanted to do what he does,” Murphysaid.

“HetoldmeIneedtofindmyownlineof questioning and I need to find a field that is expanding,notclosing.”

In writing her thesis on spatial navigation in coral reef fish, Murphy referenced a laboratory in Spain that was known for its research on fish brains. After receiving a FulbrightScholarship,shejoinedtheLaboratoryofPsychobiologyattheUniversityof Sevilleforayear Murphylearnedalotabout neuroscience, but she also learned that she didn’t want to dissect brains for the rest of herlife

Murphyreturnedtoherroots.Shebecame ateacheronaschoonerfortheOceanClassroom Foundation for two years, traveling back and forth from Maine to the Caribbeantwotofourmonthsatatime.Integrating the environment into her lessons, she taught high school students how to think likeamarinebiologist

While she felt at home on the ocean, Murphy decided to dive back into research byattendinggraduateschoolattheUniversity of South Florida. A National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship enabled Murphy to conduct doctoral research with a seal named Sprouts at the Pinniped Cognition and Sensory Systems LaboratoryinSantaCruz,California.

Having accomplished everything she envisioned when she was 5 years old, Murphy wasn’t sure what to do next, until shewaspresentingherresearchataconference in New Zealand and met Division Newport biologist and oceanographer Dr Joy Lapseritis, a scientist and head of the Ranges, Engineering and Analysis Department’sUnderseaModelingBranch

When Murphy realized that Lapseritis wasworkingonsimilarresearch,shewrote aproposaltoconductpost-doctoralresearch atDivisionNewport Adecadelater,Murphy heads up the Bio-Inspired Research and Development Lab at Division Newport, where she leads a multi-disciplinary team ofresearchers

“Thepointofwantingtobecomeamarine biologist when you’re a kid isn’t to become one, it’s the cultivation of ‘awe,’ ” Murphy said.“It’sbeingexcitedaboutsomething.”

A video from the event can be viewed here: https://www.dvidshub.net/ video/891744/four-nuwc-division-newport-employees-share-their-career-inspiration-during-speaker-series-presentation

NUWC Newport is the oldest warfare center in the country, tracing its heritage to the Naval Torpedo Station established on Goat Island in Newport Harbor in 1869

Commanded by Capt Chad Hennings NUWC Newport maintains major detachments in West Palm Beach, Florida, and AndrosIslandintheBahamas,aswellastest facilitiesatSenecaLakeandFisher’sIsland, New York, Leesburg, Florida, and Dodge Pond,Connecticut

Joinourteam!NUWCDivisionNewport, one of the 20 largest employers in Rhode Island employs a diverse highly trained, educated, and skilled workforce We are continuously looking for engineers, scientists,andotherSTEMprofessionals,aswell as talented business, finance, logistics and othersupportexpertswhowishtobeatthe forefront of undersea research and development Please connect with NUWC DivisionNewportRecruitingatthissite-https:// www.navsea.navy.mil/Home/Warfare-Centers/NUWC-Newport/Career-Opportunities/ and follow us on LinkedIn @ NUWC-Newport and on Facebook @ NUWCNewport.