Graduate EDUCATION AND RESEARCH Volume 7, Issue 1
Summer 2017 Newsletter
ALUMNI UPDATE: CATCHING UP WITH RICHARD Richard Henry graduated with his Master of Science in Engineering in Electrical and Computer Engineering in May 2015. An American growing up in Spain, Henry has a unique perspective on education. We asked Henry a few questions about his experience at Parks and how that has contributed to his post-collegiate
Q What attracted you to Parks College of Engineering, Aviation, and Technology?
A Growing up, I was fascinated by the things surrounding me, coloring
outside the lines, asking myself fundamental questions and exploring the places I wasn’t allowed to go. My goal after high school was to attend an American college, however, living in Madrid at the time made it quite challenging. With the invaluable help of my parents, they brought to my attention that Saint Louis University had a Madrid Campus with a solid engineering program and plenty of opportunities for growth in the electrical and computer engineering fields. One aspect that really attracted me to Parks was the fact that courses, especially for the core classes (Junior and Senior) were typically fewer than 20 students per class. I honestly appreciated that type of setting since it allowed students to easily engage with the professor during and after class, and more importantly they empowered students with the opportunity to engage in relevant class discussions. Tell us about the work you conducted at Parks. Throughout my years as an undergraduate (May 2013) and graduate student (May 2015) at Parks College I have had the privilege to work on two distinct research topics. As an undergraduate student I spent two years as the power co-lead of COPPER (Close Orbiting Propellant Plume and Elemental Recognition) cube satellite at the Space Systems Research Laboratory under Dr. Michael Swartwout’s supervision. I was tasked to ensure that enough power was generated through the solar arrays and batteries to meet the life span of the mission as well as providing accurate power level to each subsystem. Later, during my graduate time, I developed my thesis on “In Flight Image Processing on Multi-Rotor Aircraft for Autonomous Landing” having Dr. Srikanth Gururajan as my advisor and with the assistance of Dr. Kyle Mitchell. In a nut shell, my thesis focused on performing onboard image processing to provide guidance to the flight controller and safely ensure an accurate landing to a defined marker on the ground. How was the transition from graduation to professional life? As a fun fact, I graduated and got married on the same day. Yes, despite it being the best day of my life, it was quite stressful. My two cents, do not perform those two life changing events on the same day. Lesson learned. Back to the main question. After graduation I started working for MasterCard as a Security Engineer. I am responsible for the design and implementation of security engineering requirements, standards, and architecture review for the security aspects of projects.
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Message from the ASSOCIATE DEAN Parks College’s Graduate Education & Research is excited to share with you our Summer 2017 newsletter. I hope you enjoy reading our news! I am pleased to report that 15 graduate students started their programs this past spring, and we have processed about 100 applications for the Fall 2017 semester alone. In May 2017, Parks conferred five Ph.D. and 11 M.S. degrees in Engineering. Our accelerated B.S.-M.S. engineering program received a record high of 18 applications Spring 2017, and nine students just finished the B.S. portion of their accelerated program and are starting their fifth year now. The former SURE (Summer Undergraduate Research Experience) program, now CURE (Collaborative Undergraduate Research Experience) program funded nine proposals, pairing undergraduate students and faculty on research projects that started this spring, and will continue through the summer and potentially the fall semesters. As always, Parks is committed to increasing national and international collaboration, research and graduate recruitment. The INTO program helps international students ease into a graduate program here at SLU by taking academic English courses that focus on their written and verbal English skills to ensure they are at the graduate student level. Park College’s M.S. in engineering is one of SLU’s most popular INTO programs. In 2016, we received 33 applications. So far in2017, only halfway through the year, we have received more than 30 applications for the INTO Pathway in Engineering. In late March, I visited six universities in Spain to discuss recruiting and research collaboration. Plans are underway for another overeas trip to encourage international collaboration and relations in graduate education and research. Our two visiting scholars from China will finish off their year of research in the field of structural engineering this fall, and soon after, Parks is welcoming another two visiting scholars, this time from Spain. Our college has a lot to offer, and we look forward to continuing efforts to make Parks College at Saint Louis University synonymous with excellence. On behalf of Parks Graduate Education, I wish you a great summer!
Riyadh Hindi, Ph.D., P.Eng., F.SEI Associate Dean and Professor Graduate Education and Research
FALL 2016 conferred 7 MS degrees and 1 PhD degree Spring 2017 conferred 11 MS degrees and 5 PhD degrees Spring 2017 12 seminar speakers, over 35 grad students attending
BY THE NUMBERS
INSIDE THIS ISSUE: Alumni Feature Message from the Associate Dean Graduate/Research Seminar Speakers Spring 2017 Graduates News
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Fall 2017 40 new grad students Fall 2017 2 new INTO students Fall 2017 15 new BS-MS students
graduate/Research seminar speakers This spring, our speakers’ backgrounds were diverse, including industry professionals and faculty. Speakers are already being lined up for the Fall 2017 semester. See below for a list of topics and speakers from the Spring 2017 semester. Caryn Heldt, Ph.D. — “Virus Purification Based on Surface Properties” Guy Genin, Ph.D. — “Mechanobiological Communication with Plant and Animal Cells” James Fortney — “Interactive Lecturing Strategies” Chris Gordon, Ph.D. — “Engineering Data Rich Construction Projects” William D. Richard, Ph.D. — “Enabling Cost-/Power-/Compute-Efficient Ultrasound” Mohammad U. Zahid — “Evaluating Mechanisms of Cytoplasmic Delivery of Nanoparticles through Single-Quantum Dot Tracking” Floyd Welsh — “Career Development Skills” Kasey Fowler-Finn, Ph.D. — “Good Vibrations: How the Environment Influences Plant-Borne Vibrational Communication in Treehoppers” Robert Holmes, Ph.D. — “Flood Science: Gaps and Challenges in Observations, Fundamental Understanding, Assessments, and Situational Awareness” Bill Vavrik, Ph.D. — “Building a Culture and the Deployment of Innovation” Matt Struve — “Materials & Structures Testing at Crossroads or in the Crosshairs of Digital Revolution?” Jim Bornholdt, Ph.D. — “The Sex Life of Antenna Designs”
Congratulations to our Spring 2017 Graduates! Joseph Bruns—M.S. in Engineering, Biomedical Engineering; Advisor: Dr. Silviya Zustiak; Thesis Title: “Injectable Cell-Adhesive Polyethylene Glycol Cryogel Scaffolds” Yue Dong—M.S. in Engineering, Biomedical Engineering; Advisor: Dr. Yan Gai; Thesis Title: “Electroencephalogram Recording in Human with Auditory Stimuli” Andrew Dunn—M.S. in Engineering, Biomedical Engineering; Advisor: Dr. Scott Sell; Thesis Title: “Development of a Dermal Regeneration Template for Pressure Ulcer Wound Healing Using Platelet-Rich Plasma” Renzo Herrera—M.S. in Engineering, Civil Engineering, Non-Thesis; Advisor: Dr. Riyadh Hindi Jacob Howenstein—M.S. in Engineering, Biomedical Engineering; Advisor: Dr. Michelle Sabick; Thesis Title: “Energy Flow Through the Lower Extremities, Trunk, and Arm in Youth Baseball Pitching” Sridhar Kota—M.S. in Engineering, Aerospace & Mechanical Engineering; Advisor: Dr. Raymond LeBeau; Thesis Title: “Experimental Investigation of PIV Techniques in a Low Speed Wind Tunnel” Clarissa LeVasseur—M.S. in Engineering, Biomedical Engineering; Advisor: Dr. Michelle Sabick; Thesis Title: “A Musculoskeletal Model of the Upper Extremity to Quantify Ligament Contribution to Glenohumeral Stability” Tracy Lu—M.S. in Engineering, Biomedical Engineering; Advisor: Dr. Scott Sell; Thesis Title: “Injectable Methacrylated Alginate Cryogels Incorporated with PRP for the Minimally Invasive Treatment of Bone Nonunion” Bawan Mahmood—M.S. in Engineering, Civil Engineering; MS Non-Thesis; Advisor: Dr. Jalil Kianfar Priya T. Patel—M.S. in Engineering, Electrical & Computer Engineering, Non-Thesis; Advisor: Dr. Will Ebel Taylor Stumpf—M.S. in Engineering, Civil Engineering, Non-Thesis; Advisor: Dr. Riyadh Hindi Lisa Andes—Ph.D. in Engineering, Civil Engineering; Advisor: Dr. Amanda Cox; Dissertation Title: “Morphologic Response of Tributary Junctions Along the Middle Mississippi River” Md Ashiquzzaman—Ph.D. in Engineering, Civil Engineering; Advisor: Dr. Riyadh Hindi; Dissertation Title: “Effectiveness of Exterior Girder Rotation Prevention Systems for Bridge Deck Construction” Emily Kalaf—Ph.D. in Engineering, Biomedical Engineering; Advisor: Dr. Scott Sell; Dissertation Title: “Characterization of Sodium Alginate as an Injectable Nucleus Pulposus Analogue for Height Restoration, Bifunctionalization and Cellular Regeneration of Degenerated Intervertebral Discs” Mehdi Motaleb—Ph.D. in Engineering, Civil Engineering; Advisor: Dr. Riyadh Hindi; Dissertation Title: “Distortion-Induced Fatigue Cracking in a Seismically Retrofitted Steel Bridge: Repair Measures” Miranda Pizzella—Ph.D. in Engineering, Aerospace & Mechanical Engineering; Advisor: Dr. Mark McQuilling; Dissertation Title: “Numerical Investigation of Normal Shock Wave Boundary Layer Interactions”
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NEWS Outstanding Graduate Student and Graduate Faculty awards Parks College’s 2017 Outstanding Graduate Student is Janice McCall. McCall was a commercial pilot for more than 20 years before becoming a graduate student at Parks. As a student, she maintains a high GPA while preparing her dissertation proposal focusing on accountability and organizational resilience. As an Assistant Instructor in Aviation Science, McCall makes classes engaging by sharing her experiences as an airline pilot and military officer. Through the partnership she has built with Trans States Airlines and McCluer High School, she has increased STEM exposure to high school and college students. As a member of the Army Reserves, she has led events to promote diversity and inclusion, and participates in the SLU Student Veterans Association. For her service, loyalty and honor she was recently inducted into Alpha Sigma Nu, the Jesuit Honor Society. She has published several research papers on industry safety. Parks Outstanding Graduate Faculty for 2017 is Scott Sell, Ph.D. Sell is very active in research and graduate studies, mentoring 13 students, the majority of which are graduate students. He pushes them to be independent thinkers and better researchers. His research in tissue engineering focuses on finding new and innovative ways for the body to heal itself; he publishes extensively. Within the past few years, he has served as PI or Co-PI for more than $500,000 in research grants. He serves on a number of committees and advisory boards and lends his expertise to review and edit journal articles and conference papers. He is a strong advocate for his graduate students, going above and beyond normal faculty mentoring responsibilities to make sure they have what they need to be successful.
Graduate Education & Research Banquet On Friday, May 19 Parks College’s Office of Graduate Education & Research held their second annual banquet celebrating the 2017 graduating class. All graduates were invited to attend the event at Il Monastero that included cocktails, a seated meal, and a short program. Student advisors, the Graduate Advisory Board, administrators and staff rounded out the group of about 65 people. After opening remarks from Dean Michelle Sabick, Associate Dean Riyadh Hindi and Parks Graduate Advisory Board Chair Dr. Jim Bornholdt, Miranda Pizzella, a 2017 Ph.D. graduate, acted as our keynote speaker. Pizzella just earned her Ph.D. in Engineering within the Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering Department, with her dissertation focusing on shock wave boundary layer interactions. Her husband, fellow graduates, and advisor, Dr. Mark McQuilling looked on proudly as she eloquently shared her experiences first, as an undergraduate, and then as a graduate student here at Parks College. Her speech, at times witty, inspiring and funny, led Dr. Hindi to remark to the audience afterwards how proud Parks is of their students and alumni, and how she is a shining example of our Parks community. Concluding the program, Dr. Hindi presented the 2017 Outstanding Graduate Student and Faculty awards. Alex Fajardo, Graduate Student Association President, presented the Mentorship Award to Dr. Scott Sell. This award is “intended for a professor who has inspired students and enhanced students’ graduate education” (retrieved from http://gsa.slu.edu/awards/ brennan-recognition-awards). After the formal program, many attendees stayed for conversation and fellowship.
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Spain Trip In late March, Dr. Hindi continued his tradition of annual international trips to promote Parks College Graduate Education & Research by traveling to Spain. Because keeping in touch via email and phone is not as effective as in person communication, Dr. Hindi traveled to six universities in five days. He had a chance to present some of his research, talk about our graduate programs and discuss potential research collaboration between faculty and students. Among the universities he visited were Saint Louis University’s Madrid campus, the University of Politecnica de Valencia, the University of Burgos and the University of Castilla—La Mancha. He also met with two Spanish faculty members—Dr. Dorys Gonzalez and Dr. Miguel Vicente—who will be coming to Parks in the fall as visiting scholars for a one-year term. International trips are almost always followed by a jump in applications from that region, and continued networking and collaboration with professionals in the region with SLU faculty. We look forward to building relationships that will benefit both communities in the near future.
Best Presentation Award Mary Jennerjohn Christianer, Aerospace & Mechanical Engineering Ph.D. student, won a Best Presentation Award for her presentation titled “Review of Turbine Endwall Flows” at the 42nd Dayton-Cincinnati Aerospace Sciences Symposium held in Dayton, Ohio in early March. This award is just one of many accomplishments for this former Clare Boothe Luce Fellow and ASME Student Scholarship winner. Mary will be starting a job at Honeywell Aerospace this August and finishing her dissertation over the next year.
doctoral student Awarded NSF Fellowship for Research This spring, Jen Tennison, Aerospace & Mechanical Engineering Ph.D. student, was awarded a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship (GRPF). Last year, she was awarded an Honorable Mention through this program. These fellowships are highly competitive and represent the most promising graduate student research in the country. The GRFP can last for up to five years, or until Jen graduates with her Ph.D. She will receive a generous stipend and tuition support for three of those years along with numerous other benefits for Fellows in the program. Annually, she is required to report her progress to the NSF. Jen’s research focuses on effectively conveying visual information—pictures and other graphics—on a touchscreen using nonvisual means—haptics (vibrations) and sounds. The goal is to reduce the burden for blind and visually impaired people to have to carry around braille documents and raised line graphics, which can be quite large and inappropriate to carry with them all the time. In short, she wants to increase accessibility to visual information via the touchscreen. Jen is working closely with Dr. Jenna Gorlewicz on her project.
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NEWS CONTINUED Catching up with Richard Henry (continued from cover) Q What about your experience at Parks prepared you for your current position? A Although I learned a lot of science and technology facts throughout my formal education, I rarely use any specific knowledge on a daily basis. However, I did walk away with knowledge on how to think critically and find solutions to the problems with the data at hand. For example, I have never taken a cyber security course throughout my formal education, however, currently I am performing tasks as a security engineer and I am able to take my skillset learned from my technical courses and apply them to the knowledge I am given. Although, I rarely use the technical facts in my classes, I use the skills applied in order to perform my job at the best of my ability and I believe Parks strongly prepared me to handle any engineering position I chose.
Are you currently conducting any research or special projects? I am not at liberty to discuss that. But in all seriousness, my normal day to day includes working on specific projects and implementing new security techniques that I have had the privilege to learn at conferences, while reading security articles, knowledge sharing from colleagues and training events. What are your future plans? I will always be where there are challenging problems--that is why I became an engineer.
AIAA SciTech Forum 2017 Many of our graduate students and faculty attended the AIAA SciTech Forum 2017 back in January. Miranda Pizzella, May 2017 graduate of the Aerospace & Mechanical Engineering Ph.D. program, and Federico Garcia Lorca, Aerospace & Mechanical Engineering Ph.D student, both presented papers at the conference. Federico presented his paper, titled “Characterization of Pilot Profiles Through Non-Parametric Classification of Flight Data” at the AIAA information Systems-AIAA infotech. Faculty members, Srikanth Gururajan, Ph.D. (Aerospace & Mechanical Engineering) and Stephen Belt, Ph.D. (Aviation Science) were co-authors on this paper, which discusses their results exploring the usefulness and applicability of unsupervised machine learning algorithms to study UAV flight data. Pizzella presented her paper titled “On the Effect of Test Section Aspect Ratio for Shock Wave Boundary Layer Interactions,” closely related to her dissertation.
Sei asce structures congress 2017 Associate Dean Riyadh Hindi, along with Mehdi Motaleb and Md Ashiquzzaman (both May 2017 Ph.D. graduates in civil engineering), attended the SEI ASCE Structures Congress in April 2017. Motaleb presented a paper at the Structures Congress titled “Repairing Distortion-Induced Fatigue Cracking in a Seismically Retrofitted Steel Bridge: Field Test.” The Congress included a Career Fair and many other opportunities for networking with professionals in industry and academia. Industrial companies were set up with booths to show their products, and there was a fair for recent publications which included design codes and specifications useful for structural engineers.
summer internship
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Faress Hraib, civil engineering Ph.D. student, will be interning at ABNA Engineering this summer. ABNA is a full-service engineering company located in St. Louis. Faress will have real-world, hands-on experience which will greatly benefit him in his program of study and dissertation research. He will be handling different tasks such as reviewing drawings and designs, learning to design different structural elements, and possibly field inspection or material testing. Faress is excited about learning how to design structures in real life, and handling different tasks and projects that comprise the typical engineer’s work day. To finish off this internship experience, Faress will write a summary report at the end of the summer.
gsa Symposium On Friday, March 31st, the Graduate Student Association held their 23rd Annual Graduate Student Association Research Symposium in the Busch Student Center. Held every spring, the Symposium offers graduate students across Saint Louis University the opportunity to present their research findings in either a paper or a poster presentation. Thirteen Parks College students participated. Katie Hixon, one of our GSA Representatives and a Biomedical Engineering doctoral student, was a special guest speaker, while her advisor, Scott Sell, Ph.D. was the keynote speaker. Hixon was also awarded a Brennan Summer Fellowship Award. Elizabeth Brennan, a M.S. Electrical & Computer Engineering student, won first place in the physical sciences paper competition, and Muhammed Mustafa, civil engineering doctoral student, won second place in the same category.
aviation news Shawn Steadman (Aviation Science doctoral student) is currently working with the Department of Homeland Security Federal Emergency Management Agency in developing the national resource typing standard for all unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). The objective is to categorize UAVs for all federal, state and local agencies so that when they order UAV assistance, they know what they are getting. He is also presenting on UAVs at the State of Missouri, Emergency Management Agency Conference in August at the Lake of the Ozarks. Steadman is still in the process of formulating his dissertation proposal, but the focus of his work will be on the evaluation of risk and risk perception in manned and unmanned aerial vehicles. He wants to know if pilots/operators are more willing to take on more risk if they are not IN the aircraft or associated with the aircraft.
CURE program The CURE Program (Collaborative Undergraduate Research Experience), formerly the SURE Program (Summer Undergraduate Research Experience) has changed from a summer-only program to a program with the potential for year-long collaboration between students and faculty. Students and faculty worked together last fall to write proposals and submit before the end of the year. Students started preliminary research and lab work this spring, with the focus of the project’s work beginning in earnest this summer. At the end of the research experience, students will write a paper, hopefully worthy of publication, and/or present their findings to their department. Our office received 16 proposals for the 2017 year, and we selected nine to be funded. The funded proposals represent Aerospace & Mechanical Engineering, Civil Engineering and Biomedical Engineering. Congratulations to the undergraduate students who were selected—Bezawit Alemu, Matthew Dreyer, Gabriel Haas, Barton Huang, Scott Lambert, Joseph O’Neil, Meghana Pendyala, Leah Preslicka and Kaan Raif who will be working with the following faculty members: Chris Carroll, Ph.D, Natasha Case, Ph.D., Yan Gai, Ph.D., Koyal Garg, Ph.D., Srikanth Gururajan, Ph.D., Raymond LeBeau, Ph.D., Mark McQuilling, Ph.D., Scott Sell, Ph.D. and Michael Swartwout, Ph.D.
gsa representatives The 2017-2018 engineering Graduate Student Association (GSA) representatives are Katie Hixon and Sana Syed. They will disseminate information from the GSA to all graduate students via email, so make sure you are checking your SLU email address regularly. Additionally, all conference funding request forms should be directed to them for approval prior to submission to the GSA. Information regarding funding requests can be found at http://gsa.slu.edu/awards/conference-awards. Please feel free to contact them with any concerns or questions at khixon@slu.edu and ssyed7@slu.edu.
Please send your news to parksgraduateprograms@slu.edu
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SUPPORT THE PARKS COLLEGE GRADUATE FUND I would like to support the Saint Louis University’s Parks College Graduate Fund (11364) with a gift/pledge of $______________. CONTACT INFORMATION: Name ______________________________________ Email __________________________________ Home Address _______________________________ Employer ______________________________ ___________________________________________ Title ___________________________________ City _____________________________________ Business Phone ___________________________ State _________ Zip _______________________ Cell Phone _______________________________ METHOD OF PAYMENT: □ Check (Please make checks payable to Saint Louis University) □ Visa □ MasterCard □ American Express □ Discover Card #: ______________________________________________________ Expiration: __________ Name as it appears on card: _________________________________________________________ PLEDGE PAYMENTS:
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Signature: _________________________________________ Date: __________________ Please forward this form, your payment, and any matching gift materials to: Parks College of Engineering, Aviation and Technology 3450 Lindell Blvd McDonnell Douglas Hall, Room 1025 St. Louis, MO 63103 You can also give online at http://tinyurl.com/y9qo87z3 Thank you for supporting Saint Louis University and Parks College!
office of Graduate education and research ADDRESS: 3450 Lindell Blvd. McDonnell Douglas Hall, Room 1025 St. Louis, MO 63103 PHONE: 314-977-8306 EMAIL: parksgraduateprograms@slu.edu WEBSITE: parks.slu.edu/graduate