St. Thomas
Engineer
2015
Faces of Engineering at UST
Faces of Change
in Engineering
2 www.stthomas.edu/engineering
Dean’s Message – Faces of Change
We are building something truly special here in Minnesota! The extraordinary news emerging
from our programs includes great stories of booming enrollments, outstanding new faculty,
engaging local industry in our Senior Design Clinic, supporting K-12 engineering education
and advancing new degree programs in data science and computer engineering.
This past fall, the University of St. Thomas marked new territory when mechanical
engineering was selected as the no. 1 major by incoming freshmen. Today, 12 percent of
all St. Thomas graduate and undergraduate students are in the School of Engineering.
The faces and hands which define and shape who we are and the work we do are changing
the world around us. In this issue of St. Thomas Engineer, we see the remarkable impact of
our five women mechanical engineering faculty on building a distinctive program in a
traditionally male dominated profession. The hands of St. Thomas engineering students are
also at work signing a K-12 engineering education curriculum at the Metro Deaf School.
This issue also covers the work of our student teams in the ASME drone design competition,
the Fowler Business Challenge and their work in solving real industrial problems in the
Senior Design Clinic.
St. Thomas is one of a select group of engineering programs from across the nation to
foster a broad educational foundation for our students. We celebrate that UST’s undergraduate students are required to demonstrate proficiency in a second language, to study
philosophy and ethics, and to make a deep commitment to understanding the faiths and
cultures of our world. We are also proud that over 50 percent of our engineering students
have engaged in study abroad experiences while at St. Thomas.
If you’d like to learn more, I encourage you
to drop us a line or just plan to drop in. We
would love to show you around.
The vitality of the Minneapolis/St. Paul metro area technical community is what keeps us
strong. As I have said many times, I don’t think that there are many other communities in
the U.S. with the ability to support so energetically the growth and quality of a new
engineering program which continues to evolve here at the University of St. Thomas.
Cheers, Don
St. Thomas Engineer magazine is just a snapshot of the faces and hands of change at work
here in Minnesota and across the globe.
Don Weinkauf
Dean, School of Engineering
Again, thank you and enjoy. We look
forward to seeing you soon.
Undergraduate Engineering Enrollment
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St. Thomas
2015
Engineer
St. Thomas Engineer is published annually
by the University of St. Thomas School of
Engineering. To subscribe, update your
address or request an alternative format,
contact the School of Engineering,
(651) 962-5750 or
[email protected].
The University of St. Thomas is accredited
by the Higher Learning Commission of the
North Central Association of
Colleges and Schools.
The University of St. Thomas complies with
applicable federal and state nondiscrimination
laws and does not unlawfully discriminate on
the basis of race, color, creed, religion, ancestry,
national origin, sex, sexual orientation, disability,
age, marital status, genetic information, or
status with regard to public assistance or any
other characteristic protected by applicable law
in the employment of staff, the admission
or treatment of students, or in the operation
of its educational programs and activities.
On the cover:
Dr. AnnMarie Thomas drives
engineering education through her
Playful Learning Lab.
On the back cover:
We are proud to announce the opening
of the new Engineering Design Center.
The facility provides more than
8,000 square feet of design and build
space. The Design Center will house
the freshmen design studio, the
Senior Design Clinic teams, as well
as the SAE Formula Racing Team.
Faces of Change in Engineering
Dean’s Message
1
Freshman Engineering Class
3
Faces of Change in Engineering
4
A Hands-On Approach
8
Engineering Senior Design Clinic
10
I am a Data Scientist
12
School of Engineering News
13
Student Awards
14
I am a Computer Engineer
15
Research News
16
Study Abroad 2015
18
Graduate Takes Research to MIT
18
I am an Engineer
20
4
8
18
ENG0362_15
2 www.stthomas.edu/engineering
Welcome, Record-Breaking Freshman Class
The School of Engineering is
experiencing tremendous growth.
For the first time in the university’s
history, mechanical engineering
became the number one major for
the incoming freshman class.
Whether our students choose to
major in computer, electrical or
mechanical engineering, we
welcome all of our engineering
students to our dynamic
engineering programs.
We look forward to watching them
develop into great engineers with
the technical skills, passion and
perspective necessary to solve our
world’s most difficult problems.
Welcome!
St. Thomas Engineer
2015
3
Dr. Sarah Baxter, Ph.D., University of Virginia
Research Passion: Probalistic modeling of engineering systems
Faces of Change in Engineering
By Jordan Osterman, ’11
Through their distinctive styles and work, women
faculty impact students’ lives
J
unior Lauren Van Beek and freshman Kelly Ancel stand around a table after class
in the new Design Center, talking with a handful of fellow students. A few minutes
ago they were in a class where, as women mechanical engineering students, they
were in the vast minority. But there are smiles on both of their faces as they describe
their experiences in engineering at the University of St. Thomas. Perhaps that’s partly
because, out of the 10 Mechanical Engineering program’s professors, five are female, an
exceptional rate of gender balance and one of the highest ratios in the nation.
Underrepresentation of female students in mechanical engineering is a reality even
in today’s academic landscape, and is compounded by similarly skewed numbers
in those who lead the classes: Nationwide, only about 11 percent of mechanical
engineering faculty are female.
4 www.stthomas.edu/engineering
“It’s so great to have all these role models who have been through these same issues of
being a minority,” Van Beek said. “We can have conversations about work-life balance and
what that means for a woman in a male-dominated field. It’s really cool to have role models
that have dealt with that. It feels like they’re pushing for you.”
For example, Van Beek cited the woman faculty-led, monthly “Women in Engineering”
lunch series at St. Thomas as particularly important for her. The forum provides outstanding
opportunities to seed mentorships, gain insights into the profession and network.
St. Thomas’ mechanical engineering faculty makeup qualifies as a happy accident; Don
Weinkauf, Dean of the School of Engineering, pointed out that every professor was hired
simply because they were the best candidate for the job, regardless of gender. The effects
of having five women – Drs. Katherine Acton, Sarah Baxter, Camille George, Brittany
Nelson-Cheeseman, and AnnMarie Thomas – are as welcome as they were unintentional.
“We can have conversations about work-life balance and what
that means for a woman in a male-dominated field. It’s really
cool to have role models that have dealt with that.”
– Lauren Van Beek, junior
Mechanical engineering student
Dr. Camille George, Ph.D., University of Minnesota
Research Passion: Post-harvest processing of food
Dr. Brittany Nelson-Cheeseman, Ph.D., Cal-Berkeley
Research Passion: Advanced engineering materials
“They all have different strengths and passions. They each bring a
unique perspective to our work here,” Weinkauf said. “That matches
well with the spectrum of students coming into our programs.”
The ability to bring more women into the engineering professions is a
national concern, but the healthy faculty gender balance at St. Thomas
generates a particular sense of optimism.
“Our balance means I can put my energies into the things that really
matter to me. It’s not a distractor, which I know women face at other
institutions,” Nelson-Cheeseman said. “It liberates me to focus on why
I’m here and my connection to the students.”
That potential for connection is a distinctive element of the St. Thomas
engineering educational experience. The mechanical engineering
faculty, male and female, bring a range of interests, personalities and
teaching styles, working together to foster the development of each
individual student.
“You can tell the women engineering professors, and for that matter all
of our professors, are dedicated to forming us into full, great people,”
Van Beek said.
The gender balance also adds to the experience for the male students,
who form a large majority of students in the classes female professors
teach and lead. “That’s an important exposure,” Acton said. “It helps
those male students to get used to working with women around
them, and in teams being led by women.”
6 www.stthomas.edu/engineering
Dr. Camille George, the first of St. Thomas’ current female engineering
professors to arrive, points out with optimism the idea that such shifts
in thinking about women in engineering – like the dated notion that
females shouldn’t be doctors – are generational, and take time. That
optimism is bolstered at St. Thomas, where mechanical engineering
professors stand as role models for their students and each other, and
the focus is properly aimed at what people can do as engineers.
The spectrum of things that people can do as engineers is embodied
in the research that all five female faculty are engaged in with their
students. George leads teams to remote places around the developing
world to design new technologies for the post-harvest processing of
food. Nelson-Cheeseman has students studying thin-film crystalline
materials for advanced energy applications, while Acton and Baxter’s
groups collaborated on the advanced structural analysis of composite
systems. Thomas is moving forward K-12 engineering education with
a large group of students in her Playful Learning Lab.
“St. Thomas is such a good environment. I never felt held back or that
there was anything I couldn’t do,” said Dr. Ann Majewicz, a 2008
alumna, who received her Ph.D. from Stanford, and now is a professor
at University of Texas - Dallas. “I don’t think I would have been where I
am if not for St. Thomas and all the amazing engineering professors.”
Success stories like Majewicz’s are not uncommon for St. Thomas. The
women faculty play an integral role in helping make those stories possible,
highlighted by the fact they are success stories themselves.
“Our students know that we have also been in the minority, and it hasn’t limited us
from pursuing our passion for engineering, while bringing our own distinctive style to
our work,” Dr. Thomas said.
“Distinctive style” are words that Weinkauf likes to hear. He knows that the face of the
engineering profession has to change, and promoting the success of women in the field
is one piece of the puzzle. But in the end, the evolution of engineering is not simply a
matter of gender or race.
“We need different perspectives, different problem solving styles, a wide range of experiences,
and a deeper understanding of the human condition, regardless of race or gender,”
Weinkauf said. “This is what will bring solutions to our most difficult problems. And to
bring that all to bear, our work here is to ensure that the face of engineering at St. Thomas
is the face of change.”
“Our balance means I can put my energies into the things that
really matter to me ... It liberates me to focus on why I’m here
and my connection to the students.”
– Dr. Brittany Nelson-Cheeseman
Dr. Katherine Acton, Ph.D., Johns Hopkins
Research Passion: Mechanics of advanced materials
Dr. AnnMarie Thomas, Ph.D., Caltech
Research Passion: Engineering design and playful learning
A Hands-On Approach
By Kate Norlander ’07 M.B.C.
Senior Brynn Kasper creates engineering curriculum
using sign language for the Metro Deaf School
B
rynn Kasper is part of a team of students, including Brett
Gunderson, Emma Koller and Brynn’s brother, Noah, who
present engineering concepts to students in the afterschool
STEM club at the Metro Deaf School in St. Paul. Now in its
second year, the program has evolved from a four-session
lesson on creative circuits to a longer series on different disciplines
in engineering. The creative circuits series consisted of cumulative,
two-hour lessons that covered topics like squishy circuits, e-textiles
and snap-on LED bracelets. This year’s sessions are independent of
one another, allowing children who miss a session to still effectively
8 www.stthomas.edu/engineering
participate in the sessions they attend. Sessions cover topics such as
civil engineering, aerospace engineering, software and computer
engineering, electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, chemical
engineering and material science.
“There is a different activity for each session,” Brynn explained. During
the civil engineering unit, children had to create structures from
toothpicks and gumdrops so that their constructions could hold
weight. The aerospace unit allowed the children to create paper
airplanes as well as paper rockets that blew off of straws.
“Engineering is a crucial part of the world around us.
It is so important to help as many people – young and
old – understand how the world works.”
– Professor AnnMarie Thomas
Brynn’s road to her involvement with this project started at home.
Two of her grandparents, both deaf, worked at the Minnesota State
Academy for the Deaf in Faribault, Minn. Her mother taught American
Sign Language at a high school. When she got to St. Thomas, Brynn
was fluent in ASL and tested out of the foreign language requirement.
She didn’t want to let her signing skills get rusty, so she decided to
pursue a minor in ASL though St. Catherine University. As a part of
her classwork, she was required to volunteer for 15 hours in the
community, which lead her to devote time at Metro Deaf School
playing with the children.
When Brynn applied to work as a research assistant in Professor
AnnMarie Thomas’ Playful Learning Lab, they explored how to use
her major and minor together. “As we discussed her interests and
background in ASL, I asked Brynn if she would be willing to collaborate
on a way to bring engineering programs to local deaf students,” Thomas
said. The students worked with Thomas to develop a curriculum. Last
fall, Thomas and the three students presented a paper on their initial
curriculum, “Creative Circuits With Deaf Students,” at the American
Society for Engineering Education’s North Midwest Section conference.
Brynn’s work with the students at Metro Deaf School has added new
terms to her knowledge of ASL. As she prepares to work with students,
Brynn studies signs for engineering terms on YouTube and other sites
on the Internet. Also, Brynn noted that a lot of the work with the
kids is visual, allowing the team to use pictures, such as the shapes of
buildings, to communicate with students. “We have posters for each
of the different disciplines,” Brynn said.
Thomas is proud of what Brynn and her teammates are accomplishing.
“Engineering is a crucial part of the world around us. It is so important
to help as many people – young and old – understand how the world
works,” she said. “Through programs like this, our students serve as
mentors, teachers and role models to children who may not otherwise
have opportunities to meet engineers and participate in engineering
projects. This is exactly the sort of project that makes St. Thomas such
a special place. Our students are incredibly well-rounded and committed
to making the world a better place.” ■
St. Thomas Engineer
2015
9
Engineering Senior Design Clinic
This year, seniors in the School of Engineering will engage in 25
sponsored projects with regional industries through the Engineering
Senior Design Clinic. The experience is a critical component of
the engineering curriculum as it requires students to engage in
the complete engineering design cycle with an industrial partner.
Unlike many similar senior design project programs throughout the
nation, students involved with “The Clinic” at St. Thomas thrive on
the authenticity of the interaction with real industry needs. It is not
uncommon for multiple patent disclosures to emerge each year from
the student/industry collaboration.
At the end of the two-semester program, graduating seniors display
the working prototypes that just a few months earlier were nothing
more than problems, ideas and possibilities. The teams will all tell you
that at times it got tough and they themselves weren’t sure how it
was all going to unfold. And that is exactly what the faculty is trying to
capture with the Senior Design Clinic. The faculty knows that when the
comforts of well-defined textbook problems are abandoned, real
engineering emerges. What you will see is the manifestation of that
uncertain process of translating ideas into reality.
2015 Industry Sponsors Include:
10 www.stthomas.edu/engineering
The range of sponsors reflects the vitality of industries that thrive in the
region, including 3M, Medtronic, Andersen Windows, Polaris, Emerson,
Mayo Clinic, and numerous other large, small and start-up companies.
As one industry sponsor said, “Our group was thoroughly impressed
with the passion and curiosity of the St. Thomas students to immerse
themselves in a problem in which they previously had no experience.
The value of their prototype solution was far more than we expected
from such young engineers.”
Dr. Chris Greene, program director of Electrical Engineering, said,
“The clinic is a program that we know is one of the more unique in
the country, not necessarily in its concept, but in the details of our
execution of the program and the demands we place on the students
to develop solutions to some very real problems in industry.”
The engineering faculty is always on the search for new industries
and problems to engage with the Senior Design Clinic. If interested in
learning more about how your company can get involved, contact
the School of Engineering office at [email protected] or
call (651) 962-5750. ■
Machine Vision Control of Laser
Micro-Perforations
Automated Cleaner for
3-D Printed Parts
Team: Dr. Greg Mowry (adviser), Mitch Hoffman, Thomas Fuller,
Alex Maslakow and Josh Martin.
Team: Dr. Chris Haas (adviser), Connor Hanson, Mike Eigenmann,
Christine Gorzycki and Zach Vidlund.
Application/Market Area Description LasX’s Laser Processing
Module is used to provide laser processing for integrated material
handling systems in roll and sheet format. One of its target markets
is thin polymer films that are typically used in the frozen foods
packaging industry. Laser micro-perforation is commonly applied
to the film as a means of controlling the flow of oxygen in and
out of a package of frozen foods. The consistency and accuracy
of the micro-perforations is a critical part of maximizing frozen
food’s shelf life.
Application/Market Area Description Starkey Hearing
Technologies uses 3-D printing technology to create rapid
prototypes for engineering tests, as well as limited production
ear molds. These printed parts, which can be as small
as .1”x.1”x.1”, come out of the printer covered in wax and
need to be cleaned. The cleaning process is both messy and
time consuming.
Problem to be Solved LasX needs a system designed that is
capable of measuring the holes with a camera, in real-time, as the
production is running. Holes typically have diameters about the
size of a human hair and are moving at speeds up to 1,000 feet per
minute. Such a system would dramatically decrease the amount
of time required to set up and quality control micro-perforation
processes and could lead to complete feedback control of the
process.
Team Deliverables The team will design and build an automated
system that measures the size and ellipticity of the holes. The
team is combining machine vision technology, optics design,
mechanical design and software controls to accomplish the task.
A completed system that has been validated to accomplish the
requirements and all documentation will be delivered.
Problem to be Solved The goal of this project is to automate
the current manual cleaning process with a machine, saving
Starkey approximately eight hours of work per week. This way
engineers and production workers can be more efficient by
avoiding the time-consuming process of manual part cleaning.
Parts that enter the machine covered in wax must come out
clean, oil-free and dry in less than one and a half hours while
not exceeding a temperature of 70°C.
Team Deliverables The team will design and build the
automated system and provide Starkey with the working device
designed to be robust enough to last at least three years on
the factory floor. The team will test the machine thoroughly,
including accelerated life testing, and also will provide complete
documentation for design, construction and maintenance.
St. Thomas Engineer
2015
11
I am a Data Scientist
Name: Alyssa Peterson
Hometown: Coon Rapids, Minn.
Graduate degree: M.S. Data Science expected
May 2017
Undergraduate: Economics major, University of
St. Thomas, graduated May 2014
Who inspires her: Successful women in engineering
She’s a fan of: “Watching ‘Prison Break’ on Netflix
and ‘Friends’ reruns; coffee in cute mugs; my
computer; time having fun with my friends and
my family; HGTV.”
On a Sunday afternoon you will find her: “Drinking
coffee with my girlfriends.”
Why data science: “Because of my undergraduate
econometrics class. I worked with a large data set
of entertainment revenue and found it fun to run
an analysis and find the story behind it.”
Best thing about her program: “Seeing the
satisfying results with JAVA.”
Why UST for her graduate program: “The UST
community. Our professors work hard to make class
content interesting. The other students in the program
have helped me feel welcome and included even
though I just learned how to program last fall.”
Advice to others thinking about switching to a
software major: “At first it may seem scary, but
once you dive in, you can do it if you bring your
determination. JAVA is learnable.” ■
According to an April 2014 report by IDC, Big Data is a field full of mind-boggling potential, with data amounts now
doubling in size every two years. By 2020, the size of our digital universe will reach 44 zettabytes or 44 trillion
gigabytes. With data growing exponentially, jobs in this field of data wrangling are popping up just about everywhere.
To meet this need, Graduate Programs in Software in the School of Engineering added a Data Science master’s degree
program in the Fall of 2014, and it has quickly become very popular with software engineers and career changers alike.
14 www.stthomas.edu/engineering
12
School of Engineering News
Former Dean of Engineering at Loyola Marymount Named New Provost
The University of St. Thomas is pleased to
welcome Dr. Richard Plumb as the new
executive vice president and provost. An
electrical engineer specializing in numerical
electromagnetics, Plumb previously served
as dean of the Seaver College of Science and
Engineering at Loyola Marymount University.
During his tenure at Loyola Marymount,
Plumb developed and carried out the
college’s first strategic plan and worked
with the liberal arts and business colleges
to create joint academic programs. He also
helped to raise $70 million toward a new
$80 million life sciences building, which
will open in the summer of 2015.
Dr. Richard Plumb
In 1998, Plumb became professor and chair
of the Department of Electrical and Computer
Engineering at the State University of
New York at Binghamton. Seven years later,
Loyola Marymount appointed him dean
of sciences and engineering, a school that
includes 85 full-time faculty, 30 professional
staff, 1,100 undergraduate majors and 850
graduate students.
degrees at Syracuse because one of the world’s
foremost experts in the discipline (Roger
Harrington) taught there.
During graduate school, Plumb worked as a
program engineer in the Military Electronics
Systems Operation at General Electric.
He was an assistant visiting professor at
Syracuse for a year before moving to the
University of Kansas in 1989 as an assistant
professor in the Department of Electrical
and Computer Engineering. He was promoted
to associate professor in 1994 and served
as acting director of the Radar Systems and
Remote Sensing Laboratory at Kansas in
1997-1998.
Plumb became a noted researcher on
electromagnetics and ground-penetrating
radar. Over an 11-year period from 1992 to
2003, he received $1.7 million for 13 sponsored
research projects as a principal investigator and
$3 million for seven projects as a co-investigator,
with most of the funds coming from corporations
or government agencies. ■
Plumb earned bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral
degrees in electrical engineering from Syracuse
University. He chose to pursue his graduate
Mechanical Engineering Faculty Dr. Camille George Appointed Associate Vice Provost
Provost Richard Plumb has appointed
Professor Camille George to a newly-created
position, associate vice provost for global and
local engagement.
In her new role, George provides leadership
and creates strategic partnerships to advance
the university’s community and international
initiatives. In addition, she is responsible
for international activities, including study
abroad, international scholar exchange
programs, special initiatives, and collaborative
agreements with international universities and
nonprofit organizations.
Dr. Camille George
A faculty member since 2002, George works
closely with individuals and departments
university-wide to mobilize and strengthen
university and community-based partnerships
that prepare students to become engaged
citizens. She also is collaborating with
faculty to help create opportunities for the
development and delivery of innovative
programming to enhance student learning
and address community-identified needs
and to foster service-learning throughout
the university.
George has a broad background in applied
industrial research that includes examining
magneto-mechanical pumps, modeling
aircraft engine failures, and predicting
performance in twin-screw compressors. Her
particular field of expertise is in the coupling of
electro-magnetic fields with ionized gases.
Applications range from welding and surface
coatings, to odor and waste destruction.
In addition, George has pioneered Peace
Engineering at St. Thomas. A member of
Engineers without Borders and Engineers
for a Sustainable World, she has led projects in
which students helped women’s cooperatives
in Haiti harvest breadfruit to use as a flour
substitute, and has investigated how to
make the production of shea butter in Mali
more efficient. ■
St. Thomas Engineer
2015
13
School of Engineering News
Engineering Students Win Scholarships in Fowler Business Concept Challenge
Their project, WindWorks, took second place in the Social Venture division. The team was also
awarded “Best Presentation.“
Who would think that a group of undergraduate
engineering majors would take home
scholarships through their participation
in a business competition? That’s just what
happened when mechanical engineering
majors Michaela Andrews, Tony Kuplic and
Vang Xiong competed in the 2014 Fowler
Business Concept Challenge. Their project,
WindWorks, took second place in the Social
Venture division. In addition, the team was
deemed to have the best presentation.
Student participants developed and submitted
a business concept that has the potential to
become a viable, high-growth business. Entries
were judged on their originality, clear and
compelling value proposition, competitive
advantage, market opportunity and feasibility.
WindWorks took an existing concept – drying
breadfruit in Haiti so that it could be ground
into flour and stored for later use – and
modified it for use with other types of produce
in another Caribbean nation, Granada. By drying
mangos, bananas and other fruit when they
Graduate Programs
in Software
Celebrates 30 years
1985–2015
2015 Graduate Programs
Data Science
Information Technology
Software Engineering
Software Management
Graduate Certificates
www.stthomas.edu/software
are abundant, people in Granada can be
empowered as they earn income and improve
nutrition, diminish waste and decrease imports.
“I really like the idea of using engineering to help
others,” Andrews said.
“This project had real potential to benefit
people in island nations, like Granada,” said
Dr. Camille George, associate vice provost for
global and local engagement who worked
with the team. “Plus, this team had a working
prototype of their design. Few teams in the
contest would have that benefit.”
Through their preparation for the challenge,
Andrews was intrigued by how real the
project became. “It was very abstract at the
beginning, working in a new geography with
different fruit. I was amazed at how much
thought went into seemingly small changes,”
she said. “We started with modifying the
equipment, and moved on to the business
model. It’s one thing to design a dryer and
another to make something that would be
accepted in the community.”
The team learned these lessons well. In fact,
Xiong is in discussions with CTI, a Twin Cities
nonprofit, about continuing this project.
“St. Thomas is not in a position to manufacture
and distribute this technology,” George said.
“It would be great if we could pass this great
idea on to them.” ■
Engineering Design Team Selected for Clinton Global
Initiative University
A team of three University of St. Thomas School
of Engineering students attended a meeting
of the Clinton Global Initiative University
(CGIU) March 6-8 at the University of Miami.
Seniors John Umarov and Julio Vasquez and
sophomore Chad Helland were chosen to
attend the gathering of up-and-coming
social entrepreneurs based on a project they
are developing with the St. Thomas chapter
of Engineers for a Sustainable World. Along
with their fellow club members, they are
working to create an affordable 1kW solar
energy system targeting households in the
developing world that would otherwise not
have electricity.
Umarov believes college students are
uniquely qualified to be social entrepreneurs.
“Our generation has a lot of power to help
solve these problems because we are creative
and always pushing boundaries,” he said. “We
want to really explore our boundaries and
find a solution for people who don’t have the
tools to solve the problems themselves.”
14 www.stthomas.edu/engineering
George said, “Social entrepreneurship involves
more than an artifact. The students have to
understand the business side – supply chain,
for example. Engineers tend to think they have
to get products that are affordable and easy to
use, and assume that everyone will want to buy
them and their venture will be successful. This
competition taught these students that they
need to know the business and social elements
as well.”
The idea of improving the lives of those in
need was appealing to Helland. “Lack of
access to electricity is a problem we can do
something about,” he said. “The positive gains
can be pretty big and start to snowball. If you
bring power to people who never had it, they
can start to have technology, which will make
their lives easier. They can become more
educated, which allows for them to grow in
many other ways.”
Each year, former President Bill Clinton
and Chelsea Clinton host a meeting where
students, university representatives, topic
experts and celebrities come together to
discuss and develop innovative solutions
to pressing global challenges. This year’s
meeting brought together more than
1,100 students with ideas that could make
a difference in CGIU’s five focus areas of
education, environment and climate change,
peace and human rights, poverty alleviation,
and public health. ■
I am UST’s First Computer Engineer Graduate
Name: Megan McGill
Hometown: Dellwood, Minn.
Degree: Megan will graduate this May with a double
major in computer engineering and computer science.
She will be UST’s first graduate with a degree in
Computer Engineering.
Currently rereading: A Tale of Two Cities. “It’s my
favorite book.”
Who inspires her: “My parents, because they are very
supportive, and UST professors, especially Dr. Jarvis and
Dr. Nepal.”
She’s a fan of: “Writing, running and music. I also like
‘American Horror Story,’ ‘Doctor Who,’ ‘Criminal Minds’
and ‘Sherlock’ on TV.”
Favorite UST class so far: “Object Oriented Programming
with Dr. Jarvis”
Megan chose her major on a coin flip: “Literally. I couldn’t
decide between mechanical and electrical engineering,
so my dad and I flipped a coin, which made me first
choose mechanical engineering. After some classes,
I realized I leaned more toward electrical engineering,
and then I took a class and fell in love with computer
programming. My adviser, Dr. Nepal, told me of a new
undergraduate degree program in computer engineering.”
On computer programming: “I chose it partially to
challenge myself. I thought it was hard but interesting.
I didn’t grow up coding. However, I feel completely
competent compared to the students who did. I look
at computers as learning another language. You don’t
start fluent but if you try it and it interests you, then you
become fluent.”
After graduation: Megan has a job at Ameriprise
Financial. She starts in June. ■
St. Thomas Engineer
2015
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Sean Lipinski, Benjamin Stassen, John Miller and (not pictured) Anthony Jaworski
Engineering Team Competes in International Drone Competition
Sean Lipinski, Benjamin Stassen, John Miller and Anthony Jaworski, all
School of Engineering students, were among the 18 teams that competed
for the right to call themselves world champion drone builders at the
22nd annual American Society of Mechanical Engineers Student Design
Competition finals last November at the International Mechanical
Engineering Congress and Exhibition in Montreal.
In addition to the 11 institutions from the U.S., the event included
universities from Pakistan, India, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Turkey, Mexico
and France. Each team was required to design and build an original
drone, pilot it successfully through a series of high and low obstacles,
complete a targeted payload drop and return to the start.
The St. Thomas team performed admirably, guiding the largest drone
of the competition through some very tight spaces, according to
School of Engineering Dean Don Weinkauf. “This is an impressive
group of students who have given an incredible amount of time outside
of their normal classwork to design, build and compete for the University
of St. Thomas at a very high level,” Weinkauf said. “I could not be more
proud of their commitment and accomplishments.” ■
Dr. Saeed Rahimi Designs Behavioral
Informatics Software
Dr. Saeed Rahimi, professor in Graduate Programs in Software (GPS),
joined entrepreneur and University of Minnesota neuroscientist
Dr. Frank Burton during his sabbatical last fall. With the help from
GPS student Gabriel Alcocer, they designed and implemented a new
software package written in Java for automated diagnosis of
behavior. This software will help advance the emerging field of
behavioral informatics which has potential applications in behavioral
science, medicine, human resources, advertising, industrial,
manufacturing, healthcare, managerial and training processes. ■
16 www.stthomas.edu/engineering
School of Engineering News
Chasing Climate Change
Dr. Chih Lai Taps Into Big Data
Analytics on the Cloud
Professor Chih Lai is collaborating with Amazon and SAP
University Competence Center to bring cloud computing to
his teaching and research on big data analytics.
Lai was awarded a $7,000 Cloud Computing Teaching Grant
by Amazon last November to teach students how to use
the powerful hardware and software resources on Amazon
Cloud to analyze data sets with millions of records. This grant
provided a $100 Amazon Cloud Computing credit to every
student who enrolled in the Data Mining class this spring,
allowing each student to perform about 500 hours of big data
analysis using powerful Amazon computing resources. In this
class, Lai is demonstrating pattern extractions from real-world
big data sets using SAP HANA (High performance ANAlytics)
In-Memory Database, a new analytics tool. Companies like
General Mills, Xcel Energy and Coca-Cola have begun using
SAP HANA for their big data analytics. Students are using
HANA and other predictive analytics tools available on
Amazon Cloud on semester projects.
In February, Amazon awarded Lai a $23,600 research grant to
study brain activity. Neuroimaging has captured trillions of
functional connections among brain regions of 500 patients
performing seven tasks, data which are available publically
through the Human Connectome Project. The grant will
allow Lai and his team to use about 100,000 hours of
Amazon Cloud computing resources to analyze and predict
patterns from those brain connectivity graphs. Lai plans to
share his team’s results on Amazon Cloud to accelerate
neuroscience research and to publish a joint research report
with Amazon to describe how to use Amazon Cloud to
analyze large-scale brain connectivity graphs.
SAP also has invited Lai to develop a pilot course to use the
center’s cloud computing resources. Plans call for the course,
Data Mining and Analytics using SAP HANA, to be offered
next fall at St. Thomas. SAP would also share some of the
course materials and data with other universities through its
University Competence Center. ■
Engineering professors Dr. Tom Shepard
and Dr. John Abraham, are conducting
research to better understand how
the ocean temperatures are changing.
The oceans, which cover approximately
70 percent of the earth’s surface, have
very few temperature monitoring
stations. To truly understand the
ocean temperature, it is necessary
to make many measurements from
the surface to the ocean bottom
which can be thousands of meters
deep. Most of the information
on ocean temperatures
has been measured using
devices called Expendable
BathyThermographs, small
torpedo-like devices that are
dropped from the decks
of ocean-going ships.
The accuracy
of these devices is
impacted by the speed of
their descent through the
ocean waters. An accurate
understanding of their descent
is crucial to the measurements,
and this is where Shepard and
Abraham have made a contribution,
working with scientists from the
United States, England, Australia
and Italy to improve the measurements.
Their research has focused on the instant
that the devices impact the water. This
impact causes large forces on the device
that can be quantified through the use
of high-speed videography. Shepard’s
high-speed images and his calculations are
now being employed by oceanographers
across the world to revise our understanding
of climate change.
Photo taken with a high-speed (1000x/second)
camera showing the XBT’s descent into a
swimming pool.
St. Thomas Engineer
2015
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Students Study
Engineering
in Italy
St. Thomas Graduate Advances Desalination Research at MIT
Researchers at MIT, including Natasha Wright ’12
have found a more economical and innovative
approach to desalination.
In the search for clean drinking water, scientists and engineers have
cycled through filtration, chlorination, oxidation and just about any
“-ation” one can think of. However, researchers at Massachusetts
Institute of Technology, including St. Thomas alumna and MIT
doctoral candidate Natasha Wright, have found a more economical
and innovative approach – using a solar-powered electrical system to
remove salt from water.
The research focused on making the salty groundwater of India
drinkable, an endeavor that could yield massive effects on the
country’s villages. In India, over 80 million people do not have access
to an improved water source.
18 www.stthomas.edu/engineering
The system looks like the electrodialysis diagrams that appear in
college-level chemistry textbooks. An anode and a cathode sit parallel
to one another as water runs between the two. When the water
contains ions – or in this case, salt – a solar-powered current pushes
the positive ions one way while negative ions go the other.
“That pulls ions out of the water, so you’re left with clean, pure
water in the middle,” Wright said. The system also contains a line
of ion-selective membranes between the anode and the cathode,
Wright said, that trap salt at the sides.
Wright and her colleagues sought a method that would be simple
and economically sustainable. “If the systems are so expensive
that they have to be donated entirely, that’s not sustainable for
the village or for the organization that’s doing the donation,” she said.
Study Abroad 2015: Roman Structures
Monday, January 5, 2015
Rome, Italy
The Coliseum [is] an absolutely massive amphitheater. It
was designed to hold 50,000 Romans (about 5 percent of the
population at the time) but could hold around 87,000 when
packed to the brim. It’s estimated the stadium could empty
in 30 minutes by utilizing its 76 entrances. Let’s not forget it’s
the site of the infamous gladiator fights and, as some would
argue, one of the highlights of Russell Crowe’s acting career.
Thursday, Jan. 8
Rome, Italy
Being on top of Palatine Hill started to make me realize
why the emperors thought of themselves as gods. If I
owned a city like this, in which I overlooked something
as gorgeous as this every day, I would probably think of
myself as a god as well.
Saturday, Jan. 17
Rome, Italy
In 1702 a meridian line was placed in the [Santa Maria
church] floor and a hole drilled into the wall. That meridian
line told the date fairly accurately by having the sun hit
the line at noon at varying degree marks corresponding
to months and dates. At the end is an ellipse that was
supposed to track and predict star movements, but
unfortunately that one no longer works.
Tuesday, Jan. 20
Pompeii, Italy
The city of Pompeii is fairly large, but only 70 percent of the
city is excavated even though the excavation originated in
the late 1700s. The brickwork was old. Like real old. Like 79
A.D. old. Most of the main structures survived except for
roofs and some walls, so it looks like a ghost town.
Wednesday, Jan. 21
Florence, Italy
At the [Maserati] factory, we saw the beginning of the
main chassis coming into the factory, the drive-train
installation, electronic installation, and the final testing
of the vehicles to make sure they are actually road worthy. It
was especially awesome seeing so many Maserati cars
driving around as well, because you knew exactly when
one was coming down the road due to the sheer symphony
that the car was playing with its engine.
Thursday, Jan. 22
Pisa, Italy
From a distance the tilt doesn’t look like much, but up
close it’s very noticeable. It’s actually not completely
straight because during the second [construction] phase
the engineers tried to make it appear more straight by
slanting the new floors slightly. To their dismay, the tower
sank more and those efforts were all for naught. So now
the tower has a banana shape to it if you look closely.
Excerpted from the 2015 J-term student blog
In order to strike this balance between economic accessibility and
scientific modeling, Wright has visited India twice a year since
2012, and she plans on continuing to do so.
“The goal of the trips is really to engage all of the stakeholders,” she
said. “So that’s everyone from the village that is going to be using
this eventually, all the way through manufacturers, distributors, small
NGOs [non-governmental organizations] and big water NGOs.
“There’s always still going to be some elements of charity, but the
goal in the end is to create a system that is economically sustainable
enough that it doesn’t need to be a charitable thing in that way,”
Wright said. “One of the best ways that we can make it expand faster
is if it’s economical to begin with.” ■
Excerpted from The Daily Free Press, Sept. 16, 2014
Natasha Wright ’12
St.
St.Thomas
ThomasEngineer
Engineer
2015
2015
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I am an Engineer
Name: Michaela Andrews
Hometown: Rosemount, Minn.
Majors: Mechanical Engineering and
Liturgical Music
Anticipated graduation: May 2016
Performs with: UST’s Schola Cantorum,
Liturgical Choirs and the Wind Ensemble
Plays: French horn, piano, and pipe organ
Why UST: “UST offered both majors I was
interested in. I like the idea of making a
difference with developmental engineering and
peace engineering. I also liked the size of UST,
and that UST was affordable.”
She’s a fan of: Lord of the Rings and the
TV show “Firefly”
Favorite UST class so far: “Musical acoustics, which
is about how instruments work. It merged both
of my interests in how things work and music.”
Two highlights of her engineering program:
“I was a part of a team that took second place
in the Fowler Business Challenge, and enjoyed
my time abroad during the UST J-term trip to
Italy.” [See pages 14 and 18-19 for more on
these programs.]
Who inspires her: “My family. My dad, a mechanical
engineer, would turn family road trips into
fun learning adventures by having me use a
stopwatch and the mile markers along the road
to compare to the car’s speedometer reading to
the car’s GPS.”
I am an engineer ... “who loves learning, am
curious about the world around me and loves
learning how things work.” ■
20 www.stthomas.edu/engineering
I am an Engineer
Name: Charlie Kiolbasa
Hometown: Stillwater, Minn.
Major: Mechanical Engineering
Anticipated graduation: May 2015
Who inspires him: “My parents. I find my dad a
very motivated person, as well as my grandfather,
a Polish immigrant who fought in WWII and then
went to medical school and became a doctor.”
He’s a fan of: “Minnesota sports teams, most
music (except the country genre), tubing on the
St. Croix River, golfing and snowboarding.”
Research on 35W bridge collapse: “I have worked
to help research information on bridges in light
of the 35W bridge collapse. I helped to compile
research on the 35W bridge and general bridge
analyses, including reports from the National
Transportation Safety Board. I am working with
Dr. Acton to help make labs for future engineering
students using ANSYS, a modeling program
which will show where a bridge under a certain
load is the weakest and strongest.”
What he has learned about the 35W bridge: “Up
until the 35W bridge tragedy, gusset plates were
thought to be the strongest part of a bridge.
So this failure was groundbreaking. The bridge
failed because one particular gusset plate was
underdesigned and the stresses within this
gusset plate resulted in a low factor of safety. If
the plate had been made twice as thick, the plate
shouldn’t have failed.”
Favorite part of research work: “Working with
Dr. Acton and learning to solve problems on
my own.”
I am an engineer ... ”who is always learning and
solving problems, and knows each new project
means starting from scratch.” ■
St. Thomas Engineer
2015
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School of Engineering
2115 Summit Ave., OSS 100
St. Paul, MN 55105-1096
New Engineering Design Center Opens
Read more about the new building
on page 2.
www.stthomas.edu/engineering