Vertical Flight Society Chooses Benjamin Leon for the 2019 Lichten Award

Doctoral student Benjamin Leon has been chosen to receive the prestigious 2019 Robert L. Lichten Award for his paper, Ground and Flight Tests of a Cable-Driven Four-Bar Linkage Robotic Landing Gear for Rotorcraft. 

The paper explores Leon's research into a robotic landing gear (RLG) innovation that could improve access for rotorcraft seeking to land in mountainous terrains. Funded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the research demonstrates the design, integration and testing of the RLG system installed in a commercial S-100 Camcopter. Leon worked closely with his advisor, Prof. Claudio V. Di Leo and Prof. Julian Rimoli, to fine-tune the paper,  one of several that he has developed from the three-year research assignment. read more

National Science Foundation: Sara Miller

The National Science Foundation selected first-year aerospace engineering grad student Sara Miller to receive a 2019 NSF Graduate Research Fellowship. The Smithtown, New York native will use the NSF fellowship to continue research that focuses on the characteristics of engine degradation in electric propulsion engines. Guiding her will be her advisor, Prof. Mitchell Walker, who heads up the AE School's High Power Electric Propulsion Lab. read more

NASA Space Technology & Research Fellowship: David Gomez and William Jun

The NSTRF is bestowed each year to encourage research in groundbreaking, high-risk/high-payoff, early stage space technologies. A third NSTRF recipient, Ethan Hopping, will leave his job at Blue Origin this fall to begin his full-time doctoral studies under the guidance of Prof. Mitchell Walker.

Gomez will work in the High Power Electric Propulsion Lab (HPEPL) under the guidance of Prof. Mitchell Walker. His project: "Development of a Highly Throttlable, Bipropellant (Xe-Kr) Hall Thruster and Investigations into the Newly Discovered Oscillation Modes in Magnetically Shielded Thrusters” Jun will work with Prof. Glenn Lightsey in the Space Systems Design Lab. His project: "A Novel Navigational Architecture for Localization on other Planets using a Single-Satellite with Limited Satellite Resources" read more about their plans

The Sikorsky Scholarships

Nine AE School undergrads received scholarships of between $500 and $1,000 from the Sikorsky Scholarship Fund, a support pipeline that was established last year by Regents Professor, Dr. Lakshmi Sankar, AE's longtime associate chair for undergraduate programs. Sankar repurposed funds that came to him as the Daniel Guggenheim School's Sikorsky Professor to support the students, all of whom have demonstrated a strong grasp of the discipline through their coursework and/or lab research.

Receiving the scholarships were graduating undergraduates Katherine Kwasniak, Katie Gross, Erica Hulette, Alexandra Minor, Kelsey Pepper, Mahalakshmi Srinivasan, and Madison Stein. Two other recipients, Emily Bates and Abigail McClain, will continue their undergraduate studies at the AE School.

Helping Sankar to award the funds on April 12 was another high-performing AE student, Dr. Brian Wake, PhD AE '87, now a Lockheed Martin Fellow, Aerodynamics and Special Projects at Sikorsky. Wake happens to have been the first of 46 doctoral students to have been mentored by Sankar, (who also earned his doctorate at GT-AE in 1977).

"The presence of Brian demonstrated to these students just how far they can ascend with their degrees," said Sankar. "We can certainly anticipate that these students will continue to encourage and mentor future generations of AE School students that come after them. That's a tradition that has built the AE School legacy."

Women in Engineering Scholarships

More than $8,000 in scholarships were awarded to AE students by a variety of industry sponsors at the 2019 Georgia Tech Women in Engineering Banquet held April 11. All together, more than $160,000 in scholarships were awarded to 155 female students in the College of Engineering.

"We are awed and humbled by the generous support of steadfast supporters like Boeing, Northrop Grumman, Aptiv and others," said Dr. Christine Valle, the director of the Women in Engineering program at Georgia Tech.

They know that women provide a different perspective and a different lived experience that are extremely valuable as they design products that affect our entire population and both genders. They know that supporting, recruiting, hiring and retaining the best female engineering talent in the country is critical to keeping their companies successful, now and in the foreseeable future." 

Receiving $1,500 scholarships from the Boeing Company were Danielle Dixon (first year), Bridget Wiley (second year) and Alexandra Matlack (senior). Raven Barnes, (first year), Clarisse Matyczyk (third year) and Karena Fiore (senior) each received $1000 scholarships from Aptiv Corporation. Senior Sanjana Tewathia received a $1,000 scholarship from Siemens. read more

Amelia Earhardt Fellowship

Doctoral student Aarohi Shah has been selected to receive a 2019 Zonta International Amelia Earhart Fellowship. The Fellowship was established in 1938 to honor legendary pilot Amelia Earhart, herself a member of the global women's advocacy and service organization. The $10,000 award is bestowed annually on 35 women who are pursuing doctoral degrees in aerospace-related sciences or aerospace-related engineering.

Advised by Prof. Julian J. Rimoli, Shah was selected last year to receive the AHS Lichten Award for co-authoring, "Closed Loop Approach to Structural Health Monitoring for Critical Rotorcraft Components.” This year, she was one of two GT-AE recipients of a 2019 Vertical Flight Foundation Scholarship.

Shah is developing reduced-order structural models to extend the life of critical rotorcraft components.

"This approach reduces the overall effect of fatigue by a load alleviation scheme which gets triggered after inputs from the reduced-order damage models. Overall, this approach can lead to significant savings in cost related to component maintenance and replacement," explained Shah. 

"I am honored for being selected as an Amelia fellow. The funds provides a mean to network with other professionals in my field of work by traveling to conferences and events. This will help me discuss my work and get useful feedback from established industry and academic professionals."
read more

Grad RISE Scholarship

For the second year in a row, grad student Jean Luis Suazo Betancort has been selected by the Georgia Tech Center for Engineering Education and Diversity (CEED) to receive the Retaining Inspirational Students in Technology and Engineering (RISE) Scholarship.

The RISE scholarship was established in 2004 as a means to recruit and retain both minorities and nontraditional engineering students to Georgia Tech. RISE scholars display persistence within their engineering program, leadership and service. They are expected to serve as mentors and/or tutors to other Georgia Tech students and prospective students. 

Betancort said he is deeply committed to his research in the High Power Electric Propulsion Lab (HPEPL), but never so much that he forsakes his calling as a mentor and leader to younger students. In addition to AE undergrads in the HPEPL, he oversees some high school students who are enrolled in the ENGAGES program.

"I have a lot of things to juggle - classes, research, and even the eight hours a week where I'm still working remotely for The Aerospace Corporation in Virginia - but I know that my job in the lab is to help younger students, the under-represented students, to stay on task. All of our interactions should be with their best interests in mind, so that they learn technical skills, critical thinking skills. In the end, they may or may not contribute a lot to the research, but they can learn how to ask question, how to scope out a problem. That's a life skill, something they'll always be able to use."  read more

American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics

The scholarship of several AE students was recognized in early April at the AIAA Southeastern Regional Student Conference, held in Cocoa Beach, Florida.

Taking home the top honor in the "Team" category was "Implementation and Verification of a Modular GN&C and Flight Software Architecture for an Active Control Launch System," a paper written collaboratively by Yellow Jacket Space Program (YJSP) members Kunal Gangolli (AE), Athreya Gundamraj (AE), Wyatt Hoppa (ECE), and Shrivathsav Seshan (ECE).

Their paper outlined the late-stage development, integration, and test of a Level 2 rocket that serves as a testbed for avionics and GN&C (guidance, navigation & control) for a canard-based active control vehicle.

The winning paper in the "Master" category was "Design and Testing of a Fault-Tolerant Space Suit," written by ASDL grad student Johnie Sublett.

"The paper demonstrates technology that could allow us to predict and mitigate catastrophic space suit punctures along the majority of the body," Sublett explained.  "It includes a distributed sensor array for detection and a set of pressure bladders that inflate when the suit's seal is broken."

Each of the first-place honors came with a $500 award and an invitation to represent the AIAA Southeast Region at the AIAA Foundation International Student Conference, which takes place during the AIAA SciTech Forum in January 2020.

On hand to bestow the awards was AIAA Southeast Region director Kurt Polzin, and NASA astronaut Sunita Williams, a veteran of both the Space Shuttle and Soyuz missions. read more

Undergraduate Research Award: Kelsey Pepper

Georgia Tech's 14th Annual Undergraduate Research Symposium highlighted the work of graduating senior Kelsey Pepper who was chose for the Outstanding Undergraduate Researcher Award for Aerospace Engineering. Her classmates, Utkarsh Pandey and Anish Shenoy took home second place for their oral presentation of "RL-10-3-3A Rocket Engine Turboprop System Level Design & Optimization Trades." Read their abstract (pdf)

In addition to the crystal trophy, Pepper received a $200 stipend for her work, "Flame Visualization of Hall Thruster Propellant Distributors." Pepper's work continues research begun with her advisor Prof. Mitchell Walker in which the luminosity of flames coming from a propellant distributor is studied to ultimately determine the condition of the thruster's anode. Starting at an equivalency ratio of one for propane and air, other gas ratios are explored to see other indicators of a problem," Pepper said.

"If you have different ratios, it could indicate a leak, a degraded or clogged anode, or another instability in the system," she said. "So we have this novel way of testing for uneven flow. What we do is we light the gas mixture coming from the anode and observe the luminosity of that flame around its entire circumference. If the luminosity of the flame is the same at every point along that circumference, we know we have completely uniform flow. If not, we start to look for problems." read more

Institute Honors & Awards Event Recognizes Three AE Students

An April 16 Institute Awards Event shined the light on three exceptional students from the Daniel Guggenheim School.

Cason Butler was recognized with the Aerospace Engineering Outstanding Senior Scholar Award. Funded through an endowment established by former school chair Donnel W. Dutton, AE '40, the $1,000 award is given annually to the graduating student with highest cumulative GPA. Butler has earned a perfect 4.0 grade point average at both Georgia Tech's Daniel Guggenheim School of Aerospace Engineering and at Georgia College and State University, where he majored in physics. At Geogria Tech, he has worked on the design of Space Mission to Jupiter’s L5 Point, and on a VTOL multiple configuration aircraft.

Frank K. Kozel was selected for the Donnell W. Dutton Outstanding Senior in Aerospace Engineering Award. The $1,000 award is given annually to a student who has demonstrated excellence both in and outside the classroom. That description fairly well describes Kozel, who for the past three years, has worked tirelessly as the chief engineer for Tech's entry to the SAE Aero Design-Build-Fly competition.

"Frank Kozel has led and participated in the design, prototyping, and flight test of many novel and unconventional aircraft during his time at Georgia Tech," said Kozel's mentor, Prof. Brian German.  "I have been amazed at his and his teams’ ability to do an A-to-Z design, build, and successful test effort in a very short time. Frank’s unique skills position him for an amazing career in technical leadership in the new era of aviation that we, as a society, are now entering.”

Third-year student Savannah Jade Langer was tapped to receive the CoE Honors Day Award, an honor that is given out to engineering students with the best academic records at the end of their third year of undergraduate study. We're glad we have her for another year, at least.

Vertical Flight Foundation Recognizes Two AE Doctoral Students: Aarohi Shah and Feyyaz Guner

Two Daniel Guggenheim School of Aerospace Engineering doctoral students, Aarohi Shah and Feyyaz Guner ,have been chosen to receive scholarships from the Vertical Flight Foundation.

Shah received the $6,000 Jing Yen Cost Awareness Scholarship that is awarded to doctoral students who show interest in improving the affordability of rotorcraft. Shah’s submission included her research with Prof. Julian Rimoli on reduced order damage models for fatigue prediction in rotorcraft vehicles.

Guner was recognized with the Dr. E. Roberts (Bob) Wood Scholarship - named in memory of former Georgia Tech aeromechanics professor Dr. Bob Wood - for his submission on inflow modeling for multi-rotor configurations. Guner will use the $,650 scholarship to support his doctoral research with Prof. J.V.R Prasad on the interactions, and interferences of multi-rotor configurations to improve the fidelity of flight simulations and pilot safety.

“I’m really appreciative of the fact that they (VFF) consider Ph.D. students for these types of scholarships in the rotorcraft field. It motivates us to continue to pursue a career in rotorcraft,” said Guner.