Engineers' Forum February 2021

Engineers’ Forum FEBRUARY 2022

VOLUME 43 NUMBER 1

VIRGINIA TECH’S PREMIER STUDENT-RUN ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY MAGAZINE

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Photo / Nidhi Chopdekar

On the Cover Campus quads covered in snow.

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U.S. Naval Research Laboratory Alexander Petsopoulos

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Teacher Spotlight Jolene Ghosh

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HACKVIOLET Julia A. Pimentel

First Snowfall Of The Year!

Photos / Jessica Savage

Bridge at the duck pond.

Burruss hall.

Virginia Tech snowball fight on the drillfield.

Just some ducks being ducks.

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LETTER FROM THE EDITOR Welcome to 2022!

Our Engineers’ Forum family hopes you are enjoying the winter weather and start to the spring semester! Accompanying the new classes you’re taking, we have published the new February issue.

Senior writer Alexander Petsopoulos reflects on the impact his former article on the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory has made on several colleagues. His advice is applicable to anyone currently seeking internships or full-time jobs. His article is a must-read, especially for engineers hoping to live in the Washington D.C. Metropolitan area.

Transitioning to one of EF’s newest writers, Jolene Ghosh, the February issue includes a professor spotlight that encompasses Dr. Lucero’s physics journey, research, hobbies, and love for Virginia Tech. This article on Dr. Lucero, who could be your future Cosmology or Foundations of Physics professor, gives a deeper insight into her diverse background.

For those interested in coding, Hackathons, or attending career fairs, the HackViolet event is fast approaching. I, Julia Pimentel, share the unique perspective of an executive director for HackViolet. In this article, learn more about the technology prizes, attending companies, and how to register.

As always, we hope that you’re staying happy and healthy. We look forward to showcasing new articles in the future April issue.

Enjoy.

Julia A. Pimentel Editor-in-Chief

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**Photos shown throughout this issue may have been taken prior to COVID-19 and Virginia Tech’s recommended best practices, including wearing masks, and social distancing.**

Engineers’ Forum Editor-in-Chief Creative Director Chief Copy Editor Managing Editor Business Manager Social Media Manager Webmaster

Writers

Photography Team

Design Team

Faculty Advisors

@vtengineers_forum

Julia A. Pimentel - Materials Science and Engineering (‘22) RJ Weaver - Industrial Design (‘22) Dianna Kim - Public Relations, Professional and Technical Writing (‘22) Alexander Petsopoulos - Aerospace Engineering (‘22) Adeline Ghosh - Electrical Engineering (‘24) Jessica Barbish - Materials Science and Engineering (‘22) Hayley Stout - Industrial Design (‘22)

Aaiswarya Gopinadam - General Engineering (‘25) Adeline Ghosh - Electrical Engineering (‘24) Bethany Hillmann - Creative Writing (‘25) Cheickna Koura-Bodji - General Engineering (‘24) Jolene Ghosh - General Engineering (‘24) Kashyap Bhatt - Mechanical Engineering (‘22) Sumaiya Haque - Industrial and Systems Engineering (‘23)

Nidhi Chopdekar - Computer Science (Graduate) Sean Stroud - WIldlife Conservation (‘22) Jessica Savage - General Engineering (‘25)

RJ Weaver - Industrial Design (‘22) Hayley Stout - Industrial Design (‘22) Thomas-Mark Peterson - Architecture (Graduate) Johnathan Tan - Architecture (‘22) Stella Shin - Architecture (‘25)

Linda Hazelwood Alex Parrish

Virginia Tech - Engineers’ Forum

www.vtengineersforum.com

(Background) Parts from Randolph Hall Photo / Kendal Price

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Photo / An electromagnetic railgun fired at Naval Surface Warfare Center, on January 31, 2008, firing a 3.2 kg projectile at 10.64MJ (megajoules) with a muzzle velocity of 2520 m/s. The NRL railgun fires a projectile 3 times more energetic than the one seen in this U.S. Navy Photograph.

Hokies Helping Hokies: The U.S. Naval Research Laboratory Article /

Alexander Petsopoulos (‘22) 5

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Author’s Note: The original version of this article was originally published two years ago in our February 2020 issue. Since its publication, I know of at least three of my fellow Hokies who have used it to obtain fruitful engineering internships at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory. Having interned at the NRL myself for the last three years, I am thrilled to announce I will be starting work there as a full-time engineer this summer once I am graduated. NRL is an exciting, cuttingedge, rewarding place for young engineers to start their careers, earn fully-funded undergraduate and graduate degrees, and serve their country. This version of my NRL article is updated to reflect my latest experiences with the NRL and provides the latest recruiting information.

For the last three years, I have had the opportunity to intern at The U.S. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) in Washington, D.C. It opened in 1923 at the request of Thomas Edison, and it is the United States Navy’s premier research institution. The NRL is responsible for the invention of Radio Detection and Ranging (RADAR), the first American satellite program (Project Vanguard), and Onion Routing, the anonymous, Deep Web communication technique behind Tor. Additionally, the NRL’s Plasma Physics Group holds the world record for “most energetic rail gun projectile” at 33 megajoules, or enough energy to launch a 23lb bullet at Mach 8. I saw this rail gun last summer; it’s a beast.

All accomplishments aside, the NRL is well-positioned to continue its nearly century-long legacy of providing advanced scientific capabilities necessary to fortify our country’s Naval superiority. This is due in part to our world-class research facilities and state-of-theart equipment. For example, our Laboratory for Autonomous Systems Research (LASR) houses four unique high bay environments, including the 150’ x 75’ x 30’ high Prototyping High Bay, with its motion capture system capable of tracking up to 50 objects. LASR’s Littoral High Bay features a 45’ x 25’ x 5.5’ deep pool with its own 16-channel wave generator, capable of creating directional waves. Alan Schultz, Director of Autonomous Systems Research at NRL, explains to Donna McKinney’s 2012 News Release, “The Desert High Bay contains a 40’ by 14’ area of sand 2-foot deep, and contains 18-foot high rock walls that allow testing of robots and sensors in a desert-like environment.” This laboratory, and dozens of other cutting-edge facilities, are open to all the NRL engineers and scientists performing relevant research.

This article attempts to make a persuasive case for Virginia Tech students to make the NRL their next summer internship, or post-graduation career. The NRL sits at a convenient working location for many of Virginia Tech’s students that hail from Northern Virginia and Maryland. For the 7000+ Hokies who call NOVA home, the NRL is just a 30-minute drive from Tyson’s Corner Center in Fairfax County. As a Washington Nationals fan, I appreciate the NRL’s sub-5-mile vicinity to Nationals Park and many of DC’s other accompanying attractions like the White House, the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, and the National Gallery of Art. Also, we sit on the banks of the historic Potomac River. When stuck on a challenging technical problem, walking down the riverside and watching planes land at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport is a peaceful way to clear one’s head.

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“but it also gives them two paid days off of work each week during the semester to focus on their studies.”

Photo (top) / For any Astros fans who want to watch a real team play baseball with me after work

Photo (Bottom) / “Looking east from the Potomac River, a satellite receiver sits atop a NRL’s building 43. This 50-foot radio telescope was used by the NRL’s Radio Astronomy group in the early 1950s to make the first accurate radar measurements of the distance to the moon.”

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- Alex Petsopoulos

Photo / “The Tropical High Bay, part of the Laboratory for Autonomous Systems Research, is a 60’ by 40’ greenhouse that contains a re-creation of a southeast Asian rain forest. In the Tropical High Bay, temperatures average 80 degrees with 80 percent humidity year round. (Photo: U.S. Naval Research Laboratory)” More info about this one-of-a-kind NRL facility can be found at: www.ef.org.vt.edu/NRL-LAB

Beyond location and challenging research, the NRL provides interns with incredible opportunities through its unparalleled student benefits. Our pay is competitive with the already high average for DC area engineering interns, yet where the NRL really shines is its Undergraduate Tuition Assistance Program. While not a guaranteed benefit for all interns, section managers who intend to convert their interns to full-time employees after graduation have the ability to pay for their student employees’ college tuition and educational fees in full through higher-level division funds. I am in this program and have not paid any tuition or educational fees for my last five semesters at Virginia Tech. Since the NRL is a federal government facility, employees have access to Student Loan Repayment benefits upon conversion to a full-time hire, which enables an employee’s student loans to be paid off by the NRL (up to $60,000 in loans can be paid off over 6 years).

When pursuing one’s graduate degree as a full-time employee, the NRL encourages employees to competitively apply to its Edison Memorial Graduate Training Program. This unparalleled training program not only pays for an employee’s tuition and educational fees as they pursue their graduate degree part-time, but it also gives them two paid days off of work each week during the semester to focus on their studies. A 2017 Virginia Tech Aerospace Engineering graduate, my coworker Robert Scheible, explained in a recent interview, “You won’t find this level of emphasis on education in any private company, or any other government labs for that matter. At the NRL, co-workers listen to and respect you regardless of age; good ideas are listened to and acted upon.”

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How to Get a Job at NRL As a preface, I cannot guarantee this method will work for you. However, below are the exact steps I followed in September of my freshman year that landed me my current position. Additionally, I have sent this procedure to three of my peers here at Virginia Tech. After following it, they both received internship offers within the week. The steps are as follows:

a Competitive 1 Craft Resumé I’m not going to teach you how to write a resumé here, but this is much easier than many students think. A great starting place is Virginia Tech’s Career & Professional Development’s (CPD) website, https://career. vt.edu/. At their Smith Career Center next to McComas hall, CPD offers drop-in resumé reviews Monday through Friday, from 11 AM to 3 PM. Just walk in with a printed-out draft of your resumé, and have it reviewed by a professional for free.

2 Read This Packet https://drive.google.com/file/ d/1TKF7BpQMcbJRuIFRETH4f5sZw-3g-aX_/ view?usp=sharing Yes, it’s a long URL. If it’s that painful for you to type out, here’s a short-link from our website: www.vtengineersforum.com/nrl

a Shortlist of 3 Create Divisions Pick all of them if you’d like. For me, this was as simple as finding “Aerospace Engineering” on the chart below and contacting all of the accompanying divisions.

to a Career Fair 4 Go (Optional) In my case, this was meeting my current supervisor, Donald Kahl (Virginia Tech Class of 1986), at Engineering Expo. When I spoke to him during the December of my freshman year about what he’s looking for in students at career fairs, such as our upcoming CAMEO CareerFest (February 24 - 25), Don said, “Grades matter, but the whole person matters more. I’m looking for creative students with design team experience that have done their homework on NRL. Know what we do before you come to talk to us at a career fair or reach out digitally.”

Both of my Virginia Tech coworkers did all of their networking via email and had phone interviews scheduled within the week of sending their first emails. If the NRL won’t be at an upcoming career fair, you can still take action below!

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the Divisions on 4 Email Your List If you went the career fair route, mention who you talked to at the career fair in your email. Regardless, give some background into who you are (attach your resumé), why you’re interested in working at the NRL, and what you could bring to that specific division. Make sure to send tailored emails to each division, showing that you know what their division does. An easy way to do this is to reference something from their entry in HR Recruitment Folder I’ve linked to in bullet 2b, where you can also find each division’s email address.

That’s it! Good luck to all Hokies pursuing internships and full-time jobs at this spring’s career fairs, and I hope to see many of you this summer at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory!

Photo (Top) / Chart is taken from NRL’s “HR Recruitment Folder” outlining the variety and breadth of engineers and scientists needed at the 18 unique Research Divisions.

Photo (Bottom) / Here’s an example of where to look for email addresses for each division. My division’s entry, Tactical Electronic Warfare, is shown.

Taken from NRL’s “HR Recruitment Folder

Writer / Alexander Petsopoulos joined Engineers’ Forum as a Staff Writer in 2018 and currently serves as the magazine’s Managing Editor. He is a member of the International Association of Professional Writers & Editors and enjoys reading, writing, and solving problems.

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Teacher Spotlight: Dr. Danielle Lucero Dr. Danielle Lucero, a professor at Virginia Tech. Photo / Dr. Danielle Lucero

Article /

Jolene Ghosh

Who is Dr. Danielle Lucero?

Dr. Danielle Lucero began her teaching career in 2019 and had the opportunity to start teaching at Virginia Tech as a Collegiate Assistant Professor in August of 2021. At Virginia Tech, she has taught Modern Cosmology (PHYS-4654/5654G) and The Foundations of Physics (PHYS-2305).

The Modern Cosmology course involves studying the origin of the Universe and The Foundations of Physics is a calculus-based, introductory physics class. In the future, Dr. Danielle Lucero plans on expanding her teaching to cover Integrated Sciences I, The Physics of Galaxies, and a Black Holes elective course.

Education Dr. Danielle Lucero received her BS in Physics, MS in Physics, and Ph.D. in Physics with a dissertation in Astrophysics, from the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology, which is also known as New Mexico Tech. In addition, the university also has various resources nearby such as, “the premiere radio telescope, the Very Large Array, and the National Radio Astronomical Observatory” (Lucero). This college is perfect for any student who is interested in exploring their interests and learning more about the radio astronomy field.

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Her Research In 2018, Dr. Danielle Lucero first came to Virginia Tech to work as a Research Scientist, and then she later became a professor. Dr. Danielle Lucero is passionate about her research and trying to learn about new concepts. Over the years, she has worked on numerous research projects. In regard to some of the research projects that she has conducted over the years, Dr. Lucero stated that it “aims to understand the cold gas content of early-type galaxies (lenticular, elliptical). I am interested in how early-types obtain their cold gas and how their neutral hydrogen physically transitions to the molecular phase (where all stars are born). Star formation in early types can change their morphologies over time slowly transforming them to look more disk-like. Detecting the cold gas in galaxies requires observations from radio telescopes. I have also been involved in the science commissioning of several radio telescopes including Aperture Tile in Focus (Apertif) telescope in the Netherlands and the Karoo Array Telescope (KAT-7) in South Africa. Very recently, I have become involved in Cosmology research. I am part of a project that is using the LOFAR radio telescope to detect radio-synchrotron background radiation and determine its origin (Lucero).“

Research Opportunities for Students Dr. Danielle Lucero also has research opportunities available for students. She is currently overseeing 10 different undergraduate student research projects and has a full set of students researching for the Spring semester.

She works with students of various backgrounds such as CMDA and the Orion living-learning community. Virginia Tech offers many different living-learning communities for students to join so that they can have the opportunity to explore their interests with other students. The Orion living-learning community consists of students in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, College of Science, and College of Natural Resources and Environment. For any students interested in researching, Dr. Danielle Lucero should hopefully have more spaces available to join research projects during the Fall semester of 2022. In regard to the projects she is currently supervising, she said “the projects I have available center around radio-interferometric observations of the radio continuum and neutral hydrogen in early-type galaxies” (Lucero). It is important for students to get involved with research because it can help them in the future to know more about their chosen field of interest or to gain new skills in general. By joining one of these research projects, students will be able to learn techniques to work with data concerning the basic principles of radio astronomy.

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Her Hobbies Outside of Teaching One of Dr. Danielle Lucero’s interests besides research and being a professor is to go climbing. It is important to always try new things and “climbing is a fun and social way to stay in shape. It also appeals to me as a scientist because every climbing route is a fun problem to be solved. I recommend everyone try it at least once. I did and fell in love with it” (Lucero). Especially at a college like Virginia Tech, there are plenty of opportunities to try new things. Whether it be a design team, recreational sports, hiking, or going to football games, the campus always has something new to offer students.

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Why Virginia Tech?

When asked about her favorite part of being a professor at Virginia Tech, Dr. Danielle Lucero said, “My favorite part about being a professor at Virginia Tech is being able to work one on one with undergraduate and graduate students on research projects. I have found VT students to be academically topnotch and a joy to work with” (Lucero). At Virginia Tech, students are always striving for excellence and discovering new ways to be creative. It’s professors like Dr. Danielle Lucero who help students to continuously improve and explore their passions through research and her lessons in the classroom.

Football Game at Lane Stadium. Photo / Jolene Ghosh

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HACKVIOLET Article /

Julia A. Pimentel

Hosted by the Association of Women in Computing (AWC), HackViolet is a 24-hour hackathon for all students that features a coding competition, interactive company workshops, technology prizes, and a career fair. The 2022 fully virtual HackViolet is scheduled for the first weekend of February. Through this event, AWC aims to

Graphic / Johnathan Tan

“encourage all individuals to learn about and become change agents for the gender gap in technology by innovating and inspiring with code.” The following information was shared in an interview with Nikita Patel, a senior studying computer science, Vice President of AWC, and one of the executive directors of HackViolet.

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recognition from attending companies. Some of the attending company sponsors include Peraton, Leidos, and Bloomberg. A complete list of sponsors and their interactive workshops can be found on the HackViolet website.

Nikita Patel, Co-Executive Director for HackViolet

Overseeing a diverse team of 15, Patel manages workflow and coordinates with Major League Hacking (MLH), HackViolet’s hackathon sponsor, to ensure AWC organizes an event that lives up to everyone’s expectations. Patel herself was a former prize winner at HackViolet, formerly known as SheHacks.

“I decided to pursue a leadership role after realizing that my team was the only all-female team to win a prize—I wanted to be a part of the change.” - Nikita Patel

Former virtual HackViolet event during the COVID-19 pandemic.

When discussing previous hackathon projects, Patel revealed that Bare Skin, winner of Estee Lauder’s best self-care hack award, was a highly creative and aesthetically pleasing tracker that encouraged healthy skin care habits. HackViolet is an engaging way for students to put aside their school work and come together to develop creative projects in a 24 hour period.

Panel Q&A session for professional development.

Members of the Association of Women in Computing (AWC) team wearing custom shirts: Dream it, Believe it, Code it.

Last year’s virtual Hackathon boasted over 600 active participants, and this year they are exceeding their record by receiving over 1000 registrations. HackViolet is a beginner-friendly hackathon in which attendees can simply attend introductory coding workshops, STEM panels, or the career fair. There is an additional coding project competition, in which teams design, code, pitch, and submit a unique project which grants them the opportunity to win a variety of prizes and receive

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One of the biggest misconceptions of HackViolet is that we’re a female-only hackathon. While one of their main motivators and goals is to encourage females in technology, HackViolet is designed to be inclusive and welcoming of all genders and backgrounds. The leadership team rebranded their former name SheHacks to HackViolet for this very reason.

“Violet represents empowerment.”

- Nikita Patel

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, a highly attended in-person hackathon was held.

If you’re interested in viewing some of the hackathon projects when they are submitted, here is the website listing all the projects, prize categories, and prizes: https://hackviolet22.devpost.com.

Several prize categories include: Best Overall, Best First Time, Best Hack to Support Women, Best Low Code Hack, and Ut Prosim Hack. Pro-tip: if you want a free VT student football season ticket, you may want to gear your project towards the Ut Prosim Hack award. For inspiration, here is the website to view former projects: https://hackviolet.devpost.com/project-gallery.

To register, find the schedule, and learn more about the HackViolet event, check out their official website: https://www.hackviolet.com. If you’re interested in other hackathons at Virginia Tech, VTHacks is another opportunity for you to grow your coding skills!

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, numerous companies hosted inperson interactive workshops. For the upcoming HackViolet event, workshops will be held virtually.

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Winter Wonderland - A fresh layer of snow blankets the New River Valley. A setting winter sun bathes the hills in a warm glow.

Frozen Post - A lone fencepost stands out against a golden sunset. The first snows of 2022 have come!

Fire and Ice - The first snow of 2022 comes to Blacksburg with the warm colors of a winter sunset contrasting the freezing temperature.

Photos / Sean Stroud

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