UMass Dartmouth College of Engineering Summer 2020 Newsletter

UMass Dartmouth College of Engineering

News

Dean’s message As I watch our country respond to the COVID-19 pandemic, I realize the urgency and importance of preparing aspiring engineers and scientists to address this world crisis. It is engineers, physicists, and data scientists who are working on ways to better understand virus transmission through the air and human-to-human contact, developing systems and advanced medical equipment for helping those who have been infected to recover, and manufacturing new and affordable vaccines.

Our mission to educate future engineers and scientists is vital to human well-being.

This is why it is so important for me to ensure my college adapts and moves forward so students have access to an accredited degree from the College of Engineering. And in the spring semester, we adapted.

Contents Facts & figures

3

Fighting climate change 4

Scholarship & award recipients 6

• Instructors revised courses so engineering and data science students could meet requirements for their capstone projects, including one that is part of a national competition described in this newsletter, and physics seniors could complete their research.

• We awarded more than $160,000 in scholarships and awards.

While I regret not being able to recognize our scholarship and award recipients in person, they are all celebrated in this newsletter.

• We are moving forward with renovations to three classrooms to support undergraduate instruction and one state-of-theart laboratory that will expand our research and impact on the Blue Economy.

Student spotlights 8 Powering the blue economy

PHOTOS COURTESY Tailyn Clark Kindra Clineff Deirdre Confar Shannon Kennedy Arghavan Louhghalam Daniel G. MacDonald

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And we are continuing to adapt to welcome students back to a safe campus this fall. In the College of Engineering, we are working to ensure every student has a face-to-face experience and are designing all classes so that students may participate remotely if they wish. I encourage you to visit the university website often to stay up-to-date on news regarding students returning to campus this fall.

Abderahmane Naidjate

Best wishes for a safe summer. I hope I have an opportunity to see all of you on campus or virtually this fall semester.

Jean VanderGheynst

Sincerely,

WRITER/EDITOR

Jean VanderGheynst

Adrienne Wartts

Designer Kevin DeAquair

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Summer 2020 news

Facts & figures

97%

of our graduates from the UMassD College of Engineering are either employed or attending graduate school

>$67,000 average entry-level salary for 2019 UMassD graduates with a bachelor’s degree in engineering

183

internships completed by 2020 graduating engineers at companies such as Titleist/Footjoy, Bose Corporation, eBay, Hewlett-Packard, National Grid, and Pratt & Whitney

84%

of full-time undergraduates who apply for financial aid receive it

$106M

UMass Dartmouth students receive approximately $106 million total in scholarships, grants, part-time employment, and loans

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Ranked in the top 15 schools nationwide for master’s degrees in physics among institutions granting the MS - American Physical Society

#4

as a best value Massachusetts college for in-state students – Payscale

#1

for social mobility among universities in New England with a nationally ranked college of engineering U.S. News & World Report

170+

student organizations, including numerous engineering-specific clubs that connect students with science and engineering professionals

umassd.edu/engineering

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New app helps

combat climate change The Carbin app, created by Dr. Arghavan Louhghalam and team, is designed to reduce carbon pollution, conserve fuel, and minimize the environmental impact of driving.

A few years ago, Dr. Arghavan Louhghalam, Assistant Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at UMass Dartmouth, started studying the relationship between road designs and conditions and excess fuel consumption and environmental impact. Using mechanistic models, the team established that there is a relationship between road condition, carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, and climate change.

Dr. Arghavan Louhghalam (l), Meshkat Botshekan (c), & Dr. Mazdak Tootkaboni (r)

“When you drive over a rough road, your suspension

The team developed an app called Carbin, which is

system dissipates energy to increase the ride comfort.

uniquely spelled for several reasons. “The app provides

This energy has to be compensated with extra engine

the amount of Carbon footprint in driving on rough

power that leads to more fuel consumption and

roads. The app provides the amount of energy (Carb) in

environmental impact, Louhghalam explains. “But to

the suspension system that is dissipated into heat and

estimate the network level CO2 emissions, we also

leads to emission of CO2 in the environment, and the

needed data on road surface conditions.” Because it

app is able to bin the Cars into different categories,

is really hard to get the data for the entire network of

say, sedan, SUV, truck, etc.,” Louhghalam explains.

roads and in a continuous way, Louhghalam and her team decided to develop an algorithm (and an app) that can be used to estimate the road surface condition from data that is readily available through crowdsourcing.

Her team includes Dr. Mazdak Tootkaboni of UMass Dartmouth and Dr. Franz-Josef Ulm of MIT, and students from UMassD, MIT and around the world including two of her former students – Meshkat Botshekan, who is now pursuing his PhD at MIT and Taylor Johansen, who is now pursuing her master’s degree at Stanford University. “The results of our research reveal that rough roads will result in an increase in fuel consumption and CO2 emission. They also impact the extent of the wear and tear for vehicles,” she says.

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Summer 2020 news

How Carbin works The app uses data from drivers’ cellphones in a crowdsourced fashion to infer road surface roughness (much broader than potholes), vehicle fuel consumption, and the related greenhouse emissions. It is similar to any navigation app but you have the option of using it without navigation in the background. “When you open the app you need to push “record without navigation” and when you are done with driving you simply push the “finish” button to allow the transfer of the data to our server on Amazon Web Services (AWS),” Louhghalam explained. The data is completely anonymous. “In other words, Carbin will never know who went where.”

To properly collect the data, the position of the phone must be fixed, that is on a cell-phone mount, in the cup holder, or on the floor. “It cannot be in your hand or in your pocket.

We will discard the data as we recognize those instances,” Louhghalam says. “We use the GPS data to be able to locate where accelerations are being recorded so we are able to show the road conditions on the map later (see http://fixmyroad.us).”

The result, i.e. roughness measurements in the form of international roughness index (IRI), is publicly available to everyone.

“Pavement management systems in Federal and state agencies, as well as municipalities, can use the data provided by Carbin to decide which roads to repair (to save resources) and to bring down the environmental impact.” said Louhghalam. “Fleet companies and drivers can use it to find routes that are less rough to decrease their fuel consumption and damage to their vehicles and the goods they transport.”

Carbin’s multifaceted benefits Louhghalam says better roads are at the core of Carbin goals. ”While individual drivers can make informed decisions, saving fuel for a single driver is not enormous. On the other hand, the accumulated impact is huge. This means that highway agencies and authorities that manage roads are the ones who benefit most from Carbin by including the results in their maintenance

Dr. Arghavan Louhghalam is

decision-making processes to not only save their resources but

the inaugural recipient of the

also minimize the environmental impact of driving,” she says.

College of Engineering Faculty

”The other entity would be Fleet owners and freight companies.

Award for Excellence in Equity,

“The results will help them in route selection to minimize their fuel usage and damage to their vehicles and goods.”

In cities, the quality of pavements can contribute to around

Diversity, and Inclusion. The award recognizes Louhghalam’s

15% of a vehicle’s fuel consumption, which consequently

leadership in fostering a

translates to more greenhouse gas emission, Meshkat Botshekan

learning environment that

says. “Furthermore, users can take an extra index into account to choose their route— roughness of the road— which helps

embodies diversity, equity,

them reduce fuel consumption as well as contribute to a

and inclusion to prepare the

more sustainable environment.” The Carbin app is free and

next generation of culturally

available for download to iOS and Android devices. “Also our team is working on developing Carbin Ghost apps and SDKs to be included in other devices as well,”

competent scientists and engineers.

Louhghalam says.

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2020

Scholarship & award Congratulations to all of our 2020 scholarship

The College of Engineering generously awards

and award recipients. Special thanks to all of our

scholarships to students based on need and

generous donors for their continued support of

merit. Visit our website to learn more about

our students, and to the scholarship committees

the various scholarships and eligibility.

as well as faculty and staff who helped plan and facilitate student success.

Learn more about support at: www.umassd.edu/engineering/student-success

Bioengineering | Dr. Qinguo Fan, Chairperson Harold Bannister Scholarship Recipients: Madison Beaulieu, Kaitlyn Bernier, & Mitchell Pichette Cranston Endowment Fund Scholarship Recipients: Brooke DeSimone, & Ian Sullivan Prof. Edmund J. Dupre Scholarship Recipient: Anna Church Faulkner, Scott C. Scholarship Agency Recipients: Yousuf Shehadi & Okan Canaran Charles W. Fifield, Jr. Co., Inc. Scholarship Recipients: Nicholas Ballirano, Jacqueline Horgan, Yousuf Shehadi, & Rocco Vidaurre Joseph W. Houth Scholarship Recipients: Nicholas Ballirano, Dylan Bryda, & Rocco Vidaurre Michael and Lisa Joyce Scholarship Fund Recipient: Breana Thibodeaux (BNG)

Albert Malick Scholarship Recipients: Okan Canaran & Breana Thibodeaux McCoy Family Endowed Scholarship Recipients: Jacqueline Horgan & Shannon Kennedy William F. Sullivan Memorial Scholarship Recipients: Brooke DeSimone & Arune Vickneswaran Textile Veterans Association Recipients: Allison Leal Student Leadership Award Recipient: Mark DeSimone Outstanding Researcher Award Recipients: Reagan Dasneves, Brooke DeSimone, & Arune Vickneswaran Outstanding Academic Performance Award for Freshman Recipient: Kyle DiNunno BNG Departmental Service Award Recipient: Anna Church

Civil & Environmental Engineering | Dr. Daniel G. MacDonald, Chairperson Bertram Berger Memorial Scholarship Recipient: Shane Almeida

Donald & Sandra Wood Scholarship Recipient: Katherine McCombs

Prof. Allan L. Campbell Civil Engineering Award Recipient: Marco Rocha

John Foster Academic Excellence Award Recipient: Muhammad Shaqeem Rosdi

Computer & Information Science | Dr. Haiping Xu, Chairperson Boleslaw Mikolajczak Memorial Scholarship Endowment Recipient: William Kelley

CIS Faculty Award Recipient: Joshua Carberry

Gerhard Neumann-L. Chang Scholarship Recipient: Nathan LeBlanc

CIS Graduate Faculty Award Recipient: Alvin Thamrin

Howard, Dr. W. John Computer Science Scholarship Recipient: Daniel Mello

CIS Graduate Research Award Recipient: Chetan Kumar

Regina Rheault Scholarship Recipient: Melanie Thibodeau

CIS Departmental Service Award Recipients: Devin Cannistraro, & Liza Sousa

Brian Franconi Smith Memorial Prize Recipient: William Kelley

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Summer 2020 news

Electrical & Computer Engineering | Dr. Antonio H. Costa, Chairperson Professor Lester W. Cory Scholarship Recipient: Marcel Vieira Guimond Family Scholarship in Computer Engineering Recipient: Dylan Tocci Mata Sugni Devi Scholarship Recipient: Alex Amorim Regina Rheault Scholarship Recipient: Jessica Salerno Academic Excellence Award in Computer Engineering/ Electrical Engineering

Recipients: Abigail Rachel Keith, Cameron Scott Whittle, Jacob Brian Aubertine (Transfer Student), & Eric Sean Keefer (Transfer Student) Academic Achievement Award in Computer Engineering/Electrical Engineering Recipient: Joshua Carberry ECE Departmental Service Award Recipients: Olivia Grace de Freitas, Sakiynah Howard Abigail Rachel Keith

Mechanical Engineering | Dr. Wenzhen Huang, Chairperson Ronald DiPippo Excellence in Thermodynamics Prize Recipient: Christopher Meninno

Catlow Family Scholarship Agency Recipient: Alan Andonian

John W. Hansberry, John Memorial Scholarship Recipient: Mohammed Shonar

Academic Excellence Award in Mechanical Engineering Recipients: Samuel Almeida, Christopher Meninno, Peter Nazih Tarabay

Catlow Family Scholarship Recipient: Alan Andonian

Physics | Dr. Jianyi Jay Wang, Chairperson The John Dowd Scholarship Recipient: John Sullivan Prof. George Leung and Alumni Scholarship Recipient: William Holman Robert A. Melendes Memorial Merit Scholarship Recipients: Tyson George, & Jack McDonald

PHY Departmental Service Award Recipients: Alex Correia, Mckenzie Ferrari, & Trevor Robertson Outstanding Senior Award Recipients: Trevor Robertson, & Owen Tower

College of Engineering | Dr. Jean VanderGheynst, Dean John I. Babbitt Scholarship Recipients: Shane Almeida (CEN), & Dylan Tocci (CPE) Henry F. Cygan Endowment Scholarship Recipient: Tabitha Breault (MNE) John A. Freeman Scholarship Recipient: Alan Andonian (MNE) Scott Cory Faulkner Memorial Scholarship Recipients: Nicholas Ballirano (BNG), Okan Canaran (BNG), Jacqueline Horgan (BNG), & Breana Thibodeaux (BNG)

Santos Family Engineering Endowment Scholarship Agency Recipient: Alan Andonian (MNE) Nicholas L. & Ada A. Scarpitti Scholarship Fund Recipient: Ashton Gnoza (MNE) Robert W. Thompson Scholarship Recipient: Matthew Grota (MNE) Turbak Family Scholarship Recipient: Marcel Vieira (CPE)

Howard, Dr. W. John Engineering Scholarship Recipient: Matthew Grota (MNE)

Turbak Family Scholarship Agency Recipient: Marcel Vieira (CPE)

Everett S. Johnson Scholarship Recipient: Kaitlyn Hart (ELE)

Donald Watson Scholarship Recipients: Alex Amorim (ELE), Okan Canaran (BNG), Colin Klaes (ELE), & Dylan Tocci (CPE)

Brenda Karnasiewicz-Freese Scholarship Recipient: Breana Thibodeaux (BNG) Keigher, Gertrude Scholarship Recipient: Katherine McCombs (CEN) Gene and Ruth Mogilnicki Scholarship in Engineering Recipient: Dylan Tocci (CPE) Rego Family Scholarship Agency Recipient: Shanke Almeida (CEN) Santos Family Engineering Endowment Scholarship Recipient: Alan Andonian (MNE)

Dean’s Scholarship Recipient: Joshua Steakelum (ELE/CPE) College of Engineering Student Academic Excellence Award Recipients: Marco Rocha (CEN) & Owen Tower (PHY) College of Engineering Transfer Student Academic Excellence Award Recipient: Blake Simmons (CIS)

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Student Shannon Kennedy ‘23 Women in Engineering Peer Mentoring Program preps first-year students for early career success.

UMassD students are known for pushing boundaries to create breakthroughs that will lead to bright futures. As a first-year student, Pittsfield, MA native Shannon Kennedy ’23 used her drive to pursue an opportunity geared toward guiding women who aspire to become engineers.

“Before starting my education, I rented several

As a result, I do better in my academics than I

books on how to succeed and what to expect in the

would have on my own.”

engineering field. I found that several of the books always referred to the reader or rhetorical figure as male,” Shannon said. “To think, not long ago, a woman in this field was not only rare, but unheard of. While it is still challenging to go against the grain, I am grateful to grow up in a time that generally encourages women to enter male-dominated fields and to have benefited from the many brave females who have already paved the way.”

Shannon also said seeing familiar faces on campus helped her succeed socially. “The Women in Engineering Peer Mentoring Program allowed me to create a bond with other students,” Shannon said. “The bi-weekly activities were competitive and engineering related and built on critical-thinking skills, rethinking ideas, and coming up with better solutions.” Activities such as making balloon powered cars, engaging in straw tower contests, and competing in an engineering-themed

Now entering her sophomore year, Shannon said

version of Jeopardy! enabled Shannon to combine her

being a part of the Women in Engineering Peer

interests in math, science, and engineering with her

Mentoring Program, which is part of a living learning

creative side.

community for first-year engineering students, helped her make connections with other women in engineering.

The program offers high-quality academic and social experiences; promotes achievement, academic engagement, and independence; and empowers students to build strong academic and personal onnections with peers, faculty, and professionals.

The program is led by an engineering resident peer mentor, which Shannon said helped her smoothly transition from high school to college. “My peer mentor, Lexi Lannigan, was always available to help with homework. She also formed study sessions before our important exams, gave us practice problems, and explained topics prior to exams.

“It’s a great way to make friends as you transition from high school to college. You get outside of your residen-

“

tial hall, you have a peer mentor who lives with you, and you meet friends who will most likely be in your classes or the same organizations.”

Shannon chose bioengineering because she likes dealing directly with helping people. “It excites me that I will one day be working on projects that will improve the quality of or even save someone’s life.

I am interested in the satisfaction that will come from knowing that I am positively contributing to the lives of others,” she said. “I am also proud to be a women going into a male-dominated field.

I remind myself I am doing what I love. I have made it this far, and I intend to persevere.”

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Summer 2020 news

Learn more about the program at: umassd.edu/engineering/women-

Abderahmane Naidjate ‘21 Internship with impact for engineering student leader.

“

The Women in Engineering Peer Mentoring Program allowed me to create a bond with other students.

Joining a student organization led Abderahmane Naidjate, a computer engineering major, to a field-related internship with The Boeing Company.

Abderahmane Naidjate is one of

convention.” He also landed an internship

the few individuals who realized

with The Boeing Company, a Fortune 500

his dream very early in life. As a

company, through networking and various

youngster, he disassembled batteryoperated toys to examine the inner workings of the circuits and figure out how the devices worked.

The activities were built

“I was so passionate about computers

on critical-thinking skills,

that I actually saved up all my birthday

rethinking ideas, and

money over the years in order to build my own first computer at the age of 13,”

coming up with better

says the Laghouat, Algeria native who is

solutions.”

majoring in computer engineering.

Shannon Kennedy ‘23 Bioengineering major

-engineers.

skills he gained from actively serving in NSBE. At The Boeing Company in Seattle, WA, Abderahmane worked with flight-test database software and learned technical skills such as JavaScript, SQL, and Nodejs. “I gained experience with a software product development cycle.

I also led the intern team and presented our project/intern report out to upper

Computers were always my escape –

managers and senior vice presidents of

whether it was videogames, coding, or

the flight test sector, and learned how a

reading articles on technology.” Now,

globally renowned company functions,”

he is pursuing his dream of becoming

he says. “I also learned how to network,

an engineer. His strategy is simple. He is

communicate, delegate, lead, craft my

gaining a return on his college investment

resume – the list goes on and on.” As

by supplementing his academic studies

for his future, Abderahmane plans to

with internships and leadership oppor-

develop his own startup company.

tunities within student organizations like

“My ultimate goal is to start a tech

the National Society of Black Engineers

company that I can establish through-

(NSBE). “As President of the NSBE student

out Africa and various communities

chapter, I coordinate professional devel-

to bring new economy and light to

opment workshops for members, and

my beloved continent.”

organize and fundraise for the national

umassd.edu/engineering

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How can we contribute to saving our oceans and coastal areas to ensure environmental sustainability? “Science, innovation, and the exploration of the unknown…” are at the heart of the U.S. Department of Energy’s mission of “Powering the Blue Economy” – the theme of their Marine Energy Collegiate Competition (MECC).

This summer, a team of students from UMass Dartmouth’s College of Engineering and Charlton College of Business helped set the standard for renewable energy in an ocean application during the virtual competition.

The inaugural event challenged 15 teams of undergraduate and graduate students representing colleges from around the globe to come up with innovative marine energy solutions to power the Blue Economy. Students put their creativity and skillsets to the test to develop marine energy solutions for next-generation technologies such as autonomous vehicles to advance ocean exploration, battery and fuel cell technology for marine transportation, desalination to serve coastal and island communities, offshore renewable energy, and alternative fuels.

The UMassD MADWEC concept is a small scale, low cost, low maintenance,and configurable solution for providing ocean power to sensors, underwater vehicles, and other local energy uses. It uses a tethered buoy to create rotation and drive a bank of generators. Shown here, the MADWEC is powering a variety of ocean sensors and satellite communications for data upload.

Students innovate ways

Blue Economy “For students majoring in mechanical engineering, this

Wave Energy Converter. Earlier efforts involved

has overlapped with their senior design capstone project.

the design and modeling of a tethered ballast system

A similar classroom experience is true for the business

to keep the WEC stable in the water column. The 2019-

school involved,” said Daniel MacDonald, professor of

20 MECC team engineering students designed a new power

Civil and Environmental Engineering, who served as team

take off for the ballast system, which is the mechanical

advisor along with Mehdi Raessi, associate professor of

component that actually captures energy and transforms

Mechanical Engineering, and Peter Karlson, adjunct

it into electricity.

professor at the Charlton College of Business.

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In addition, a team of business students have performed

The UMass Dartmouth project builds on earlier work at

marketing research and developed a business plan and

the University focused around the creation of a small-

licensing strategy to bring the technology to the market-

scale wave energy conversion (WEC) device, known as

place. MADWEC 2.0 fills an important niche in the marine

MADWEC 2.0, which stands for Maximal Asymmetric Drag

technology sector, with the capability of providing

Summer 2020 news

low-cost, low-maintenance power for local applications in the ocean, such as powering robotic under-water vehicles, oceanographic sensors, or underwater communication nodes. A source of readily available, low-cost power could transform the ocean landscape and revolutionize the way we manage, do commerce in, and learn about the ocean.

Teams were tasked with creating and presenting market research-supported business plans and conceptual-level design of a marketable device that powers a sector of the blue economy. Project management, communication, and scheduling skills were also tested. “This has been a great opportunity for students to put into practice many examples of “textbook” learning, and apply them to a new and emerging field,” said MacDonald. In addition to getting an in-depth view of an emerging industry, students had the opportunity to network with others across the country and internationally, and learn how to apply their skills to Blue Economy problems.

Competitors also had the chance to interact with the judges and discuss marine energy technologies and Blue Economy opportunities as well as career paths with industry experts. “The opportunity to interact with Department of Energy and National Renewable Energy Laboratory personnel and to be part of the larger community of teams and students representing 15 different institutions has been a valuable experience, realizing that all the teams are facing similar challenges,” said MacDonald. “The Department of Energy benefits by exposing talented young people to the industry, and, hopefully, turning on a lot of bright energetic young minds to solving ocean related energy problems. We are looking forward to continuing next year with

a

a new team.”

UMassD MECC team: Faculty advisors • Daniel MacDonald, Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering • Peter Karlson, Adjunct Professor at the Charlton College of Business • Mehdi Raessi, Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering Student leaders • Gregory Browne ’20, Mechanical Engineering • Sumalee Frank ’20, Management-Leadership Student team members • Christopher Dill ’21, Civil Engineering, MS • Abigail Mangsen ’20, Marketing • Mason Menard ’20, Management-Leadership • Christopher Meninno ’20, Mechanical Engineering • William Michaud ’20, Mechanical Engineering • Ariel St. Germaine ‘21, MBA Marketing • Veronica Szymczak ’20, Marketing • Alexa Van Voorhis ’22, Bioengineering • Nicholas White ’20, Mechanical Engineering

umassd.edu/engineering

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