These are the final works I created for my AHS Capstone project on Character Creation. The characters shown took a lot of time and work to develop and explore. This was a great chance to learn about the process of character design and to make some exciting art.

For the 2024 AHS Capstone year, I decided to create a new medium for storytelling. A story told through short stories, songs, poems, and flash fiction. By combining all of these elements, I'm hoping to capture much more emotion in the story than what could be gained from any of the mediums standalone. The project is designed so that each piece works as a standalone piece and when read together provides a bigger picture to a much deeper story.

2024 AIAA SciTech Conference

This report and reflection outline the experiences, learnings, and development of the Combat Robot Group, a new organization at Olin with the goal of developing combat robots to compete in local leagues

SAG Grant Final Report for research trip for OSSTP researchers Amanda Chang '26, Angela Huang '25, Lilo Heinrich '24, and alum Celvi Lisy '23 to the 2023 AIAA ASCEND Conference in Las Vegas, NV 10/22/23-10/25/23.

SAG Grant final report for Olin Society of Women Engineers (SWE) 2023-24 to go to the WE23 Conference

Two changemaking posters that are designed for Olin's 3D printing space.

The first poster gives a data analysis of some of Olin's 3D printing data from our usage forms to convince students that there is a problem

The second posters gives design considerations and adjustments to making strategies to help students to reduce their impact on the environment and the shop's filament supply

Both posters are 11x17 to be accessible to re-print and mount. These posters were taken to the International Symposium on Academic Makerspaces in 2023 to be presented during the poster session.

Reverse osmosis (RO) is one of several methods for water desalination. Over the years the energy efficiency of these systems have increased greatly and many variants of RO have emerged. The method that provides the most energy efficient system is batch RO. Batch RO provides the ability to recycle the retentate that is produced until it reaches a concentration where it can no longer be used. Additionally, batch RO can keep the pressure and osmotic pressure of the system balanced to prevent the need of external energy recovery devices. One challenge about this system is the supersaturation levels which can occur in the recycled retentate. With a high enough concentration nucleation will begin to occur causing scaling in the membrane reducing system efficiency. In this study, a 15-hour batch cycle is observed to analyze the concentration of calcium sulfate at the membrane, the saturation index of gypsum, and the potential induction times over the trial. After the sixth hour in the trial, a batch developed a concentration at the membrane of about 10 mM higher than any other batch creating a supersaturation solution with an induction time near the length of time the batch ran for. Subsequent batches revealed that each took almost twice as long to complete, suggesting that scaling of the membrane had occurred during the batch with the highest saturation index. These results help explain why: concentration at the membrane, saturation index, and induction times are important metrics to consider to run a batch RO system more efficiently.

In March 2020, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) initiated a processing round calling for additional applications for non-geostationary satellite orbit (NGSO) fixed-satellite service (FSS) operations in Ka-band. Satellite operators submitted descriptions of their planned constellations and provided proof that their systems would comply with interference limits set by the FCC and the International Telecommunications Union (ITU). All ten companies in this processing round provided power flux density (PFD) compliance calculations. Three companies optionally submitted interference-to-noise (I/N) compliance calculations: Telesat, SpaceX, and OneWeb. This paper documents a standardized process to calculate I/N and analyzes I/N compliance for these three companies. I/N analyses consist of static analyses, which considers the worst-case interference scenario, and dynamic analyses, which computes the interference over time. In ITU-R F.1495, the long-term I/N limits are defined to not exceed -10 dB for greater than 20% of the year, requiring dynamic analyses to prove compliance. Static I/N analysis is calculated in this paper, which allows for verification of compliance with the long-term dynamic -10 dB limit in the worst-case scenario. Dynamic I/N analyses are required to verify compliance fully and will be addressed in future work. This study shows that Telesat, OneWeb, and all SpaceX operations at a minimum elevation angle of 25° complied with I/N long-term dynamic limits of -10 dB, but SpaceX operations at altitudes of 360 km and 373 km with a minimum elevation angle of 5° exceeded I/N limits in the worst-case scenario.

Batch reverse osmosis is a unique process that uses standard equipment to recover water from scaling-prone reverse osmosis (RO) concentrate. Batch RO avoids scaling by operating in cycles that are too short for scalants to nucleate. Batch RO can efficiently reduce inland desalination plants’ concentrate disposal costs while recovering potable water. We have demonstrated batch RO at the pilot scale as part of the US Bureau of Reclamation’s More Water Less Concentrate Challenge. The pilot system demonstrated more than 80% water recovery from RO brine for less than 2.5 kWh/m3. By leveraging batch RO’s cyclical operation and demonstrating its efficacy with the Yuma Desalting Plant’s challenging RO brine, we hope to expand the capabilities of RO for low-energy, high-recovery desalination.

Drones are often equipped with shock-absorbing rigid structures intended for landing or absorbing impact of crashes. While the landing gear that manufacturers supply does protect the drone from damage, these rigid structures work best on flat surfaces. We investigate the use of compliant structures inspired by origami for landing gear and bumper systems for drones. Compliant structures absorb more energy than rigid structures and are adaptable to varied terrain. Two of our main goals were to make the designs easy to manufacture/reproduce, and to reduce the weight of the prototypes to minimally affect drone flight performance. The majority of our designs are targeted towards the landing system of the drone. In our investigation, we explore variations of origami folds and how these variations affect damage from compressive impact.

There has been a rise in demand for fish products in the US, leading to the need for more offshore aquaculture farms. These farms have been a source of controversy for many years. While some point to them as sustainable alternatives to land farms, there has been an outcry that aquaculture is bad for the oceanic ecosystem. Despite these arguments, not enough data exist to support either claim, particularly as to how damaging aquaculture is to the underwater environment. In response to this, we are developing a deployable, autonomous aquaculture profiler. The profiler is designed to be handled by two people, and can dive to varied depths, collect data, and return to the surface along a mooring line. It shows promise as a solution to the controversy surrounding fish farms, as it can help in data collection concerning the environmental impact. Additionally, it can act to monitor fish health on established aquaculture sites for more general use.

LiDAR technology can accurately generate a 3D representation of the environment which creates numerous opportunities for improving assistive technology for blind and visually impaired individuals. Unfortunately, LiDAR is expensive and only available in high-end mobile devices, including the iPhone 12 and 13 Pro, making assistive technology inaccessible to the majority of users. Software LiDAR aims to imitate the capabilities of LiDAR by integrating the output of MiDaS, a neural network for depth estimation,and Apple’s ARKit to bridge the gap in technology and make assistive technology more accessible to users. Software LiDAR was created and benchmarked against LiDAR, and found to be fairly accurate, especially after removing failure cases. Moreover, codesigners expressed a desire for using the MiDaS depth data to create object detection, showing its potential in assistive technology and motivating the future development of software LiDAR.

Before the 1950’s, the Air Force believed in the ‘average man’ [4]. The ‘average man’ was believed to be the average in human body data as a way to oversimplify the variability in a population of pilot bodies. This was to simplify the design for a cockpit to fit everyone since it would fit the ‘average man.’ It was only until further investigation by Gilbert Daniels revealed that out of the thousands of Air Force pilots (over 4,000 pilots), no one was average in all dimensions of a pilot. Daniels quoted that “‘the average man’ is a misleading and illusory concept as a basis for design criteria,” illustrating the importance of handling variability in the real world and the consequences of only using a single value (the mean) to represent a distribution [4]. However, this is not the only example of variability negatively affecting the effectiveness of designs, and furthermore, this is not a widely known study. Despite the results of this study, there is a lack of research regarding how engineers handle variability. Many industries rely on single values (like the mean) when doing engineering design work. This flattens real world variability, and opens up the potential to design shortfalls and probability of failure. For example, if an engineer were building a structural system out of an aluminum alloy, they might use a mean strength value of that alloy when doing calculations for the design. Because real world materials have variability, meaning the samples will exhibit a range of different strength value, this design approach could lead to mechanical failure if the sample used in the construction falls below the mean strength used in the design. This is why it is important that engineers are given adequate tools and knowledge on how to approach real world variability. In this study, we conducted interviews with engineers to understand how they approach real world variability. The goal of this study is to better understand how engineers reason under uncertainty, and to provide more baseline research that will help us to better educate engineers on how to approach variability.

Makeup Assist is an iOS app that improves the experience of applying makeup for individuals who are blind or visually impaired. Most efforts in developing assistive technology have concentrated on making necessary tasks more self-reliant. This app strives to create more ways through which blind and visually impaired people can freely express themselves and experience independence beyond just basic tasks. With Apple’s Face Tracking technologies, voice overs capabilities, and Firebase’s cloud database, the Makeup Assist app provides real-time assistance and feedback to achieve just that.

From 2015 to 2021, the FCC held eleven auctions, an unprecedented amount [1]. Analysis and comparison of these auctions provide a unique opportunity to quantify bidding trends and auction results based on metrics like frequency, geographic factors, and population data.

This paper primarily assesses Auction 107 (C-Band) data and compares the findings with those of Auctions 1000 (600 MHz Band), 101 (28 GHz Band), 102 (24 GHz Band), and 103 (Upper 37, 39, and 47 GHz Bands), and 105 (CBRS Band).

This is the Fall '23 SAG application for the Robo Lab: Tractor team

The spaces we live in shape us. Built spaces like cafes, bookstores, or houses are functional, but are also able to carry significance for us, be it cultural, aesthetic, or based on personal experiences. Inspired by the multitude of poetry praising the great outdoors, I wanted to explore praising built spaces through poetry. This paper includes analysis of built-space-based poetry, including some of my own.

I explored many different ceramic techniques including slab-building, coil-building, and wheel throwing. For my final exhibition, I wanted to continue on with a previous final project that I had for Tell the Story that was centered around integrating Asian snack designs into everyday objects.

For my AHS Capstone, I wrote a paper on policy changes that would be necessary in order to promote satellite servicing in space and help promote a more sustainable space environment. This infographic summarizes the technology and policies in the satellite servicing field.

This article is the final version of my 2023 AHS Capstone work. It is a 10 page paper about the ethics of robots especially the ones that are used in the workforce.

The project focused on creating accessible video game designs for individuals who experience limitations in their physical movements. Through research on requirements and existing approaches, this project aims to provide enjoyable gaming designs that are inclusive and accessible to all players, regardless of their physical abilities.