At the Texas A&M University Engineering Project Showcase, held on April 25 in Reed Arena on campus, more than 150 student engineering teams composed of over 600 undergraduates exhibited their projects from Senior Capstone Design courses.
Tied for first place and representing the Department of Computer Science and Engineering in the Departmental Capstone Design Projects category were the CPSC team, capstone project Spiral, and the CECN team, capstone project sDANS. Each team received a plaque and Certificate of Merit for their achievement.
Spiral team members are Ruiz Akpan, Stephen Chen and Stephen Ten Eyck, under the supervision of the CSE Sketch Recognition Lab Director Dr. Tracy Hammond and Teaching Assistant Paul Teale. Spiral is a revisualization of the modern calender and is "inspired by future concept visions that are occasionally released by Corning, Microsoft, and other groups," said the three Spiral designers.
Jonathan Harrison, Austin Dalton, Trenton Jones and Zachary L'Anglois comprise the sDANS team. The team, under the supervision of Dr. Ricardo Gutierrez-Osuna, director of the CSE PSI (Perception, Sensing, Instrumentation) Lab, and Teaching Assistant Joseph Lee, were inspired by a project idea from Dr. Jinsil Hwaryoung Seo, an assistant professor in the Department of Visualization at Texas A&M. Dr. Seo wanted "a robotic dance partner for a live performance. The team developed a spheric robot (hence the 's' in the name)," said Dr. Gutierrez-Osuna."
In the General category, students from the Engineering Projects in Community Service class, which is a multidisciplinary class open to undergraduates in all engineering majors, took the second place ($500) award. Team members are Chokote Kamdeu (mechanical engineering), Jeremy Cantu (computer science), Janice Rosado (computer engineering) and Melissa McNeil (computer science). They won with their project, Communications Network in Remote Areas. The team was mentored by Dr. Richard Furuta, CSE professor and director of both the Center for the Study of Digital Libraries and the Hypermedia Research Laboratory, and Rodney Boehm, COO for Ground Force Building Systems and industry mentor for the Engineering Academic and Student Affairs program.