Design Competitions

As an engineer, my role is to solve problems in creative and innovative ways in order to fit a specific set of requirements. As part of my extracurricular activities, I have been taking part in space mission design competitions and workshops. Relevant design competitions, workshops, and projects are listed below in reversed chronological order.

Logo and participating students of ECHO, part of the 2021 NASA RASC-AL Embry-Riddle Team.

  • Faculty Adviser for the Embry-Riddle Multi-Campus NASA RASC-AL 2021 Team: currently advising a team of 26 undergraduate and graduate students from the Embry-Riddle Prescott, Daytona Beach, Worldwide, and Singapore campuses in collaboration with one ERAU Daytona Beach faculty co-adviser to formulate a space mission design to bring innovative and creative ideas to a human surface stay on the dwarf planet, Ceres. The mission is called ECHO: Exploration for Ceres Habitation Operations.

  • Faculty Adviser for the Embry-Riddle Multi-Campus NASA RASC-AL 2020 Team: advised a team of 35 undergraduate and graduate students from the Embry-Riddle Prescott, Daytona Beach, and Worldwide campuses in collaboration with two ERAU Daytona Beach faculty co-advisers to formulate a space mission design to deliver a crew to the surface of Mars for a 30-day period along with searching for life on Mars. The mission name is Martian Environmental and Geological Life Examination (M.E.A.G.L.E.).

Logo of the 2020 NASA RASC-AL Embry-Riddle Team.

  • Worked on NASA's 3D-Printed Habitat Challenge with a Penn State team of engineering and architecture faculty members and graduate students. NASA's 3D-Printed Habitat Challenge is one of NASA's Centennial Challenges. Penn State won 2nd place in Phase 2 and 2nd place in Phase 3 of the competition

Representation of the basic Mars habitat design recalling the Southern Italian "trulli".

ConOps of the Minerva mission design.

  • Worked on Global Trajectory Optimisation Competition (GTOC 9) (organized by the European Space Agency) with a group of 8 graduate students and 1 undergraduate student of the Astrodynamics Research Group of Penn State (ARGoPS): this competition took place from April, 3 2017 to May, 1 2017. The Global Trajectory Optimization Competition is an event taking place every one-two years over roughly one month during which the best aerospace engineers and mathematicians world wide challenge themselves to solve a “nearly-impossible” problem of interplanetary trajectory design. The 9th edition of GTOC proposed a scenario known as the Kessler effect, in which the density of orbital debris in Low-Earth Orbit becomes so high that any collision triggers additional cascading collisions. Teams were tasked with removing a set of 123 pieces of debris from a sun-synchronous orbit with a goal of minimizing launch mass and submission time. ARGoPS placed 23rd out of over 70 teams internationally, 7th out of all US teams, and 1st out of the US teams consisting solely of students.

Summary of the optimization process utilized in GTOC 9.

  • Winner of the AIAA Phobos Base Competition; worked with a team of 10 graduate students on the design of a crewed interplanetary platform on Phobos, Mars' biggest moon, that would function as a "gateway" to cis-Martian space and beyond.

Representation of the Phobos Base design.

IMaGInE Mission Team Picture, winners of NASA RASC-AL 2016, June 2016

Mission Animation below

IMaGInE_Final_Video.mp4

  • Winner in NASA Revolutionary Aerospace Systems Concepts - Academic Linkage 2016 (RASC-AL 2016) (Cocoa Beach, FL)

      • Led a team of 15 graduate students from 8 countries and 11 different universities to derive an architecture that delivers a crew of four to the surface of the Martian Moons for 340 days and lay out a series of Mars moons surface excursions driven by science, technology demonstration, ISRU and possible future human exploration site reconnaissance on Mars. Presented in June, 2016 at the NASA RASC-AL 2016 Forum in Cocoa Beach, FL and won the following awards:

HECATE Team, winners of the ESA Moon Challenge 2015, December 2015

ConOps of the Mars flyby mission.

Spacecraft diagram of NEXUS, the Next EXploration Universal Station.

  • Finalist in Space Station Design Workshop 2015 (Stuttgart, Germany)

      • Participated in a week-long competition to design a modular, extensible, and sustainable space station in cis-lunar space to conduct unique research, support current and future robotic and human planetary exploration, and provide a platform for international cooperation and commercial development. The final presentation was streamed live from Stuttgart, Germany.

ConOps of the Explorer Team in the Caltech Space Challenge.

Spacecraft diagram of one of the main vehicles in Martian Lion, RASC-AL 2013's design.

  • Finalist in Revolutionary Aerospace Systems Concepts - Academic Linkage 2013 (RASC-AL 2013) (Cocoa Beach, FL)

      • Worked as the leader of a team-based mission proposal for a Human-Focused Mars Mission for the 2013 RASC-AL competition sponsored by NASA; presented an innovative mission design for future human exploration of Mars through written report, presentation, poster, and a series of outreach events to Pennsylvania grade schools and Boy Scout groups.

  • PSU Zephyrus for the Kremer Prize Competition (Lecture and Laboratory, 7 semesters: 2010-2013)

      • Worked in teams for the design, fabrication, and integration of the PSU Zephyrus, a full-scale, 22.5-meter wing span composite-made Human Powered Aircraft designed to compete in the Kremer Prize Competition; worked on wing, fuselage, propulsion system, connections; successfully tested and flew.

First flight of the PSU Zephyrus.

Headband with support structure (cognionics.com)

  • Epilepsy Sensor System (Spring 2014)

      • Worked with doctors at the Hershey Medical Center and a team of graduate students to design a portable electroencephalogram (EEG) device that patients can wear during their typical daily life.

3D CAD model of potential electrode support structure for sleeping

More Pictures

IMaGInE Mission 2016 RASC-AL Forum participants, receiving the "Best Overall," "Best in Theme," and the "PEACH" awards, June 2016

IMaGInE Mission 2016 RASC-AL Forum participants, poster session, June 2016

Astrodynamics Research Group of Penn State (ARGoPS) Team working on GTOC 9