houck2040/tees huggingface dataset:
as a result of the work the coastrr team conducts future coastal management decisions will be improved through a more detailed understanding of how storms reshape our coastal barrier island systems the information will also be incorporated into classroom teaching ongoing outreach activities and publications to the research community research on extreme event impacts to the nearshore environment is paramount to the creation of more resilient coastal communities figlus said the conducted field measurements provide a unique dataset of great societal importance as our coastlines will continue to face increased pressure from natural disasters and human development while the coastrr teams work is still ongoing it has the potential to help communities rebuild stronger than ever not only along the texas coast but coastal communities around the world by better predicting the potential damage of a storm before it makes landfall
gordan england former us deputy secretary of defense and secretary of the navy recently visited texas a&m university to give a lecture on ethics and the principles of leadership to engineering students in the department of engineering technology and industrial distribution england served in the george w bush administration from 2003-09 he received a bachelors degree in electrical engineering from the university of maryland college park in 1961 and a master of business administration from texas christian university in 1975 in addition to his government service england had a very successful career as an electrical engineer he started out working on the project gemini space program with honeywell in 1966 and later served as executive vice president of general dynamics as well as president of lockheed fort worth co
england provided insightful anecdotes spanning his career in business and government on defining leadership best leadership practices and leading technical teams effectively the most important lesson england stressed is understanding that leadership is based on strong moral character and a consistent set of ethics such as the aggie core values you cannot be a leader unless you are ethical said england you have to be ethical all the time not just at work you have to make that the touchstone of your life; otherwise you are not going to be successful england went on to share his personal code of honors: never embarrass your mother and be forthright honest and direct with everyone in every circumstance he also shared his 15 principles of leadership highlights from his list include providing an environment for every person to excel; improving effectiveness to gain efficiency; encouraging constructive criticism; and being forthright honest and direct with every person in every circumstance at the conclusion of englands lecture dr ben zoghi electronic systems engineering technology (eset) faculty and professor of the engineering leadership class facilitated an in-depth q&a with the students and england
students in the zachry leadership program in the texas a&m university college of engineering engage with a wide variety of extraordinary leaders from industry academia and government who have made positive impacts on the world through these engagements the students learn more their own possibilities and opportunities to influence others for the better regardless of the career they pursue seniors in the program recently had the opportunity to have an extended conversation with texas railroad commissioner ryan sitton sitton class of 97 with a bachelors degree in mechanical engineering at texas a&m started pinnacleart with his wife jennifer in 2006 the engineering and technology company focuses on reliability and integrity programs for the oil gas petrochemical mining pharmaceutical and wastewater industries as a project that sitton started from the ground up the company now employs more than 700 people across four continents he told the students his goal is to find ways to impact the world around him which can be difficult because making an impact involves taking risks and being creative outside of owning his own business sitton also serves as the texas railroad commissioner a position he has held since 2014 the railroad commission is the energy regulator for the state and sitton is the first engineer to serve as railroad commissioner in 50 years one element students asked him to discuss was communication as a society we are getting worse at communication sitton said people think it is about being a good speaker it is about articulating your ideas well that is not what communication is thats why we have the term public speaker communication is about connection connection is not about my ability to talk its about my ability to hear he encouraged students from the zachry leadership program to take the knowledge they acquire while at texas a&m and in the zachry leadership program with them and turn it into skills that will help them become leaders in whatever path they choose moving forward the zachry leadership program is currently accepting applications for its next cohort to qualify students must be enrolled in the college of engineering and not be planning to graduate before may 2021 accepted students will attend leadership retreats enroll in exclusive classes designed to expand their leadership capabilities earn a certificate in holistic leadership and receive a scholarship each semester
two graduate students from the texas a&m university college of engineering received the us senator phil gramm doctoral fellowship award for scholarly excellence the awards each for $5 000 will support the research efforts of the students as they pursue their doctoral degrees madeleine s durkee from the department of biomedical engineering and nazanin afsar kazerooni from the department of mechanical engineering were among a group of eight students to receive the award during a ceremony in april that featured a three-minute presentation by the recipients highlighting their academic work durkee whose advisor is dr kristen c maitland associate professor in the biomedical engineering department presented her research on improving detection of pathogenic bacteria specifically mycobacterium tuberculosis in a living host she works with an optical method to detect viable bacteria in a small animal model of disease the bulk of her research has been developing a model of light transport within a host to determine what limits the number of bacteria that can be detected then attempting to improve the optical system to overcome these limitations this will eventually lead to more sensitive detection of bacteria and a better diagnostic she is also deeply involved in teaching undergraduate courses and research which has led her to pursue a career path in academia
i am very honored to receive the phil gramm award durkee said i have dedicated the past five years to teaching and academic research and to be formally recognized for those efforts is very exciting kazerooni whose advisor is dr arun srinivasa the holdredge/paul professor in the mechanical engineering department presented her research on the inelastic behavior of soft tissues especially skin and damages that happen for a better understating of wearable electronics skin diseases aging and wrinkling etc she has designed and built an intricate biaxial tension setup and has been instrumental in repairing a precise laser cutter system she has also worked in a co-op program with st jude medical (aka abbott) for five months on developing antimicrobial meshes and material testing for the next generation of cardiac implantable electronic devices in addition to her contributions to research she has been the instructor of record twice teaching two courses in the department of mechanical engineering as the winner of the graduate teaching fellowship i am deeply grateful and honored to receive this award from senator phil gramm kazerooni said i feel thrilled and overjoyed that my work has been recognized as well as its potential to help people the fellowships are named for phil gramm who served as an economics professor at texas a&m for 12 years before embarking on a highly successful political career
nuclear forensics involves using analytical techniques to determine the origin and history of nuclear materials in particular those that have been intercepted from smuggling operations or recovered following a nuclear explosion according to jeremy osborn a nuclear engineering phd student working with the texas a&m engineering experiment stations center for nuclear security science and policy initiatives (nsspi) the growing concern regarding nuclear terrorism has heightened the need to develop nuclear forensics analysis techniques that allow nuclear material source attribution and thereby strengthen nuclear deterrence
osborn is part of a team of researchers at nsspi who have been working on a project to develop new methods to determine the reactor origins of weapons-grade plutonium dr sunil chirayath director of nsspi has led this seven-year project which was funded by the us department of homeland securitys domestic nuclear detection office under an academic research initiative (dndo-ari) grant in conjunction with dr charles m folden iii of the cyclotron institute this project has brought a much-needed nuclear forensics capability to nsspi and has led to the training of many graduate students in this crucial field this year osborn and fellow phd student paul mendoza will be the latest students to earn their doctorates through this project which has already generated three masters degrees another phd and research experience for three undergraduates up to now pre-detonation nuclear forensics for chemically separated weapons-grade plutonium has been limited to estimating the time since last chemical separation mendoza said this project provides a means and methodology developed and tested for determining much more much more includes determining characteristics of the material in question like the reactor type irradiation history burnup and scalar neutron flux magnitude the material saw in the reactor this information could help pinpoint the origins of the material which mendoza notes would be important in a national security context if such a material were to be interdicted from a us adversary
the researchers used a radiochemistry technique utilizing plutonium uranium oxidation-reduction (redox) extraction to separate the plutonium from the trace elements in spent nuclear fuel nsspi has developed the first capability for bench-scale plutonium uranium redox extraction (purex) reprocessing of plutonium at a us university they used a gaussian maximum-likelihood reactor-type discrimination process for the forensics methodology development osborn and mendoza built on the work of past nsspi graduates to investigate two different methods for discriminating the separated plutonium from various reactor-types using the forensics methodology developed as part of this dndo project mendozas project focused on forensics methodology that uses destructive analysis to investigate the trace contaminants in plutonium recovered using the purex process which could give clues to the conditions under which the plutonium was produced osborn developed a non-destructive forensics technique based on using intra-element isotope ratios to determine the reactor type both methodologies were verified through both experimental and computational means mendoza graduated with a bachelor of science degree in nuclear engineering from biola university he successfully defended his dissertation in october of 2017 and will be receiving his phd in may 2018 he currently works as a postdoctoral researcher at los alamos national laboratory osborn has both a bachelor of science degree and a master of science degree in nuclear engineering from texas a&m and is planning to defend his dissertation and graduate in august 2018 for more information on this project visit nsspis website
networks have been widely used to represent real-world information systems such as social media networks or a healthcare provider network traditional network data often operates without human input until now in a traditional data-driven network-embedding framework only network analytics algorithms are considered they are purely data driven meaning that the algorithms do not take into consideration any human prior knowledge that may be helpful in many situations
how do you compete in supercomputing the students on the texas a&m university supercomputing team know thats going to be the first question before its even asked build run optimize said dr jian tao advisor for the team and texas a&m engineering experiment station researcher you build the computer you run programs on it and then you optimize the performance theyre simple words but the competition is anything but over 300 student teams from around the world entered the asia supercomputer communitys student supercomputer challenge (asc18) but only 20 made the cut to the finals to be held in may in china texas a&ms group is not only the lone team from the united states to make the finals its the only team from the entire western hemisphere and it almost didnt happen instead of just trying to form an extra-curricular team tao was encouraged by the engineering academic and student affairs office to create an aggie-challenge course for the competition aggie-challenge courses give students the opportunity to work on projects related to engineering challenges facing our society in this case the challenge is building efficient high-performance computers working against the clock tao was able to get the course approved during the middle of the last week where students can add and drop classes i wasnt sure we would even be able to get anyone but they were able to announce the class and some students were interested he said we didnt even have a room yet we had to figure out where the best time and place to meet would be after everyone had already signed up four students will travel to china but there are nine on the team theyre a mix of underclassmen and upperclassmen coming from multiple departments within the texas a&m college of engineering like any team figuring out each others strengths and weaknesses was one of the major challenges early on we have members with different engineering backgrounds and skill levels said freshman michael lau two of us are freshmen so were learning some things we wouldnt have learned for a couple of years otherwise so thats been cool also to see how everyone fits together on the team
students in the aggie women in computer science (awics) organization at texas a&m university hosted the ninth annual awics leadership workshop on friday april 6 at the event sponsored by chevron female leaders from academia and industry participated in two panels as well as a lunch with activities and discussion the panels centered on leadership and how to make an impact in the workplace
one of the most important components of a successful career is about interacting with colleagues said diane uwacu awics graduate president as women training for a career in tech it is important to hear from women in leadership we learned about how we can prepare for leadership roles while in college as well as the kind of impact that we can have my favorite part of the event was hearing guests answer questions with examples from their personal stories apart from the incredibly inspiring success stories they shared about the hard times in their journey which showed us that failures make for better success stories in the long run panelists included tammy mcneley ‘84 lockheed martin aeronautics fellow; dr theodora chaspari computer science and engineering assistant professor; and dr dilma da silva department head professor holder of the ford motor company design professorship ii and interim deputy director of the texas a&m institute of data science dr nancy m amato regents and unocal professor served as the moderator mcneley serves as chief engineer of the lockheed martin aeronautics warfare integration laboratories including f-35 and advanced development program facilities and as the corporate modeling and simulation lead for next generation platform initiatives she has 35 years of experience in military operations analysis human-in- the-loop experimentation and modeling and simulation she is also certified as an expert systems engineering professional by the international council on systems engineering mcneley is one of three female fellows at lockheed martin aeronautics and is very involved in stem activities in schools and through girls inc she earned her bachelor of science degree in computer science from texas a&m in 1984 through mentoring workshops students have the opportunity to identify areas in which they can be leaders here and now da silva said as they continue to grow in technical knowledge through their courses they can also strive to make their workplace better by learning from those who can offer invaluable leadership experience
dr juan garay professor in the department of computer science and engineering at texas a&m university was named a fellow of the international association for cryptologic research (iacr) for his fundamental contributions to the interface of cryptography and distributed computing and for service to the cryptographic research community garays research focus is cryptographic protocols and schemes which play a fundamental role in enabling new functionalities and privacy-preserving ways of interaction in todays digital world recently garay has greatly contributed to the continuous research on the subject of blockchain protocols and cryptocurrencies for this distinction technical contributions and distinguished service to the cryptologic community are considered iacr has established the fellows program to recognize outstanding iacr members for their technical and professional contributions that advance the science technology and practice of cryptology and related fields; promote the free exchange of ideas and information about cryptology and related fields; develop and maintain the professional skill and integrity of individuals in the cryptologic community; and advance the standing of the cryptologic community in the wider scientific and technical world and promote fruitful relationships between the iacr and other scientific and technical organizations the iacr fellows program was established in 2004 and as of today around 70 cryptographers world-wide have been elevated to fellows this is an awesome – and at the same time humbling – honor which i would like to share with my large number of amazingly talented collaborators garay said
the center for robot-assisted search and rescue (crasar) received the emergency management association of texas (emat) emergency management technology and innovation award at the 11th annual emat leadership symposium last week crasar received the award for the 100-plus flights they conducted with their small unmanned aircraft system during hurricane harvey the award is presented to local or regional-level emergency management programs in texas that developed and implemented a technology product project or innovation in texas during the previous calendar year (2017) that was developed at the local or regional level; was successfully implemented and tested during an exercise special event or emergency circumstance; and can be replicated at little or no cost by other local or regional programs
dr robin murphy raytheon professor in the department of computer science and engineering at texas a&m university director of the humanitarian robotics and ai laboratory and vice president of crasar said she was pleased with the award to be recognized by emergency professionals is so rewarding we believe that helping them use and adopt the technology they need will transform disaster response murphy said in a year with major flooding and then hurricane harvey with so many agencies are responding it is amazing to be singled out for an award" the purpose of the emat annual awards program is to recognize the achievements and hard work of the individuals organizations and jurisdictions that have made exceptional efforts to further the field of emergency management and to ensure a whole community approach to preventing preparing for mitigating against responding to and recovering from disasters crasar serves as crisis response and research organization that strives to direct and exploit new technology development in robotics and unmanned systems for humanitarian purposes worldwide crasars mission is to serve existing rescue organizations by providing deployable robot-assisted search and rescue teams while fostering research into sar-specific robot systems and educating the public murphy is an ieee fellow a ted speaker and a founder of roboticists without borders she has worked in disaster robotics research and deployment since 1995 and has deployed ground air and marine robots in disasters worldwide
human stem cells have shown potential in medicine as they can transform into various specialized cell types such as bone and cartilage cells the current approach to obtain such specialized cells is to subject stem cells to specialized instructive protein molecules known as growth factors however use of growth factors in the human body can generate harmful effects including unwanted tissue growth such as a tumor researchers at texas a&m university have explored a new class of clay nanoparticles that can direct stem cells to become bone or cartilage cells dr akhilesh gaharwar an assistant professor in the department of biomedical engineering and his students have demonstrated that a specific type of two-dimensional (2-d) nanoparticles also known as nanosilicates can grow bone and cartilage tissue from stem cells in the absence of growth factors these nanoparticles are similar to flaxseed in shape but 10 million times smaller in size their work widespread changes in transcriptome profile of human mesenchymal stem cells induced by two-dimensional nanosilicates has been published in proceedings of the national academy of sciences this week two-dimensional nanomaterials have gained increasing popularity over a variety of fields such as energy optics and regenerative engineering due to their extremely small size and unique shape these nanoparticles consist of highly organized atomic layers made from minerals the minerals are abundantly present within the human body and help in some vital functions
to understand how these nanoparticles interact with stem cells we utilized a next-generation sequencing technique called rna-seq said irtisha singh a computational biologist from weill cornell medicine at cornell university and the corresponding author rna-seq takes a snapshot of gene activity of the cell at any given moment this is similar to taking a high-resolution photo during the super bowl and identifying the reaction of every fan during the touchdown rna-seq uses next-generation sequencing (ngs) to reveal the presence and quantity of rna in a biological sample at a given moment for example cell-nanoparticle interactions can result in significant change in cellular behavior that can be observed by using this technique
this technique is very sensitive to investigate the interaction of a wide variety of nanomaterials with cells said jake carrow a doctoral candidate in gaharwars lab and co-first author of the study with this combination of nanotechnology and computational biology we can better understand how a materials chemistry shape and size can contribute to cell functions from this study nanosilicates demonstrated some very interesting capabilities when applied to adult human stem cells these cells presented signaling typically observed during regeneration of bone and cartilage this indicates a great deal of potential for these nanoparticles as a possible therapy against osteoarthritis among other orthopedic injuries this cellular response is believed to originate from the unique physical and chemical composition of the nanoparticles this premise of mineral-based particles affecting cell behavior has opened the doors to the development of new class of therapies
the ability to customize a therapy to a specific tissue simply by changing the mineral content within the nanoparticle presents a great potential within the field of regenerative engineering said lauren cross also co-first author on the publication we believe this new field of ‘mineralomics can provide a viable alternative compared to the current treatments existing today another collaborator on this research was dr carl gregory an associate professor in the institute for regenerative medicine at the texas a&m college of medicine a component of the texas a&m university health science center who studies stem cells this work represents an excellent example of the long-standing interdisciplinary collaborations between the health science center and engineering he said one way to foster innovation is to bring together investigators with shared interests but substantially different research approaches life science-engineering collaborations are powerful in this respect because they encourage investigators to reassess dogmatic approaches that frequently slow progress this research is funded by the national institute of biomedical imaging and bioengineering the gaharwar lab targets cell-biomaterial interactions across multiple biological scales his group is specifically interested in the repair and regeneration of biological tissues through the use of nanoengineered biomaterials see more details at inspired nanomaterials and tissue engineering laboratory
technology advancement is changing the disability landscape as demonstrated by the 10 student teams at aggies invent for assistive technology this past weekend the 58 participating students were challenged to improve the lives of the more than 57 million americans who have some form of disability by developing a technological solution to one of the 16 need statements of the competition this aggies invent had students from 18 different majors and ranged from freshmen to graduate students across campus with advancing technology comes new opportunities to address the needs of the larger population said rodney boehm director of the engineering entrepreneurship program advances like artificial intelligence and text to speech are evolving so rapidly we take these cutting-edge technologies and apply them to those who live every day with disabilities aggies invent an intensive design experience offered at the texas a&m engineering innovation center at texas a&m university provides an environment made to inspire and support entrepreneurship and innovative thinking students have 48 hours to generate a solution to need statements presented at each aggies invent competition each event has a completely different theme keeping the students ready for a challenge the solutions presented ranged from translating sign language to text increasing real-time captioning efficiency and lowering cost affordable hands-free technology to unlock and open residential doors and supportive technology for those on the autism spectrum
credited with acquiring the legislative funding needed for the texas a&m university systems center for infrastructure renewal (cir) texas lieutenant governor dan patrick was the special guest for the centers ribbon-cutting ceremony held on the rellis campus april 11 the 138 000-square-foot multidisciplinary research center boasts state-of-the-art research facilities and laboratories aimed at making infrastructure smarter more resilient and longer lasting ground was broken for the $80 million project 17 months ago at this particular time in history infrastructure is a part of the national conversation greg winfree agency director of the texas a&m transportation institute (tti) told the crowd gathered for the ceremony its never been more important to our state and to our country
the center is a joint facility operated by tti and the texas a&m engineering experiment station (tees) that will leverage the strengths of numerous engineering professionals to develop research-based solutions to engineering and transportation challenges imagine roads being paved with new materials that instantly harden so roads reopen immediately afterward a&m system chancellor john sharp said highlighting some of the expected products of the center new ways to use asphalt that will pay for this place 50 times over bridges that have sensors that self-report when they weaken and need replacing and homes and businesses that are flood- and wind-proof just imagine what this facility is going to be prior to the ceremony sharp patrick vice chancellor and dean of engineering and tees director m katherine banks and several other elected officials who had critical roles in the conceptualization funding support and construction of the center toured its newly opened laboratories the cir is designed to renew every public-critical infrastructure systemfrom transportation to nuclear reactors to water systems this is a one-of-a-kind coordinated cross-disciplinary effort to focus on improving the nations infrastructure for the long term sharp introduced patrick telling the crowd that the cir absolutely would not have happened without him after walking through here i know this is an investment thats going to pay great dividends to the university other universities to the country to the state of texas patrick said from the podium its going to make infrastructure more efficient more affordable and safer for us
texas governor greg abbott signed a proclamation that was presented to sharp by tommy williams senior advisor for fiscal affairs for the governor recognizing the cir ribbon cutting ceremony charles schwartz chairman of the a&m system board of regents gave attendees an overview of the new campus a few years ago rellis existed only as an idea in the mind of john sharp schwartz stated in a few short years weve seen an amazing development on these 2 000 acres cir will be a place where well deliver the kind of professional workforce development training that we need in this state well see big things from these laboratories and the people of the state of texas will benefit from them other members of the stage party included: texas senator paul bettencourt of houston; texas representative john raney of bryan/college station; texas representative paul workman of austin; texas a&m university president michael young; banks; and zachary grasley cir director
education has the potential to impact lives an impact that is usually made by a good teacher few teachers however have impacted their students like dr jean-louis briaud distinguished professor spencer j buchanan chair professor and regents fellow in the zachry department of civil engineering at texas a&m university and the director of the national geotechnical experimentation site
in honor of briauds 40 years of teaching and research he was recognized at the geo-institute of the american society of civil engineers (asce) annual congress in early march 2018 at a special symposium held in his honor briaud has also been named a geo-legend by geo-strata magazine a series honoring professionals who have left a significant impact on the field of geotechnical engineering more than 20 speakers presented at the asce symposium on work they have done in the field of geotechnical engineering based on briauds work it didnt really dawn on me until i had two students that got up there and said that i had changed their [lives] because of my teaching briaud said it raises this concept that professors have the potential to change young peoples lives but it is a big responsibility that i did not see the full weight of until now the symposium included researchers from korea brazil egypt and russia who each gave presentations on their work based on foundations laid by briauds work and influence more than 180 colleagues attended the symposium to have a special limited copy of a book reflecting briauds lifes work all of which began at texas a&m in 1978 born and educated in france briaud received his masters and doctoral degrees in canada and eventually came to the united states to pursue a teaching career briaud fondly remembers getting off the plane at easterwood airport in a suit and tie to interview for a teaching position only to be greeted by a professor in a ten-gallon cowboy hat driving a pickup truck the environment at texas a&m was not at all what he had expected i remember thinking to myself: ‘what kind of place is this briaud said then i met the people kind interested and ready to help with a can-do attitude i had six job offers but i chose texas a&m because of the environment and the people here reflecting on the highlights of his career one contribution served to preserve a piece of aggie history: the cliffs at pointe du hoc made famous by the assault of james earl rudder and his men during the normandy invasion we worked on a fantastic project to save the cliffs from collapse because there was erosion at the bottom of the cliffs and we were about to lose the bunker that was overtaken by rudder and his men briaud said it was one of the most interesting and significant projects i ever worked on briaud remembers a long list of similar projects and research contributions over his lifetime but maintains that his greatest contribution has been the relationships he has built over the years with his students as briaud plans to continue teaching and serving as a mentor and guide to students he finds that educating others has given him a career of immense purpose and satisfaction i have always looked at my graduate students as my professional children briaud said you have discussions that are technical sure but you talk about family philosophy and all sorts of things it really hit me during these presentations that as a professor you really have an impact on young peoples lives and it is beyond what you can measure
when browsing the web it is vital to have peace of mind that your data has not been stolen or corrupted by a virus or a malicious site researchers understand the severity of situations where data is compromised and have worked for many years to come up with a way to block impending attacks dr jeff huang assistant professor in the department of computer science and engineering at texas a&m university has proposed a new technique that can detect use-after-free (uaf) bugs in web browsers with a higher detection ability than the state-of-the-art techniques currently being used uaf is a class of memory errors in computer programs written in unsafe languages such as c/c++ uaf errors occur when a program continues to use a pointer after it has been freed depending on the timing of the vulnerability or flaw the use of previously freed memory can have any number of adverse consequences ranging from the corruption of valid data to the execution of arbitrary code which is when the attacker can execute any command of choice on a target machine uafs have been one of most exploited memory errors in web browsers such as chrome many zero-day cyberattacks which occur when a flaw is exploited and attackers release malware before a developer has an opportunity to create a patch to fix the vulnerability have also been launched through uafs huang was awarded the prestigious google faculty research award for this work the google faculty research awards program supports academic research in computer science engineering and related fields through the program google funds world-class research at top universities facilitates interaction between google and academia and supports projects whose output will be made openly available to the research community this project is one of the 152 considered by google during its 2017 call for research project proposals chosen from a total of 1033 covering 46 countries and over 360 universities what excites me most about this project is its practical impact huang said web browsers such as chrome are used by billions of people this project will make browsers more secure by killing more uafs huang is working on this project with his students in the automated software engineering research (aser) group in the parasol laboratory at texas a&m this is the second google faculty research award he has received among huangs many honors are a 2016 national science foundation career award a 2015 google faculty research award the 2013 association for computing machinery sigsoft outstanding dissertation award and a 2013 acm sigplan pldi distinguished paper award which was also recognized as acm sigplan research highlights
lisa bratton has always loved being outdoors and jumping in the water marrying these two passions in college has proven to be the ultimate success story i was an extremely active child so my favorite childhood memory would have to be any time spent playing outdoors bratton said whether that was with friends playing catch with my dad playing with sandy our dog or simply entertaining myself
bratton a senior in the department of ocean engineering at texas a&m university is also the captain and a member of the womens swim team all the males in my family are civil engineers--my dad his dad my moms dad--so ive always been drawn to engineering but i wanted to do something a little different bratton said when i learned about ocean engineering it sounded like the perfect way to apply civil engineering in a different environment and to top it off i truly do love the water pursuing a degree in engineering while juggling the demands of being a student athlete may be daunting enough but tack on training for the olympic trials and holding the school records for the 200 backstroke 400 medley relay and being the 2016 sec champion and the questions arise of how she handles the demands of each however the most recent honor came in 2018 when she was named the sec female scholar athlete of the year this award keeps me focused and reminds me of the balance needed to succeed bratton said sometimes you have to be a student-athlete and sometimes you have to be an athlete-student in the end it all works out if you just keep your head down do the work and trust the process the journey hasnt always been easy bratton is most proud of the way she has learned to balance school and swimming i set high standards for myself and my first semester was rough bratton said ive come a long way im proud of all the hard work i have put in to be where i am today
bratton acknowledges that she could not have achieved these accomplishments without support from her family and team but most importantly her dad he has helped me work out many homework problems showed me the value of hard work and what it means to do what you love and love what you do bratton said my dad after taking many years off continues to swim simply because he enjoys it he worked hard at his job because he knew thats what it takes and he always found time for family time i learned the value of balance hard work and finding the fun in what you do by watching my dad the greatest honor she has received to date was being named captain of the swim team
this team works extremely hard day in and day out in the pool and in the classroom it is an honor that they see me in a position to lead them and im proud to compete side-by-side with them bratton said while she is still searching for her dream job bratton knows she was meant to be around the water im still trying to figure out what i want to do but ideally i would like to work with renewable energy resources or coastal environments bratton said in a perfect world if i could make a living swimming that may take the cake bratton encourages those looking to journey upon similar paths to go for whatever it is no matter how difficult it may seem going into college everyone asked ‘how are you going to do it engineering and swimming bratton said i knew it wasnt going to be easy but i knew i wanted to do it if it was easy it wouldnt be any fun! so enjoy the process dont get too bogged down with school and take some time for yourself – i promise there is time
dr jean-briac le graverend assistant professor in the department of aerospace engineering has been awarded the von humboldt research fellowship one of the most prestigious awards in germany from the alexander von humboldt foundation le graverend joined the department in 2014 after receiving a doctoral degree in materials science and engineering/aerospace from the national school of mechanics and aeronautics (poitiers france)/national office for studies and aerospace research (chatillon france) in 2013 and working as a postdoctoral scholar at caltech in the aerospace department le graverend whose research goals are to predict the mechanical behavior and lifetime of materials at high temperature by means of a multi-scale approach combining experimental theoretical and computational tools will spend the next three summers in bochum germany working with dr gunther eggeler and studying microstructure degradation and damage in high-temperature materials the ultimate goal of this project combining experimental theoretical and computational mechanics is to initiate a new approach in the field of viscoplastic damage in metals in particular superalloys and precipitation-hardening metals he will do this by gaining knowledge in how microstructural degradation affects the kinetics of damage and therefore the mechanical response and lifetime to do so the proposed research will examine the thermo-mechanical response of a ni-based alloy at multiple length scales the humboldt foundation was established in 1953 to foster an international network of scientific cooperation and trust the fellowship enables highly-qualified postdoctoral scientists and scholars from around the world to carry out research projects of their own choice in germany
dr jaime grunlan the linda & ralph schmidt 68 professor in the department of mechanical engineering has been named a fellow of the american society of mechanical engineers (asme) an asme fellow grade is conferred upon worthy candidates to recognize their outstanding engineering achievements fewer than 3 percent of all asme members are fellows im very honored to be named an asme fellow grunlan said achieving the fellow grade in any major professional society is a significant accomplishment it serves to legitimize my professional efforts as a professor and scientist grunlans polymer nanocomposites laboratory is focused on the development and understanding of multifunctional thin films grunlan recently completed pilot coating trials of food packaging film with one of the worlds largest film converters additionally he has filed a patent in relation to his work with an aircraft materials manufacturer who is interested in using a novel coating developed this past year in grunlans research group grunlan said the lab is working on developing environmentally benign flame-retardant treatments for plastic items such as foam seat cushions furniture upholstery clothing fabric etc while becoming a fellow does not alter grunlans research he said it could open doors in the future we are also interested in gas barrier layers for food and electronics packaging and thermoelectric energy generation such as converting body heat into electricity using thermoelectric fabric we are developing grunlan said someday i hope a jogger can power their phone from their own body heat grunlan received his bachelors degree in chemistry from north dakota state university and his phd in materials science and engineering from the university of minnesota he joined the department of mechanical engineering at texas a&m in 2004 the department of mechanical engineering has been very good to me over the years so im basically an adopted mechanical engineer grunlan said
highways serve as a critical asset for our economy: underpinning our national infrastructure while providing avenues of travel for people and essential goods across a complicated yet convenient network of roads as our highways continue to be physically taxed the demand for maintenance projects and construction continues to grow and is estimated to cost taxpayers $21 billion each year to maintain our current highways additional projects will only add to taxpayer costs but researchers at texas a&m university are finding new ways to make highways more sustainable and cost-effective supporting both our economy and the everyday consumer
in march the texas a&m engineering experiment stations (tees) center for nuclear security science and policy initiatives joined with the tees institute of nuclear-security and cyber-security education and research the bush school of government and public service and the texas a&m university student chapter of the institute of nuclear materials management to present a panel discussion on 21st century deterrence and the 2018 nuclear posture review the event which was open to the public was moderated by dr marvin adams htri professor of nuclear engineering at texas a&m and associate director of inscer the panelists included rebecca hersman director of the project on nuclear issues (poni) and senior advisor of the international security program at the center for strategic international studies dr robert webster principal associate director for the weapons program at los alamos national laboratory dr jasen castillo associate professor at the bush school and dr matthew fuhrmann professor of political science at texas a&m
the discussion centered on the latest nuclear posture review (npr) which reviews us nuclear weapons policy and describes strategies for the coming years given the evolving global threats present in the current geopolitical environment the the question of how the us can maintain effective deterrence has become especially critical panelists addressed how this newest npr differs from previous versions and what those changesand similaritiesmean for us weapons strategies and its role in extending nuclear security guarantees to allies in europe and asia the group also answered many questions from the audience
a partnership between the texas a&m college of engineering college of medicine and houston methodist hospital enmed is the nations first four-year fully integrated engineering and medical education curriculum leading to both a md and masters degree in engineering accredited by lcme this news represents a major accomplishment reflective of the extensive efforts between the texas a&m college of engineering college of medicine and houston methodist hospital said dr amy waer vice dean of education and academic programs at the college of medicine the successful development of this program is directly attributed to our facultys collaborative nature and adherence to the aggie core values of leadership and excellence enmed will train a new type of physician engineer the ‘physicianeer who will be a practicing physician and a trained engineer it is expected to be the largest engineering-based medical degree program in the nation it is also the only program that allows graduates to receive both a doctorate of medicine and masters in engineering in four years enmed will be a signature program for the texas a&m college of medicine and will serve the state by offering unique training that will advance health care technologies and ultimately the health of texans said dr carrie l byington dean of the texas a&m college of medicine senior vice president of the texas a&m health science center and vice chancellor for health services at the texas a&m university system the proposed curriculum is a case-based format with integration of both medicine and engineering content to develop and improve students clinical reasoning and problem-solving skills through real-world examples students admitted into enmed will have a bachelors degree in engineering computer science or in selected instances a closely related field to effectively develop the technologies required to advance health care engineering and medicine education should be integrated from the startcreating a mindset that sees medical needs analyzes them and then creates the desired solutions said dr roderic i pettigrew ceo of enhealth and executive dean for enmed through enmed we will generate a new class of clinicians who can actively participate in and lead research invention and entrepreneurial endeavors to improve health care one of the tenets of enmed is for students to design something transformational and take their invention to the marketplace prior to graduation utilizing the unparalleled world-class facilities at the states top-ranked houston methodist hospital and houston methodist research institute students will have access to those on the leading edge of engineering medicine