Curriculum Vitaes

Resume (Two-Page, updated 20 May, 2010)

Industrial Curriculum Vitae (updated 25 February, 2009)

Academic Curriculum Vitae (updated 20 May, 2010)

PhD Documents

PhD Qualifier Paper – Risk and Uncertainty in Design Trade Studies

Complex systems engineering projects are increasingly prevalent in our world. Technical requirements for complex systems usually break out individual subsystems parameters. For instance, each subsystem on a spacecraft can be assigned target mass, volume, power consumption, and other technical requirements. These tangible variables are often traded between subsystems engineers to maximize subsystem design utility. This in turn helps to maximize overall system utility. Design margins are also often assigned to these design variables during early stages of the design process.

Risk, reliability, robustness, and uncertainty have until this point not been part of subsystems parameter trading and design margins. This research aims to formalize a method of trading and margining these design variables among subsystems with the end effect of maximizing system utility and system integrity. Further, this research will investigate how different stakeholders in the complex system design process value and perceive risk, reliability, robustness, and uncertainty. This research will also be extended to examine the role culture plays in the valuation of these variables.

This paper presents a literature synthesis on the topics of the methods and tools of design Trade Studies, and the research and practice of risk and uncertainty in collaborative design and model based engineering. Initial thoughts are presented on how to incorporate risk and uncertainty into Trade Studies in collaborative design environments. A summary of future areas of research is included. Expected contributions of the overall research and a rough plan are outlined.

Masters Thesis

Mechanical Engineering Masters Thesis – Mechanical Engineering Design Across Cultures: A Method of Designing for Cultures.

Mechanical design is often based on formal methodologies such as Quality Function Deployment. Techniques to quantitatively account for attractability, sensory perception, and affective design have been successfully incorporated into these methods and are receiving growing acceptance across many industries. Although the adoption of these methods marks a large improvement for mechanical designers, more advances in design methodology are needed. Recently, mechanical design engineers have run into problems moving designs across cultural boundaries. As mechanical design engineers move forward with creating designs to be sold to culturally different and distinct groups of consumers, methods must be developed to aid in minimizing the number of people who are un-attracted to a product.

This thesis proposes one potential method to address cultural factors in the design process. An extensive review of literature on subjects important to the development of techniques for incorporation of cultural considerations into mechanical engineering design methodologies is presented. Cultural methods used in other disciplines are surveyed. Practical advice on avoiding ethnocentrism in engineering design is given. An example of the method proposed in this thesis is developed. The shortcomings and strengths of the proposed method are discussed. The thesis concludes with potential future avenues of research.

Conference Papers

IDETC2010 CIE Conference – Towards Risk as a Tradeable Parameter in Complex System Design Trades

IDECT2008 DTM Conference – The Integration of Affective Design Into QFD

The use of design methodologies in product development has been proven to work for functional and performance requirements. However, when it comes to more abstract requirements – like attractivity – existing, widely accepted design methodologies do not provide guidance. This paper introduces tools commonly used in psychology for determining and quantifying Sensory Requirements and then proceeds to detail a method for collecting and preparing data on sensory attractiveness in a way that it is readily incorporated into the well defined method for product development, Quality Function Deployment.

Undergraduate Theses

Honors College Bachelors Thesis – The Eyes of Tunis: a fictionalized travelogue of my time in North Africa.

People often grow increasingly culturally confused when spending significant amounts of time in a foreign land. Identity can become lost only to reform in the image of the host society. This thesis presents a creative nonfiction series of essays that explore the author’s loss of self and contextual identity, the reshaping of that identity, and the destruction of the new identity. The theme of identity is explored, sometimes violently and sometimes comically, through interactions with tourists and natives; local, national, and global politics; ethnic food; journeying through a sandstorm; crime in a medina; the veneer of religion; and visibility and invisibility within a society.

International Studies Degree Bachelors Thesis – International Engineering Interns in Their Own Words: Past Interns Share Their Stories and Their Wisdom with the Future

Students participating in international engineering internships are still relatively rare. It is commonly held that more engineering students would choose to intern abroad if there were role models available, as there are in other disciplines. Profiles of past students, participants, and Alumni serve as role models to perspective students allows prospective students to step into the shoes of those who have gone before. Potential participants can then visualize themselves participating in a program, enrolling in a department, or attending a university. While student profiles exist in many departments and programs, Oregon State University has no profiles of students who have successfully completed an international engineering internship. This document analyzes existing profiles for effectiveness, develops recommendations for writing profiles, and provides several examples of interviews and the resulting profiles. Curriculum vitas are also included to serve as instructional templates for those in the future.

Class Projects – Graduate School

Project Management Report – A simulated project management exercise and report based upon the real-life example of constructing a rainwater catchment system on a school in rural El Salvador.

Virtual Performance Measurement System Design Project – An analysis and redesign of the performance measurement systems the local student chapter of Engineers Without Borders.  Several performance metrics were developed and methods to implement them in a meaningful way were presented.

Combined Brayton/Rankine Cycle Analysis – An analysis of a combined Brayton/Rankine cycle power generation plant preformed using Phoenix Integration’s Model Center and Engineering Equation Solver.  An optimum design point was found and details on the analysis are presented.  Discussion of the project is available here.

Human Factors Engineering Course Term Paper – Investigation of Typing Performance Degradation when Switching from Standard QWERTY Keyboard to Ergonomic Split QWERTY Keyboard.

Mechanical Design Optimization Term Project – Optimization of Geometry and Beam Sizing for Load-Bearing Structure.

Complex Systems Design Across Cultures – A term paper that reviews current literature in complex systems engineering and quantitative cultural research to look for methods to quantify and reduce the risk of multi-cultural design teams.

Class Projects – Undergraduate and Earlier

Jack – An eight foot tall humanoid robot modeled on my own dimensions designed for the 2001 SME Robotics Engineering Challenge. I led a team of 12 in the design, construction, and competition of the robot. Jack took 1st place in the open robotics construction competition, won a special Fluid Power Society award, and was awarded the highly coveted Judge’s Choice Award. Aside from the electric motor to raise and lower Jack out of his box, the entire machine is powered by pneumatics. Logic is provided by a Square-D PLC.

J-Walker – A simulated Mine-Clearance Robot designed for the 2004 ASME Student Design Contest titled “Mine Madness.” The robot placed 3rd out of 30 teams at the Oregon State University contest. At the regional contest in Moscow, Idaho, it won first place. Our team went on to place 5th out of 13 teams at the 2004 ASME International Design Challenge in Anaheim, California.

Mechanical Engineering Senior Project Final Report – Porous Media Test Bed. My senior project final report detailing a proposed design that would permit visualizing microscopic flow conditions at high Reynolds numbers. The device was never built due to a lack of funding. 2-D testing was conducted to verify dispersion calculations.

Mechanical Engineering Senior Project Proposal – Porous Media Test Bed. My senior project proposal presenting a design solution to visualize microscopic flow conditions at high Reynolds numbers. A drawing package created in SolidWorks, all materials used in construction, and costing information is provided.

Industrial Projects and Work

Venturi Vacuum Generator on an Electronic Component Handler – An in-process patent application for some work I did at ElectroScientific Industries.  The invention was for the Model 35xx electrical test machine.  I am not sure if the Model 35xx ended up with this invention as standard equipment or an option.  This is my first invention that was patented.