Experience

Honeywell UOP

June 2018 - Present

Senior Design Capstone

January 2018 - May 2018

Sandia National Labs

May 2016 - May 2017

In the summer of 2016 (after my sophomore year in college), I worked full-time at Sandia National Labs in Albuquerque. I worked on the Computational Structural Mechanics and Applications team, doing mathematical modelling. Through my work, I was exposed to many different fields of engineering. I was a chemical engineer and mathematician working on a mechanical engineering team doing primarily computer science. There was certainly a steep learning curve, but I found myself able to pick up the necessary information quickly. I grew skilled at modelling and contributed to the code base. As a result of my performance, I was invited to continue work at Sandia year-round during the school year. During this time, I continued to contribute to a set of python codes commonly used within the organization. I left the company on good terms to pursue work more relavant to my long-term goals.

Dispersive Hydrodynamics Lab

September 2015  - May 2016

During the 2015-2016 school year, I worked with applied math professor Mark Hoefer and graduate student Michelle Maiden to model nonlinear phenomena in fluid mechanics. This lab approached problems experimentally and analytically to get a clear picture of the topic being studied.

Professor Hoefer often said that "we choose a system where the experiments are easy, but the math is hard." As he hinted, the experimental setup was quite simple: we filled a Plexiglas column with a viscous fluid (corn syrup or glycerin), and inject a diluted, dyed version of the same fluid into the bottom of the tube. Due to buoyancy, the diluted fluid rises to the top of the column, forming a structure resembling a flexible pipe. The flow rate at the bottom is computerized, allowing for the creation of structures of interest.

The two most significant structures we encountered were solitons and dispersive shock waves. Solitons are isolated, nonlinear waves (meaning their speed grows with amplitude), which maintain their shape as they travel. They show up in a variety of fluid mechanics problems, such as in shallow water. Dispersive shock waves (DSWs) appear as an ordered set of wave peaks, and emulate structures observed in the earth's mantle.

I worked on many projects during my time at the lab, some of which are listed in my portfolio. My most interesting project, however, dealt with determining the conditions under which our system goes unstable. I ran several experiment to find the conditions of instability and a qualitative description of the types of instabilities. Unfortunately, the project was much larger than expected, and I was unable to finish this project completely before the end of the school year. Thus, I wrote a report detailing the work done up until that point to pass on to whoever finishes the project.

More information on the Dispersive Hydrodynamics Lab can be found here.

University of Colorado at Boulder Applied Math Department

February 2016 - May 2016

After completing Partial Differential Equations with Fourier Series, one of my peers and I worked with Professor Harvey Segur to improve certain aspects of the class. We rewrote several of the projects students complete during the class, which will improve their results. Hopefully, it will also contribute to greater student success. I have posted one of the rewritten projects in my portfolio.

My partner and I also statistically analyzed course data to determine if certain aspects of the course were actually helping students. I enjoyed my work the Professor Segur, so I decided to work in the Fall of 2016 as a Learning Assistant to help students understand the course.

Denver Museum of Nature and Science

Summer 2013

After my junior year of high school, I worked as a Teen Science Scholar for the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. The program began with field work: we camped in Wyoming for two weeks, collecting fossils in the middle of nowhere. Once I got over being constantly covered in dirt, I began really enjoying the experience. 

After our fieldwork, we returned to Denver and cataloged the specimens for the Museum's archive. We finished the summer by analyzing our findings and publishing our results. My portion of the project examined the change in the relative population of perissodactyls (a type of hoofed animal) following their arrival on the evolutionary scene during the Eocene Epoch, around 50 million years ago. The abstract for our presentation is posted in my portfolio.