Mississippi State student engineering teams earn regional awards
April 3, 2007
Mississippi State student engineering teams earn regional awards
Starkville, Miss.—Four Bagley College of Engineering departmental student teams recently earned regional awards in the areas of civil and environmental engineering, electrical and computer science engineering, as well as computer science and engineering.
American Society of Civil Engineers ‘DEEP SOUTH’ champions
The Mississippi State student chapter of the American Society of Civil Engineers created a concrete canoe that would float so they could compete in the ASCE Deep South regional concrete canoe competition. The boat did more than float; it carried four passengers during several water races to the title of “Deep South Regional Champions.” The ten member civil and environmental engineering team made history as the first ever MSU concrete canoe team to qualify for the ASCE national competition in Seattle, Washington, in June. At that time the MSU ASCE team will be competing against 18 other regional champions from across the nation.
Team Members:
Austin Moore, captain, senior, civil engineering
Jesse Doyle, co-captain, senior, civil engineering
Eric Hattox, senior, civil engineering
Erica Souther, senior, civil engineering
Suzanne Dees, senior, civil engineering
Hayley Martin, senior, civil engineering
Josh Littlefield, senior, civil engineering
Andy Jackson, freshman, civil engineering
Brittany Blackledge, freshman civil engineering
Katie Strickland, freshman civil engineering
Dr. Dennis Truax, faculty adviser
‘IEEE REGION’ champions
Electrical and computer engineering students built a robot for the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers Southeast Region 3 Conference (SECON) 2007 competition. Thirty-seven student teams from the southeast region were asked to build a robot that could play a modified version of say ping-pong, tennis, and basketball. The independently operated robot stands about a foot tall and uses computer code and sensors to move within the white line boundaries that looks much like that of a tennis court or ping-pong table. Staying inbounds on the court, the robot then uses a camera to recognize a basketball hoop that is painted red. The camera computer program talks to
Cont’d: Student teams
the motion code of the robot to let it know when it is lined up to shoot a ping-pong ball into the basketball hoop. The team with the robot shooting the most balls into the basket in the quickest amount of time advances to the next round of competition.
The double elimination tournament was set-up much like the NCAA “Road to the Final Four.” The BCoE student team’s robot won 12 rounds of competition to capture the IEEE REGION 3 CHAMPIONSHIP title.
Team Members:
Benjamin Payment, captain, senior, electrical engineering
David Warren, senior, computer engineering
Ryan Irwin, senior, computer engineering
Michael Peach, senior, computer engineering
Austin Walton, senior, computer engineering
Heather Hickman, senior, electrical engineering
Evan Dozier, senior, computer engineering
Jeffrey Fairley, senior computer engineering
Dr. Bryan Jones, faculty adviser
Students take top honors at Southeast Collegiate Cyber Defense competition
This is a story of firsts for students in the computer science and engineering department. It was the first time Dr. Rayford Vaughn, a Billie Jay Ball Professor of Computer Science and Engineering and the CCSR director decided to organize a “Cyber” student team and then entered the team in the “Southeast Collegiate Cyber Defense” regional competition. The faculty adviser’s instincts about his students’ cyber capabilities were correct; in their inaugural debut, the student team placed in the top three in regional competition. Through this competition students were learning how to defend against different types of cyber crime and the ability to keep information technology services available during a security breach. The competition is sponsored by the Department of Homeland Security to better prepare students for the information security industry.
Team Members:
Robert Wesley McGrew, captain, graduate student, computer science
Jonathan Pittman, graduate student, computer science
Michael King, senior, software engineering
Paul Cleveland, senior, computer science
Sherry Thomas, senior computer science
Will McKeon, senior, computer science
Daniel Cranford, senior computer science
Dr. Ray Vauhn, faculty adviser
Student AISC team qualifies for national steel bridge competition
Civil and environmental engineering students qualified for the American Society of Engineers (ASCE) and the American Institute of Steel Construction (AISC) national steel bridge competition. At the regional level the student team had to design, fabricate, and construct a steel bridge. They were judged on standards for strength, durability, constructability, usability, functionality, and safety. In addition, the real twist was maintaining speed and practicing safety while building the bridge over a simulated ravine without construction support machinery or builders in the water. The average speed to construct a steel bridge for a winning team is usually around three minutes. The BCoE team was awarded ratings of excellence in the categories for stiffness, lightness, construction speed, display, efficiency, and economy. The national steel bridge competition will take place at California State University, Northridge, May 25 and 26.
Faculty advisers Drs. Dennis Truax, professor and head of civil and environmental engineering, Bryan Jones, assistant professor of computer and electrical engineering and Ray Vaughn, an endowed Billie Jay Ball Professor of Computer Science and Engineering facilitated the student engineering teams.
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NEWS EDITORS/DIRECTORS: For additional information on the student teams please contact them through their faculty advisers office numbers: Dr. Dennis Truax, civil engineering; Dr. Bryan Jones, electrical computer and engineering; or Dr. Ray Vaughn, computer science and engineering.