Vol. 5, No. 3 news-q013.wpd

In this issue of the KlipschSpeaker Alumni News we want to report that the Goddard Hall renovation is now complete. We also want to highlight prestigious awards received by two Klipsch School alumni, to tell you about a satellite radio being built with off-the-shelf parts, and to introduce you to new faculty member Dr. Marco Terada.

During June, faculty and graduate students from the Klipsch School began moving into the newly renovated Goddard Hall Annex. The Annex will be used for research in Telecommunications and Telemetry, Digital Signal Processing, Image processing, and Photonics. The Annex renovation cost $3 million with $1.3 million coming from a research infrastructure renovation grant from the National Science Foundation, $1.5 million from State of New Mexico 1998 General Obligation Bonds, and $200,000 from NMSU infrastructure funds. The new space fills a critical need to meet the growing research and education efforts in these technical areas. External funding for the research conducted by the faculty moving into the Annex totals over $1 million per year.

Goddard Annex Along Horseshoe Drive

Rear Annex Facing Thomas & Brown

We all know what a wonderful technical experience a co-op can be. But what about this? Kendall Mauldin, Klipsch School electrical engineering student, is currently in a co-op phase at NASA Dryden Flight Research Center, Edwards AFB, California, and has had some great interaction. After watching a shuttle land, the co-ops got word that the astronauts would be eating at a nearby Mexican restaurant. A birthday party for one of the co-ops was at hand so they got to the restaurant early and got a table near where the astronauts and other STS-100 crew members were going to sit. Kendall talked to the commander, then the co-ops went out in front of the restaurant and got a group picture taken with the astronauts. (Kendall Mauldin is directly below the second astronaut from the right.) Kendall emailed us the news saying: "The was one of the most profound and exciting experiences of my life. I will definitely never forget it. It was really cool being around the astronauts and talking with them in a relaxed atmosphere without them having to be 'prim and proper' for the press." Kendall also reports that on another occasion, five historical aerospace pioneers came to speak at Edwards AFB for the 50th Anniversary Celebration. They were: retired Brigadier General Chuck Yeager, the first man to fly at supersonic speed; Scott Crossfield, the first to fly at twice the speed of sound; retired Lt. Colonel Fitz Fulton, an Edwards test pilot for NASA from 1950 to 1986; Dick Horner, the first technical director of the center; and Fred Stoliker, who came to Edwards in 1951 and advanced to the position of the center's technical director. After their formal presentations, Kendall asked Chuck Yeager for his autograph on some pictures of the X-1. Kendall commented: "I don't think anything could have taken my attention from their every word. I couldn't believe who we were listening to."

When NASA launches three miniature satellites in the summer of 2003, the trio's communication system will have components familiar to any amateur radio operator. The Klipsch School's Dr. Stephen Horan and a team consisting of technician Larry Alvarez, Klipsch School major Michael Jourdan, and engineering technology major Allison Silva are building the communications system for the experimental satellites out of parts ordered from catalogs. The design is based on experiments performed in the telemetry laboratory. Everything not needed was stripped from the components, but the components are familiar to any amateur radio builder who regularly orders out of catalogs.

Three Corner Sat mission, which used miniature nanosatellites, is a joint project of the Klipsch School, the University of Colorado at Boulder, Arizona State University, and NASA. The three satellites will be launched in a stack configuration from a space shuttle in 2003 and will then separate to form a "virtual formation." The goal is to demonstrate stereo imaging, formation flying, and innovative on-board software that makes some of its own decisions based on data from sensors such as cameras. The Continuous Activity Scheduling, Planning, Execution and Replanning (CASPER) software builds on previous NASA efforts to use artificial intelligence to control spacecraft. The CASPER software is built by the University of Colorado at Boulder, but the communications system that transmits information to CASPER from Earth and between the three satellites is the work of Dr. Horan and his team. While it is unusual to order catalog parts for a NASA project, the decision was made because of the deadlines and bare-bones budget for the Three Corner Satellites project.

A computer in each satellite, a control computer at the University of Colorado, and computers at ground stations in Las Cruces and at Arizona State University in Phoenix send data back and forth over the Klipsch School designed radio link. The transmitter and receiver are a single unit about the size of a cell phone. The units were easy to modify out of the amateur radio frequency range into the satellite frequency range. Once the satellites are launched, personnel at a ground state on the NMSU campus, along with personnel in Arizona and Colorado, will help monitor the satellites' program and transfer data to their respective ground stations.

Both plants are merchant plants that will sell their energy into the market. Western is providing transmission interconnection. These projects will provide an estimated $42 million in capital additions to the Desert Southwest Region's transmission system without using any taxpayer funds, as well as adding $15 million in annual transmission service to Western and the Federal government.

Desert Southwest Engineering and Construction manager, David Radosevich said, "Chuck's project management knowledge is one reason the transmission portion of the project was on schedule and within budget. He demonstrated through his work, perseverance. and numerous awards that he is outstanding. Outside entities wishing interconnections with us seek his abilities, which is a compliment to his focus toward customer service, teamwork, and collaboration."

Klipsch School alumnus Kim Dalton Linder (BSEE 1988, MSEE 1991, PhD ME 1995) and two other Honeywell Manufacturing and Technologies engineers Chris Baumgart, PhD, and Steven Cave were instrumental in developing an electronic imaging process to scan concrete samples, calculating sixteen microscopical properties with precision to ½ micron. The work was accomplished in partnership with the Missouri Department of Transportation (MoDOT).

Cave, a Technical Project Specialist added, "This is a success story for the Cooperative Research and Development Agreement process that allows application of DOE technology to … commercial and industrial environments. We are hopeful that the system will be adopted by other state DOTs or testing laboratories in the near future."

Texas Instruments has donated $65,000 to support the Klipsch School's microelectronics/VLSI program. The grant will be used to support graduate students working on mixed signal research, as well as to acquire new hardware and software for the microelectronics/VLSI research programs. Dr. Jaime Ramirez-Angulo and Dr. Paul Furth direct research programs in this specialty.

Beginning in August, Klipsch School professor Nadipuram (Ram) Prasad will spend a year at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory's Center for Space Microelectronics Technology under NASA's Administrator's Fellowship program. During his one-year fellowship, Prasad will research new technologies in artificial intelligence for sensing, imaging, and storing information that may someday lead to "autonomous systems" that are self-controlling robots. NASA scientists are working to develop robots that will be able to navigate the harsh landscape of Mars and other planets with human-like agility while collecting samples, performing tests, then transmitting data back to Earth. Teams of such robots could prospect for minerals on other planets, preparing the way for more elaborate robotic structures to carry out mining operations. For human astronauts, self-contained robots could provide such basic services as construction labor, cooking and laundry, even paramedical services.

Ram Prasad is the director of the Rio Grande Institute of Soft Computing (RioSoft), a consortium of four New Mexico universities - NMSU, UNM, New Mexico Highlands, and New Mexico Tech, and the University of Texas at El Paso. RioSoft seeks to develop artificial intelligence technologies for use in government and industry.

Drs. Paz and Ranade begin project with iCASA. Dr Robert Paz and Dr. Satish Ranade have begun a relationship with the Institute for Complex Additive Systems Analysis (iCASA) at New Mexico Tech. The Modeling, Simulation and Control (MSC) group at iCASA has the following as a statement of purpose:

 

One of the most interesting and important scientific and technical challenges presently facing researchers is the development of a comprehensive and rigorous understanding of the behaviors exhibited by complex, interdependent systems.

Researchers in the Modeling, Simulation and Control group at iCASA are applying concepts from disciplines such as control theory, dynamical system theory, statistical physics, and agent-based modeling and simulation to address this challenge. The work in the Klipsch School will focus on Power System Dynamic Vulnerability. The project has received funding of $130,000 for this year, with the probable continuation of funding for the next two years.

We now have the KlipschSpeaker on our web site. Locate http://www.ece.nmsu.edu/alumni/alumni.html, select KlipschSpeaker and bring up the issue you want.

It's important to us that all of the Klipsch School alumni receive the quarterly KlipschSpeaker. We get our mailing labels from the Office of the Vice President for University Advancement, but we know there are Klipsch School alumni who are not in the database. We want to include these alumni, but we don't know how to find them. Please send us addresses of alumni not receiving the KlipschSpeaker.

We can also provide the KlipschSpeaker as an attachment to an e-mail message for those alumni who prefer electronic service. This may be especially attractive to foreign alumni. If you want e-mail delivery, send your name and e-mail address to jtaylor@nmsu.edu. Indicate any special requirements.

If you haven't already, please check the Klipsch School's web page at http://www.ece.nmsu.edu. Our web page tells about the Klipsch School students, faculty, programs, and research. Look us up. The NMSU web page address is http://www.nmsu.edu. You can get to our web page from NMSU's or directly at the address above. The University has a calendar of events web page at http://www.nmsu.edu/general/calendar. If you want to get in touch with us, obtain additional information, or tell us something about you or other alumni, contact the Klipsch School Head, Dr. Steven Castillo at 505-646-3115 or e-mail to scastill@nmsu.edu, or Dr. Javin Taylor, Associate Head and KlipschSpeaker Editor at 505-646-1239 or e-mail to jtaylor@nmsu.edu, or use the Klipsch School fax number, 505-646-1435.