Welcome to our Summer 1999 edition of the KlipschSpeaker Alumni News. The Klipsch School is running smoothly under the direction of Klipsch School Interim Head, Steve Castillo and College of Engineering Dean Jay Jordan. Many things have happened since our last newsletter. Our telemetry chair has been renamed for Frank Carden, the Klipsch School Head for 19 years, and Public Service Company of New Mexico has started the process of endowing a professorship in electric utility management. Also, a scholarship endowment is underway in the memory of Michael Corpening, an outstanding Klipsch School student killed in a car crash in May. In January, 2000, Goddard Hall is going to undergo renovation and remodeling which provides us with the opportunity to create a new electrical machinery lab. Finally, we highlight two Klipsch School alums: Dr. Alvy Ray Smith who has received two Academy Awards for his leadership and pioneering work in computer-generated animation and Ben Boykin, a US Space Program pioneer.
JAY JORDAN - DEAN OF THE
COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING
As mentioned in the Fall 1998 KlipschSpeaker, effective January 1, 1999, Klipsch School Head Dr. Jay Jordan was appointed Interim Dean of the College of Engineering. During the spring a national search was undertaken to select a permanent dean. Jay was selected, and on May 31, became Dean of the College of Engineering. One of Dean Jordan's action items has been to resolve the interim status of the heads of Chemical Engineering, Industrial Engineering, and the Klipsch School. The Klipsch School faculty, professional, and classified staff voted to conduct an internal NMSU search for a permanent head. Applications close on July 21, and a permanent head should be selected by the end of July.
FRANK CARDEN CHAIR
Klipsch School Emeritus Professor Frank Carden was honored in May at the annual Sociedad de Ingenieros initiation by the inclusion of his name to the $1.3 million endowed chair he established. At the ceremony, the chair was named the Frank Carden Chair for Telemetry and Communications. Carden was also named by the College of Engineering as an "Ingenieros Eminente" for distinguished work in the field of telemetry and telecommunications.
Frank Carden joined the NMSU electrical engineering faculty in 1966, serving as department head from 1968 to 1987. His primary research interest involved telemetering and telecommunications, and during this time he worked to raise funds for an endowed chair in that area. At the same time he developed a strong education and research program with the International Foundation for Telemetry (IFT) which named NMSU as an IFT Center of Excellence and resulted in significant IFT sponsorship for the endowed chair. His goal was realized in 1990, and he retired from the Klipsch School in 1994.
"We are happy to honor Dr. Carden with the naming of the Chair," said Steve Castillo, interim head of the Klipsch School. "Professor Carden was instrumental in establishing a world-class research and teaching program in telecommunications and telemetry within the Klipsch School."
The telemetry and telecommunications program receives about $1 million per year in funding from NASA, Sandia National Laboratories, and other industrial sponsors. Students graduating from the program are in extremely high demand in the wireless industry.
A selection committee appoints the holder to the Frank Carden Chair for Telemetry and Telecommunications for a three-year term. The faculty member with the title receives a salary supplement as well as funds to be used for research equipment, and other needs in promoting the telemetering program. Dr. Stephen Horan is the current chair holder.
MICHAEL CORPENING MEMORIAL
SCHOLARSHIP
Michael Corpening, a 21-year-old Klipsch School senior needing only nine credits to complete his BSEE degree, was killed on May 15, 1999, when a car ran a red light and struck his car broadside. A 1995 Mayfield High School honor graduate, he was completing his bachelor's degree with majors in electrical engineering, mathematics, and computer science. Michael Corpening was also an Eagle Scout, a talented soccer player, and a member of several engineering honor societies. All who knew Michael felt he was an extraordinary individual, multi-faceted, an inventor, and a genius.
The Klipsch School has established the Michael Corpening Memorial Scholarship as a permanently endowed scholarship in the memory of Michael Corpening. Since Michael was well known in Las Cruces and at NMSU, donations are being received at a high rate. To date, the endowment is at a level of $5300 and is expected to top $20,000 by the end of the summer. As the earnings from the endowment grow, the maximum annual level of support for a scholarship recipient will be tuition, fees and $250 per semester.
If you are interested in contributing to the Michael
Corpening Memorial Scholarship, please make your check out to the NMSU Foundation, Michael Corpening Memorial Scholarship and send it to the Klipsch School.
EUMP PROFESSORSHIP
The Klipsch School has received a grant of $50,000 from the PNM Foundation Inc. to establish the endowed Public Service Company of New Mexico Professorship in the Electric Utility Management Program (EUMP). An additional $50,000 from PNM Corporation and a one-to-one match from NMSU will be used to ultimately bring the total endowment for the Professorship to $300,000. The grant will be sent to the Klipsch School over a three year period. Professor William Kersting is the director of the Electric Utility Management Program. Klipsch School professors Drs. Satish Ranade and Howard Smolleck are also in EUMP.
GODDARD HALL REMODELING
The new millennium will usher in the beginning of some big changes for the Klipsch School. Plans for the renovation of Goddard Hall are being finalized this summer, with remodeling scheduled to begin January 1, 2000. Since it's construction in 1913, Goddard Hall has been at the center of Electrical Engineering at NMSU. The building, named after the first EE department head, has been added onto twice: a WPA annex in 1936 and a teaching/support wing in the 1960s. Many of you are familiar with the WPA annex, the home of the large machinery lab.
Goddard Hall is listed on the National Registry of Historical Places, and as such, it's architectural style and general appearance cannot be modified. The renovation work will leave the exterior of the tower and belfry intact. The interior will be remodeled, but the original staircase and molding will be refurbished or duplicated. The original entrance stairs on the west side will also be rebuilt. Work is being funded by $2.2 million from the State. Once completed in the fall of 2001, the tower will be the new home of the College of Engineering Dean's complex. The Dean, Associate Deans, Assistant Dean, student services, and registration offices will relocate from their present spaces in Engineering Complex I.
The annex and teaching/support wing will be almost totally demolished, with the exception of the north and east walls. Behind these walls will be built a 13,000 square-foot Electrical Engineering facility which will house the Klipsch School's optics, telemetry, communications, and signal processing research programs. The National Science Foundation is providing $1.4 million and the State is matching that amount. When the construction is complete, much needed space will become available in Thomas and Brown Hall for new computer and teaching facilities.
ELECTRIC MACHINES LABORATORY
As mentioned above, the long awaited remodeling of Goddard Hall and Goddard Hall Annex will commence January 1, 2000. As a result of this project, the large machines laboratory will become history. Do you remember how awe struck you were when you started working with those huge machines? The lab dates back to at least 1939 when the power panel was installed. The laboratory was updated in 1959 and has survived until now. For the last two years, the laboratory has not been used because there weren't enough hard hats to provide the students protection from the randomly falling ceiling tiles. With the loss of the large machines laboratory all EE 332 Introduction to Electric Power Engineering machine experiments have been conducted in the "Faraday" machines lab which dates back approximately 20 years.
The Klipsch School is addressing two issues. First, what should be done with the antique machines in the large machine lab? The large green machines pre-date by many years the five setups that were installed in 1959. At this time, the plan is to save one or two of the large green machines with hopes that they can eventually find a new home in a museum. We also plan to save one or two of the gray 1959 machines for possible use in the future. We welcome suggestions as to how we should dispose of the remaining machines. Send your thoughts and comments to Professor William Kersting at wkerstin@nmsu.edu.
The second issue is what should be done to provide the undergraduate students with a meaningful electric machinery lab experience? A decision has been made by the power system faculty, Professor Kersting, Dr. Ranade, and Dr. Smolleck, to develop a proposal that will create a totally new machines laboratory which will replace both the old large machines lab and the existing Farady machines lab. Three machine setups, complete with instrumentation and computer control, are planned. The total cost for the three stations will be approximately $250,000. In order to raise the necessary support we will be seeking matching funds from alumni, industry, and other friends of the Klipsch School to include as part of a proposal. The importance of matching support continues to be critical in successful proposals to NSF and other funding agencies. Consequently, we will be putting together a fund-raising campaign to raise $125,000 matching money. Again, send any thoughts or comments to Bill Kersting.
KLIPSCH SCHOOL ALUM HOLDS
TWO ACADEMY AWARDS
The faculty of the Klipsch School take great pleasure in telling undergraduate students about the many, varied careers of our alumni. We tell the students to consider a BSEE as an excellent professional education, as well as a good general education. We tell the students to go where their talents lead them, to be whatever they wish. Be a physician, an attorney, a high school math teacher, a priest, a rancher, an Academy Award winner. Here's the story of an alum who is the holder of two Academy Awards.
Dr. Alvy Ray Smith graduated from the Klipsch School with a BSEE in 1965. Upon graduation he went to Stanford University and obtained a MS degree in 1965 and a PhD in 1970, both in computer science. He then became a professor of computer science at New York University from 1969 - 1973, and the University of California at Berkeley in 1974. In 1974 he also became a Visiting Scientist with Xerox PARC Palo Alto Research Center. Since then, Dr. Smith co-founded, or was present at the beginning of four centers of computer graphics excellence. He is now with Microsoft which he joined in 1994 as its first Graphics Fellow.
The centers:
- •Altamira Software Corporation: CEO and Founder 1991 - 1994
- •Pixar: Executive Vice President and Co-founder 1986 - 1991
- •Computer Division of Lucasfilm Ltd.: Director of Computer Graphics Research 1980 - 1986
- •Computer Graphics Laboratory of the New York Institute of Technology: Senior Scientist, 1975 - 1979
Dr. Smith's product, Altamira Composer, introduced the concept of image objects (sprites) to the personal computer imaging world. Sprites are based on the alpha channel concept, which he co-invented and for which he shares a 1996 technical Academy Award. He was awarded his second technical Academy Award in 1998 for digital paint systems as a fundamental contribution to filmmaking.
Dr. Smith was co-awarded the Computer Graphics Achievement Award by the Association of Computing Machinery SIGGRAPH in 1990 for "seminal contributions to computer paint systems," including the first full-color paint program, the first soft-edged fill program, and the HSV color space model. His portrait was recently included in a group of 200 photographs of major contributors to the computer industry, at the Computer Museum in Boston, and published in the book Portraits in Computing.
Dr. Smith directed the first use of full computer graphics in a successful major motion picture Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, the "Genesis Demo," while at Lucasfilm. He collaborated with and directed John Lasseter, Disney-trained animator, in his first computer graphics film, The Adventures of Andre & Wally B. The resulting team proceeded, under Lasseter as artistic director at Pixar, to create Tin Toy, the first computer animation ever to win an Academy Award, and the first completely computer-generated film, Toy Story, also an Academy Award winner.
Dr. Smith initiated and negotiated the Academy Award winning Computer Animation Production System (CAPS) project between Pixar and Disney, the hardware and software system that Disney now uses for full production of all its "traditional" 2D animated feature films, including Rescuers Down Under, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, The Lion King, Pocahontas, the Hunchback of Notre Dame, and Hercules.
In 1994, Dr. Smith's company Altamira was acquired by Microsoft, where he is currently articulating Microsoft's vision for multimedia authoring and guiding the incorporation of Altamira Composer software technology and philosophy into Microsoft products.
This short review of Dr. Alvy Ray Smith's career has been excerpted from his extensive biography at www.research.microsoft.com/~alvy/. Visit it, it's fascinating. In a recent response to the question, My education prepared me for the job I now have, on the College of Engineering's What's Happening? form, Dr. Smith replied: "A qualified yes - I had to work very hard on social skills after NMSU - but bottom line is I've been very successful."
A US SPACE PROGRAM PIONEER
Ben Boykin, BSEE NMSU 1953, and Klipsch School Electrical and Computer Engineering Academy member, retired in April after five years as Program Manager, Allied Signal Technical Services Corporation, NASA White Sands Test Facility. Ben grew up in Las Cruces. As an Aggie, at the then New Mexico A&M, he lettered in football and was president of the Aggie Band and the TKE Fraternity his senior year. Upon graduation in January 1953, he accepted a commission in the U.S. Air Force and flew jet fighter aircraft for four years. Following his Air Force duty, Ben worked for Rockwell International in Houston and Los Angeles for 37 years, 30 of those years in the manned US Space Program. He was Chief Engineer for the construction and delivery of three Shuttle Orbiter spacecraft: Challenger, Discovery, and Atlantis. After retiring from Rockwell, Ben joined Allied Signal Technical Services and returned to Las Cruces.
Ben is an active member of the Electrical and Computer Engineering Academy. He also keep busy as Chairman of the Southwest Regional Space Task Force, which is a New Mexico citizen's advocacy group lobbying for a New Mexico located Spaceport for the next vintage launch vehicle, the Reusable Launch Vehicle.
ALUMNI HAPPENINGS
Dr. David Voelz, BSEE NMSU 1981, PhD University of Illinois 1987, Senior Research Engineer, Air Force Research Lab, Kirtland AFB, was awarded the rank of Fellow by the International Society for Optical Engineering (SPIE) at the SPIE's Annual Technical Symposium on Optical Science, Engineering, and Instrumentation in Denver in mid-July. He has worked at the Air Force Research Lab in Albuquerque for 12 years. His principal research interest has been the conception, development, and testing of a variety of high-resolution imaging techniques that use coherent laser illumination.
Logan T. White, Jr., owner of Logan T. White
Engineering, BSEE NMSU 1970, has recently
authored and published a technical book
Hazardous Gas Monitoring, A Guide for
Semiconductor and Other Hazardous
Occupancies.
Patricia Lucero, BSEE NMSU 1994, is currently a
Machine Vision Project Engineer with Delphi Delco
Electronics Systems in Kokomo, Indiana.
THE ACADEMY
Information on the Electrical and Computer Engineering Academy including current membership with biographies, bylaws, eligibility for membership, etc., can be found on the Klipsch School home page at www.ece.nmsu. ece/ecea/ecea.html. If you are interested in knowing more about the Academy or Industrial Advisory Group, becoming a member, or wish to nominate someone, let us know. We will e-mail, fax, or mail the information to you.
FACULTY/ STAFF HIGHLIGHTS
The Klipsch School's New Mexico Space Grant Consortium (NMSGC) main responsibility is to seek out outstanding students interested in space science and engineering, to provide scholarship support, and create exceptional learning experiences, so that NASA and the U.S. will have a continuous stream of high-quality talent entering the space-related research, engineering, and manufacturing workforce. To this end, NMSGC is vitally interested in helping the NASA scholars and other engineering students, as well as engineering faculty, be successful at NMSU and realize their full potential. Dr. Judy McShannon, Associate Director of NMSGC, was awarded first place for Best Paper at the 1999 ASEE Gulf-Southwest Meeting in Dallas for her paper, "Interactive Learning Styles of Undergraduate Engineering Students in New Mexico." The study considered interactive learning of engineering students: Do they learn by interacting with the faculty or with other students; do they interact differently during class than between classes; do different demographic groups interact differently? This paper describes the research NMSGC Director Dr. Patricia Hynes and Dr. McShannon are conducting with the College of Engineering on the interaction of engineering students and faculty as part of the ABET 2000 assessment process.
After a national search, the Klipsch School selected
one of its own graduates to fill the vacancy in the
electromagnetics area created by the departure of
Dr. Qing Huo Liu. Dr. Russell P. Jedlicka joins the
faculty as Assistant Professor of Electrical and
Computer Engineering. Dr. Jedlicka received his
PhD from the Klipsch School and has been a
part-time instructor for a number of years. However,
his main duties have been with NMSU's Physical
Science Laboratory where he oversees about a
dozen employees as the Electromagnetic Systems
Branch Manager. During his tenure at PSL, Dr.
Jedlicka has been involved in the analysis, design,
fabrication and test of antennas for a variety of
telemetry and electronic warfare applications. Most
recently, he has been directly responsible for the
development of telecommunication antennas for the
STARDUST spacecraft and NASA's X-34 reusable
launch vehicle. In addition to antenna design, Dr.
Jedlicka has worked in the analysis and design of
microwave components and systems. In recent
years, the Klipsch School's electromagnetics faculty
have concentrated on computational science and the
parallel computer solution of Grand Challenge types
of problems. Dr. Jedlicka's significant background
in the design and engineering of electromagnetic
systems will add another dimension to the
electromagnetics area.
The Klipsch School's Manual Lujan Center for
Telemetering and Telecommunications, directed by
Dr. Stephen Horan, has received a $700,000
renewal contract from NASA for the upcoming
fiscal year. Co-principal investigators include Drs.
Tom Shay, Phillip De Leon, and James Le Blanc.
EXIT INTERVIEWS
The new ABET 2000 accreditation guidelines require that engineering programs have a set of mechanisms in place for evaluating the effectiveness of their programs in meeting a set of objectives. This past spring, the Klipsch School began conducting exit interviews with graduating EE students as an evaluation mechanism for our undergraduate academic programs. The exit interviews along with telephone alumni surveys and recruiter surveys are the primary instruments that will be used to evaluate our academic programs effectiveness. The objectives of the Klipsch School academic programs are focused on meeting the needs of our customers - the companies and government agencies that hire our students. We are working hard to satisfy our customers with excellent engineers.
The surveys are rather extensive, covering topics including the adequacy of our facilities, the effectiveness of the teaching in our core academic classes, and the services provided by the university placement office. In addition, students are asked for general comments about what important skills they learned while they were in the program as well as any skills they needed for which they were not adequately prepared.
Although we have not yet formally compiled the results of the surveys, we are pleased with the initial results. In general, students indicate that we are doing a good job of presenting the core materials in our curriculum. In addition, the skill the students most frequently mentioned as having learned is being able to solve complex problems. Since this is one of the primary objectives of the new curriculum, a heavy emphasis is placed on problem solving skills from the first freshman classes through the senior design projects. One of the frequently cited problems is the need for state-of-the-art computer and measurement equipment in our laboratories. With your help, we are working hard to continually upgrade the facilities to provide the students with the most up-to-date equipment and computers in the laboratories.
As mentioned in the Spring 1999 KlipschSpeaker, we also want to survey you. This fall we will be conducting telephone interviews with a sampling of Klipsch School alumni. If you receive a phone call from us asking you to participate in an alumni survey, please help us out by taking the time to let us know how we did in preparing you for your engineering career. Please be prepared to give us your candid praise and criticism. The results of the surveys are critical in helping us to ensure that changes we make in our programs result in top- notch engineers.
KLIPSCH SCHOOL NOTES
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.