Systems Engineering

To help develop a strong pipeline of students who are interested in becoming in engineering majors — and who have the skills and abilities to succeed in this rigorous program — Dr. Seshadri Mohan in 2008 founded the Engineering Scholars Program (ESP) at UALR. Dr. Mohan defined the program and successfully procured grants from the Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation and the Arkansas Science and Technology Authority to launch ESP.

The objective of ESP is to increase the number of students entering engineering programs in Arkansas through exposure to hands-on engineering projects, plant trips, and interaction with industry engineers. In addition, the two-week residential summer program includes counseling and advising sessions to assist students in preparing for college. In summer 2009, the second year of the program, 16 high school students spent two weeks at UALR studying with professors.

The exposure to engineering and counseling and advising sessions helps high school students make informed choices on appropriate course work during their high school years for pursuing future careers in engineering.

UALR’s Donaghey College of Engineering and Information Technology has signed a memorandum of understanding with Pondicherry Engineering College (PEC) in India to promote educational and cultural cooperation in the areas of education, research, and other activities in systems engineering.

The relationship between the two institutions was forged by Dr. Seshadri Mohan, the chairman of the Systems Engineering Department at UALR with his long-time colleague Dr. V. Prithiviraj of PEC. The agreement includes exchange of faculty, exchange of students, joint research activities, lectures, lectures via e-learning, participation in seminars and academic meetings, exchange of published academic materials, and special short-term academic programs.

Departments of both institutions involved in the agreement are electronics and communication engineering, electrical and electronic engineering, computer science engineering, information technology, and mechanical engineering.

Award Entrance Video:

• Navigating for the Visually Impaired - [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7sE5tAsLNOc]

Faculty Excellence Winner News Posts: 

• [http://ualr.edu/www/2009/05/04/yoder-al-rizzo-flinn-win-faculty-excellence-awards/]
• [http://ualr.edu/academics/?page_id=49]
• [http://ualr.edu/facultyexcellence/index.php/home/winner-archive/university-level-winners/professor-building-through-real-life-experience-hussain-al-rizzo/]

Dr. Jing Zhang, Associate Professor in the Systems Engineering Department, has been awarded, along with his coauthors P. Srirama and M. Mazumder, the IEEE Creativity and Innovation Prize Paper Award for the paper:

“E-SPART Analyzer for Mars Mission: A New Approach in Signal Processing and Sampling”, IEEE Transactions on Industry Applications, vol. 43, no. 4, July/Aug 2007, pp. 1084 - 1090.

Jason Robison and Laura Lawson, undergraduate students from Systems Engineering Department, are carrying out internship at Jet Propulsion Laboratory.  Their internship is supported by Arkansas Space Grant Consortium.  Their internship involves dust participle mitigation from  solar panels.  They were featured on ‘Arkansans of the Week’ by KATV Channel 7. 

To watch the video, visit http://www.katv.com/news/stories/0608/530005_video.html?ref=newsstory

The Systems Engineering Department hosted 17 high school students at the 2008 Summer Engineering Scholars Program. The program headed by Dr. Seshadri Mohan, Chair and Professor of Systems Engineering Department, offered students a taste of several branches of engineering.  The program was supported by funding received from Arkansas Science Technology Authority (ASTA) and Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation.

For pictures of this event follow this link.

For more information click follow this link.

For KARK Channel 4 coverage click follow this link.

Summer 2008 Engineering Scholars Program

Congratulations to the following graduate students who were selected as winners for their paper presentations at the 18th Annual Graduate Student Research Forum held at the Donaghey Student Center, University of Arkansas at Little Rock, on Friday April 25, 2008.�
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2nd Place Winner:  Rabindra Ghimire (Advisor: Seshadri Mohan): “Concurrent Multi-Layer Restoration Scheme for GMOLS-based WDM Networks.”
3rd Place Winner: Fei Song (Advisor: Guoliang Huang): “Surface Wave Propagation”
3rd Place Winner: Daniel Rucker (Advisor: Hussain Al-Rizzo): “Design of Microstrip Antennas for Biomedical Applications Using Nanotechnology Fabrication Methods”

We would like to invite you for the presentation of this year’s Systems Engineering Senior Capstone Design Project in ETAS 230 on April 30 at 3:00 p.m. The project team (Trojan Racing) consisting of 6 senior students designed an off-road vehicle, i.e. a mini Baja. The team will compete in the 2008 Society of Automotive Engineers’ competition to be held in Peoria, Illinois in late May.  Engineering teams from 115 schools will participate in the event.

 The presentation will be followed by a demonstration of the vehicle.

 Best regards,

Professors Jung H. Kim and Ibrahim H. Nisanci

Congratulations to Chris Wyatt on receiving the EIT 2008 Student Excellence Award in the Bachelor’s Degree Category.

Chris Wyatt is a graduating senior from the UALR EIT Systems Engineering program with an emphasis in mechanical systems. He has had the opportunity to perform undergraduate research in the field of Mars Rover dust mitigation and interned during the summer of 2007 at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. During this internship, Chris pursued advanced research in dust mitigation practices. He has served several positions in campus organizations including as president of INCOSE. Chris has been the proverbial “thorn in the side” for getting the SAE Baja collegiate design competition started at UALR; and in 2007-08, has joined a group of 5 other seniors, as well as underclassmen from several other disciplines, to bring UALR’s first Baja racing buggy to life. This summer he is set to intern for Lockheed Martin in Colorado Springs and then go on to a graduate research assistantship position and work towards a Masters of Aerospace Engineering degree at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Noting the experience of his undergraduate career, Chris feels that the Systems Engineering program has allowed him to go far beyond that of any other program in Arkansas. “This program has an amazing potential, and businesses are starting realize that we are the future of the ever-growing complexity of engineering solutions.”

Congratulations to Jeremy Stark on receiving the McNair Scholars Grant.  Dr. Jing Zhang will work will Jeremy this summer on various research projects.

For more information on the McNair Scholars program follow this link http://www.ed.gov/programs/triomcnair/index.html .