Spectra Newsletter

Peggy Nelson
Vice President of Engineering and
Global Product Development
Northrop Grumman Corporation
Aerospace Systems

Peggy Nelson, vice president of engineering and global product development for Northrop Grumman Aerospace Systems, is no stranger to CSUN, having earned both a teaching credential and a master’s degree in electrical engineering there. In the early 1980s, she was part of a cutting-edge program organized by Women in Science and Engineering in partnership with ten companies and CSUN, which sought to recruit professional women in math or science and bring them back to school to become engineers. Nelson, who had earned her undergraduate degree in mathematics at UCLA, was teaching high school math at a private school when she learned of the program. She enrolled in the College of Engineering and Computer Science, and TRW (which later became part of Northrop Grumman) paid for her education, gave her a half-time internship and then hired her full time after graduation. [Read more…]

Kunal Chitre: CECS degrees have given his career a running start

It’s a long way from the Indian state of Maharashtra to Los Angeles, but for Kunal Chitre (MS ’05; MS ’09), it has proven the shortest distance to his career goals. Chitre’s father is an engineer, and he always knew that he would one day be an engineer as well. So ten years ago, he left his hometown of Nagpur to pursue a master’s degree in electrical engineering at CSUN. Of the several U.S. universities he had applied to, CSUN was the first to accept him. Not only was it affordable, he says, “but it was close to Hollywood”—a decided bonus for a self-avowed movie buff.

Chitre entered the university in 2003, and as a student, he began working for Physical Plant Management on campus, managing the department’s technology infrastructure for over 300 users, including day-to-day IT operations. He was also involved with special engineering projects.

“My job with Physical Plant Management was one of the best things that ever happened to me,” he says. “I got dragged into little projects that gave me experience on so many levels. I don’t know if it was destiny or simply luck, but I chose communications and optics as my minor within electrical engineering. [Read more…]

CSUN paid tribute to one of the college’s most steadfast and distinguished friends last May, when the university presented Dr. Asad Madni with an honorary doctorate. Madni, a prolific and pioneering researcher, influential business executive, generous civic leader and member of the National Academy of Engineering, has shared his knowledge, passion and commitment to education with the university and the college for more than two decades.

An internationally recognized authority on the development and commercialization of intelligent sensors, systems and instrumentation, Madni earned his B.S. and M.S. from UCLA and his Ph.D. from California Coast University. His initial contact with CSUN came in the mid-1970s, shortly after he joined Systron Donner Corporation’s Microwave Division in Van Nuys, where he held a series of senior technical and executive positions and eventually became chairman, president and CEO of the corporation.

“We were looking to formalize our educational program for technicians, engineers, scientists and other employees,” he says. “We wanted a university that taught relevant subjects, had excellent faculty, was convenient to attend and had an environment that was conducive to collaboration. It was not very difficult to conclude that CSUN possessed those qualities” [Read more…]

Its name is CSUNSat1, and it’s what is known generically as a CubeSat—a micro satellite measuring 10×10x20 cm, roughly the size of a shoebox and weighing about five pounds. After designing, building and testing the CubeSat, the CSUN project team will work with NASA to get it launched into space.

“You’ll have your own satellite circling Earth,” explains Naomi Palmer, section manager for power and sensor systems at Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Last spring, as part of a design clinic, JPL collaborated with electrical and computer engineering professors Sharlene Katz, Jay Flynn and David Schwartz, plus six students in the department, on a CubeSat project. The aim was to teach the students what a CubeSat is, how it works, what it takes to fly one and what the micro-satellite can do. At the end of nine months, the team presented a working prototype, including a ground station, to JPL. [Read more…]