COMPUTER SCIENCE
As the national economy starts to improve, there is a renewed interest and need in software engineering and computer information technology professionals. Enrollments and interest in computer science related degrees at CSUN are on the increase, returning to the levels they were at 5 years ago.
Jeff Wiegley
For the past year, Professor Jeff Wiegley has been the Director of the Academic Affairs Pioneering Technology Group, a group of staff and students involved in the exploration and application of computing technologies to improve academic activities and assist in instructional technology initiatives.
ELECTRICAL & COMPUTER ENGINEERING
Sembiam R. Rengarajan
Professor Sembiam Rengarajan continues to serve as the Vice-Chair (and Chair elect) of the Commission on Waves and Fields of the United States National Committee of the International Union of Radio Science (USNC/URSI) for the triennium 2009-2011. He will serve as the chair of the Commission during 2012-2014. He has served in the technical program committees of the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Symposium in Toronto Canada (2010) where he organized and co-chaired a special session and the National Radio Science Meeting in Boulder, CO (2011) where he chaired a session on Antennas. Prof. Rengarajan received the following two awards from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA):
1. ‘Receive Mode Analysis and Design of Microstrip Reflectarrays NPO 47048’, NASA Tech Brief Technical Innovation Award, September 2010.
2. ‘An Optimization Procedure for including the Higher Order Mode Coupling in Feed Waveguide of a Planar Slot Array Antenna NPO-47419’, NASA Tech Brief Technical Innovation Award, July 2010.
Recent journal publication
S. R. Rengarajan, “Excitation of a parallel plate waveguide by an array of rectangular waveguides,” Electromagnetics, vol. 31, Feb. 2011.
II Conference Papers
S. R. Rengarajan, Scanning Properties of Microstrip Reflectarray Antennas, IEEE International Symposium on Antennas and Propagation, Toronto, Canada, July 2010.
S. T. Krishnasamy, and S. R. Rengarajan, Teaching-in-Context of Maxwell’s Displacement Current: What Do Professors and Students Perceive?, IEEE International Symposium on Antennas and Propagation, Toronto, Canada, July 2010.
S. R. Rengarajan, Advances in Waveguide-Fed Slot Arrays, IEEE International Symposium on Antennas and Propagation, Toronto, Canada, July 2010.
M. S. Zawadzki, S. R. Rengarajan, R. E. Hodges, and J. Chen, Low Sideloe Arrays for the Juno Microwave Radiometer, IEEE International Symposium on Antennas and Propagation, Toronto, Canada, July 2010.
S. R. Rengarajan, Application Rectangular Patch Elements for Dual Polarized Dual Beam Microstrip reflectarrays, National Radio Science Meeting, Boulder, CO, Jan. 2011.
III Honors and Awards
Prof. Rengarajan continues to serve as the Vice-Chair (and Chair elect) of the Commission on Waves and Fields of the United States National Committee of the International Union of Radio Science (USNC/URSI) for the triennium 2009-2011. He will serve as the chair of the Commission during 2012-2014.
He has served in the technical program committees of the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Symposium in Toronto Canada (2010) where he organized and co-chaired a special session and the National Radio Science Meeting in Boulder, CO (2011) where he chaired a session on Antennas.
Prof. Rengarajan received the following two awards from National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
1) ‘Receive Mode Analysis and Design of Microstrip Reflectarrays NPO 47048’, NASA Tech Brief Technical Innovation Award, September 2010.
2) ‘An Optimization Procedure for including the Higher Order Mode Coupling in Feed Waveguide of a Planar Slot Array Antenna NPO-47419’, NASA Tech Brief Technical Innovation Award, July 2010.
Congratulations to our Autonomous Ground Vehicle and our Formula SAE Car Teams!
Mechanical Engineering
Autonomous Ground Vehicle
CSUN mechanical engineering students working on the autonomous ground vehicle senior design project under the leadership of Professor C.T. Lin, participated in the 18th Annual Intelligent Ground Vehicle Competition (IGVC) in Rochester, Michigan, in June 2010. The CSUN entry, named NorMAN Jr., placed fifth in the competition’s Grand Award. NorMAN Jr. also earned the fourth place in the Design Challenge, the fifth place in the Autonomous Challenge, the fifth place in the Navigation Challenge, and took first place in the Design Presentation category. NorMAN Jr. was one of about 60 other intelligent robotic ground vehicles in the competition, which featured entries from engineering colleges across the nation.
The fifth-place finish for the CSUN team was the highest placement among all previous CSUN teams that had participated in this competition. Moreover, it was the highest place that any vehicle participating from the western region of the country had ever earned in the IGVC’s history. Congratulations to Professor Lin and his students!
Formula SAE Project
Students in the Formula SAE (FSAE) senior design project design, construct and test a race car–style vehicle that is entered into the annual competition sponsored by the Society of Automotive Engineers. The competition was held in June 2010 at the California Speedway in Fontana. The CSUN team, under the leadership of Professor George Youssef, was one of the select few that were able to finish all of the dynamic and static events successfully. The team came in 14th overall, among a group of about 80 teams; it also placed 15th in the Presentation category, 16th in the Design category, 17th in the Acceleration category, 25th in the Skidpad event, 26th in the Autocross, and 15th in Endurance.
The results can be viewed at http://www.sae.org/students/fsaew2010results.pdf. The team’s placement was the highest among all the teams that participated from California, including competitors from the various UC campuses. Congratulations to the 2010 CSUN Formula SAE team for an outstanding performance!