Clarkson Wins Third at AIAA Student Paper Competition 2009
The 2009 Region 1-NE Student Paper Conference was held March 27 and 28, 2009 at Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Worcester Massachusetts! Students from across the Northeast presented their research and advanced their interest in aerospace engineering. This year, two Clarkson students travelled south to present their research on aerodynamics and aircraft design.
Prizes of $500 are be given to the winners of separate undergraduate and graduate paper category competitions. $300 and $250 is awarded for second and third place in each competition, respectively. In addition, the winner gets the chance to present their paper at the national conference. presented papers on research they had done at either the Undergraduate or Masters level.
Congratulations to Senior Aero Jonathan Holla for his paper "High Speed Multipurpose ESTOL/VTOL Aircraft Design" which took third place in this years competition. Brent Pomeroy, a junior aero, also presented in the undergraduate category with his paper "Computational Study of Minimum Induced Drag for Spanwise Cambered Wings". The students must write a technical paper own their own that conforms to the national conference paper standards. The papers are reviewed by experts across the country. The students must then give a 20 minute oral presentation of their work, which is also judged. The combined scores determine the winner. Particpating Universities included Syracuse, NJIT, Cornell, WPI, Princeton, MIT and Clarkson. In 2008, Clarkson won first place in the undergraduate competition, and the winner, Mark Czajkowski, was flown in January 2009 to the AIAA National Aerospace Sciences Conference in Orlando, Florida.
The conference culminated in an awards lunch where astronaut Professor Albert Sacco Jr. gave a lecture about his experiences as a member of the astronaut corps. In 1995, Dr. Sacco flew on Space Shuttle Columbia, STS-73, performing microgravity experiments on zeolite crystal growth behavior. The 16 day mission aboard Columbia focused on materials science, biotechnology, combustion science, and fluid physics contained within the pressurized Spacelab module. Dr Sacco's wry wit provided an entertaining lecture for students and faculty alike, highlighting the dedication that astronauts require to be a member of this elite group.