{"id":1817,"date":"2026-03-04T12:25:51","date_gmt":"2026-03-04T17:25:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/?p=1817"},"modified":"2026-03-17T09:42:39","modified_gmt":"2026-03-17T13:42:39","slug":"lockheed-martin-helps-ut-launch-successful-hypersonics-senior-design-projects","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/news\/lockheed-martin-helps-ut-launch-successful-hypersonics-senior-design-projects\/","title":{"rendered":"Lockheed Martin Helps UT Launch Successful Hypersonics Senior Design Projects"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>As he prepared to select a senior design project before the 2023-24 academic year began, Joseph Motto noticed there&nbsp;weren\u2019t&nbsp;any topics&nbsp;directly related&nbsp;to his passion&nbsp;of&nbsp;hypersonics. Motto wondered if something could be done to give students like him&nbsp;an option&nbsp;to work on a project in that field.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The aerospace engineering major reached out to&nbsp;Keith Stanfill, the Tickle College of Engineering\u2019s director of <a href=\"https:\/\/design.utk.edu\/\" id=\"https:\/\/design.utk.edu\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">integrated engineering design<\/a>,&nbsp;to arrange a meeting. Once he informed&nbsp;Stanfill&nbsp;about his wish,&nbsp;Stanfill&nbsp;told Motto they would do everything possible to make it happen.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Motto\u2019s inquiry coincided with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.lockheedmartin.com\/en-us\/index.html\" id=\"https:\/\/www.lockheedmartin.com\/en-us\/index.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Lockheed Martin\u2019s<\/a> (LM) interest in engaging more students and professors at the college level in&nbsp;hypersonics,&nbsp;which\u202fis typically defined by something that is traveling at speeds&nbsp;in excess of&nbsp;3,800 miles&nbsp;per hour at sea level&nbsp;(Mach 5).&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Barry Bauer, a&nbsp;principal&nbsp;program manager at LM had already been conducting a monthly call with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.utsi.edu\/people\/faculty\/john-schmisseur\/\" id=\"https:\/\/www.utsi.edu\/people\/faculty\/john-schmisseur\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">John&nbsp;Schmissuer<\/a>, associate&nbsp;dean&nbsp;and executive director of the University of Tennessee Space Institute (UTSI), to discuss collaboration opportunities between LM and UTSI.&nbsp;Schmisseur&nbsp;brought up the opportunity to Bauer&nbsp;for leveraging&nbsp;the&nbsp;UT&nbsp;Interdisciplinary&nbsp;Senior Design (ISD) Capstone as a workforce development opportunity for LM.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>One of the internal programs Bauer managed for LM was the Hypersonic University Engagement (HUE) initiative, which\u00a0established\u00a0a dedicated forum for future hypersonic workforce developments for LM.\u00a0Bauer was willing to sponsor the UT project with internal research and development\u00a0funds and\u00a0brought the idea to the LM team.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cI&nbsp;asked,&nbsp;\u2018How can we really leverage this as an opportunity?\u2019\u201d Bauer said. \u201cNot only for advancing the state of technology by bringing students and professors in to solve really hard problems, but also&nbsp;to promote&nbsp;workforce development with the notion that we can identify and recruit the best and the brightest to come work for us.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>TCE alum Walker McCord (MS\/AE \u201921;&nbsp;PhD\/AE \u201922), who had recently joined LM Marietta, Georgia Skunkworks as a hypersonic thermal engineer, jumped at the opportunity to support his alma mater and continue novel research and development work on&nbsp;hypersonics&nbsp;in a meaningful way that would benefit the next generation of engineers.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"width:100%\"><div style=\"width: 15%;height: 10px;margin: 40px 0 px;border-bottom: 6px solid #ff8200\"><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Meeting Industry Standards&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>McCord and Bauer worked closely together and pulled in technical domain subject-matter-experts (SMEs) in&nbsp;hypersonics&nbsp;and materials across the LM enterprise to strategize on a concept that was technically suitable for the undergraduate engineering level, did not have security restrictions that would prohibit outside work, and would be impactful to a focus mission for LM.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The LM team developed a&nbsp;statement of&nbsp;work (SOW) focusing on relevant hypersonic material interactions for passive aperture cooling and structured the period of performance to be&nbsp;accomplished&nbsp;by undergraduate students over the course of a single academic year.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cMy idea was&nbsp;let&#8217;s&nbsp;not try to do something&nbsp;that&#8217;s&nbsp;been done before in a senior design project. Let&#8217;s kind of push the envelope here,\u201d McCord said.&nbsp;\u201cLet&#8217;s&nbsp;incorporate some type of paradigm shift on what\u2019s previously&nbsp;been executed&nbsp;and&nbsp;what&#8217;s been thought possible to achieve with undergrads&nbsp;working on hypersonic relevant technology.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"683\" src=\"https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/03\/20251124_Engineering-0006-1500x1000-1-1024x683.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1819\" srcset=\"https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/03\/20251124_Engineering-0006-1500x1000-1-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/03\/20251124_Engineering-0006-1500x1000-1-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/03\/20251124_Engineering-0006-1500x1000-1-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/03\/20251124_Engineering-0006-1500x1000-1.jpg 1500w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>McCord and Bauer structured the SOW for the UT students&nbsp;very similar&nbsp;to how a standard defense program is run in industry. The intention was to&nbsp;teach&nbsp;the students about the importance of not only having&nbsp;a feasible&nbsp;design that can meet the requirements, but also closely track cost, schedule, and risk mitigation approaches. This approach also ties well into the ISD multi-discipline structure that&nbsp;leverages&nbsp;teams comprised of engineers, business, and finance senior students&nbsp;from the Heath Integrated Business and Engineering Program.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Motto\u2019s interdisciplinary team, named Hypersonic Solutions, launched the process by developing a cooling solution to lower&nbsp;temperature&nbsp;and limit optical distortion during high-speed&nbsp;flight&nbsp;through a novel ceramic lens material.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The inaugural team\u2019s performance yielded a great business case for LM, which was able to&nbsp;utilize&nbsp;the manufactured prototype to&nbsp;benefit&nbsp;internal program questions.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe outcome of this project has shown that the LM and UT partnership in this domain can be leveraged as a budget-efficient technology testbed demonstrator where both parties are able to have meaningful outcomes while contributing to the future growth of hypersonic talent,\u201d Bauer said.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"width:100%\"><div style=\"width: 15%;height: 10px;margin: 40px 0 px;border-bottom: 6px solid #ff8200\"><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Pushing the Envelope&nbsp;<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>The first team\u2019s success paved the way for continued funding of projects by LM. The senior design partnership is now in year three with the full intent of both parties to keep going for years to come.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Last year\u2019s UT team designed, fabricated, and tested a vapor chamber, which is like a heat pipe,&nbsp;for leading edge heat dissipation, specifically for hypersonic vehicles. The team\u2019s project, \u201cNovel 3-D Printed Heat Pipe Thermal Protection System,\u201d was recently awarded The Engineers Council&#8217;s Distinguished Engineering Project and&nbsp;was&nbsp;recognized on February 28,&nbsp;at an awards ceremony in Universal City, California.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This year\u2019s team is&nbsp;taking the heat&nbsp;pipes and seeing how they can apply them to a system level and make the components work together efficiently.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"683\" src=\"https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/03\/20251124_Engineering-0895-1500x1000-1-1024x683.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1820\" srcset=\"https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/03\/20251124_Engineering-0895-1500x1000-1-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/03\/20251124_Engineering-0895-1500x1000-1-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/03\/20251124_Engineering-0895-1500x1000-1-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/03\/20251124_Engineering-0895-1500x1000-1.jpg 1500w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cOur group is&nbsp;designing the mechanism that connects multiples&nbsp;of these&nbsp;heat pipes to&nbsp;the&nbsp;actual model,&nbsp;the leading-edge profile&nbsp;for a wing&nbsp;or vehicle,\u201d said UT senior aerospace major Cole Perry. \u201cBecause&nbsp;on&nbsp;their own,&nbsp;there are&nbsp;formations in&nbsp;between the heat pipes&nbsp;that get&nbsp;really hot.&nbsp;Our project&nbsp;is to&nbsp;design and develop&nbsp;a way for these&nbsp;heat pipes&nbsp;to&nbsp;connect.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Perry has appreciated how much the LM project has advanced his skill set in multiple areas.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cAs&nbsp;far&nbsp;the&nbsp;technical work goes, we&#8217;ve all had&nbsp;to&nbsp;pool stuff that we&#8217;ve taken from our undergrad experience&nbsp;in all of our classes,\u201d he said. \u201cThis project,&nbsp;specifically,&nbsp;is&nbsp;really advanced, and&nbsp;it\u2019s&nbsp;pushed us to broaden our skills and learn new ones. I think&nbsp;that\u2019s&nbsp;a huge benefit of senior design.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"width:100%\"><div style=\"width: 15%;height: 10px;margin: 40px 0 px;border-bottom: 6px solid #ff8200\"><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Career-Building Mentorship&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Officials from LM meet weekly with the senior design team to help guide the students through the process as&nbsp;well&nbsp;provide mentorship and career development advice that expands beyond the scope of the project.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIt&#8217;s been like a dream come true, because Lockheed Martin is&nbsp;everyone\u2019s&nbsp;dream company, or definitely mine&nbsp;as an&nbsp;aerospace engineering major&nbsp;at UT,\u201d said senior aerospace engineering major Kameron Ross. \u201cI know Lockheed is going into&nbsp;additive manufacturing, so&nbsp;hopefully learning from Lockheed engineers and seeing what they can do with additive&nbsp;manufacturing gives&nbsp;me hope of what the future can actually be and&nbsp;gives me a lot of great experience in that space.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"683\" src=\"https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/03\/20251124_Engineering-0626-1500x1000-1-1024x683.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1821\" srcset=\"https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/03\/20251124_Engineering-0626-1500x1000-1-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/03\/20251124_Engineering-0626-1500x1000-1-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/03\/20251124_Engineering-0626-1500x1000-1-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/03\/20251124_Engineering-0626-1500x1000-1.jpg 1500w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Senior mechanical engineering major Noah Kefauver admits it was initially intimidating to think about working with LM engineers because of the prestige of the company and knowing they would see his technical work.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cBut they&#8217;ve been&nbsp;an absolute joy&nbsp;to work with, and&nbsp;really&nbsp;great mentors to us,\u201d Kefauver said.&nbsp;\u201cI have learned so much from them and made connections that are going to benefit me for the future.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>McCord and his LM colleagues have been impressed with the outcomes of the projects and the ingenuity of the students involved.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cI think we can say we have been successful in showing industry and government offices that LM and UT have redefined what was previously thought possible to achieve through an undergraduate focused senior design project,\u2019 McCord said, \u201cThe students at UT are tackling complex design problems head on and delivering operational excellence.&nbsp; The effort continues to win awards and get recognition from national agencies. The support UT has provided for the project is&nbsp;just amazing&nbsp;and we could not have picked a better university to partner with on this.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"width:100%\"><div style=\"width: 15%;height: 10px;margin: 40px 0 px;border-bottom: 6px solid #ff8200\"><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Becoming a&nbsp;National Model&nbsp;<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>LM has challenged all the UT senior design teams to present their work at defense-focused conferences across the nation. The first-year project was presented at the University Consortium for Applied&nbsp;Hypersonics&nbsp;(UCAH) fall forum in Washington, DC.&nbsp;The presentation was supported by Motto and Benjamin Sparkman, who received praise for their efforts from national agencies such as the Joint&nbsp;Hypersonics&nbsp;Transition Office (JHTO) and Missile Defense Agency (MDA).&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Bauer is hoping to duplicate the senior design relationship between UT and LM at other universities across the country.&nbsp;He\u2019s&nbsp;been working through the JHTO to&nbsp;advocate&nbsp;the government to direct more workforce development money towards universities to allow more students to benefit.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThere are&nbsp;over&nbsp;a thousand students&nbsp;that are members of the&nbsp;UCAH, and only a fraction of them get&nbsp;any kind of hands-on experience,\u201d Bauer said. \u201cI&#8217;m arguing that models similar to&nbsp;what we are pioneering at UT&nbsp;would really promote workforce development and also contribute significantly to our ability to deal with some national security issues related to&nbsp;hypersonics.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"width:100%\"><div style=\"width: 15%;height: 10px;margin: 40px 0 px;border-bottom: 6px solid #ff8200\"><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Contact<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Rhiannon Potkey (<a href=\"mailto:rpotkey@utk.edu\">rpotkey@utk.edu<\/a>)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In need of support for a senior design project in hypersonics, UT found an instrumental partner in Lockheed Martin. The relationship has the potential to become a national model for workforce development in the field. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":1818,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,382],"tags":[403,529,327],"class_list":["post-1817","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-student","tag-hypersonics","tag-lockheed-martin","tag-senior-design"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Lockheed Martin Helps UT Launch Successful Hypersonics Senior Design Projects - Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"In need of support for a senior design project in hypersonics, UT found an instrumental partner in Lockheed Martin.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/news\/lockheed-martin-helps-ut-launch-successful-hypersonics-senior-design-projects\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Lockheed Martin Helps UT Launch Successful Hypersonics Senior Design Projects - 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