Five College of Engineering undergraduate research projects were singled out as award winners at this year’s EUReCA awards ceremony on March 29, 2012. They are:

“Thermal Stratification of a Twin Jet Mixing Experiment”: Lane Carasik and Christopher Baxter, Nuclear Engineering. The faculty sponsor was Dr. Art Ruggles.

“Haitian Green Wall”: Patrick Beasley, Brianna Cooper, Chad Tague, Joe Yantis, Biosystems Engineering. The faculty sponsor was Dr. Daniel Yoder.

“Quarter Scale Tractor Team”: Erick Foster, Mathew Menachery, Steven Motruk, and Jacob Smith, Biosystems Engineering. The faculty sponsor was Dr. William Hart.

“Multi-threaded Erasure Coding in Jerasure”: Michael Jugan, Computer Engineering. His faculty sponsor was Dr. James Plank.

“The Efficient Production of Esters in Whole Cell Biocatalysts”: Akshitha Yarrabothula and Katie Lutes, Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering. The faculty sponsor was Dr. Cong Trinh.

These awards come with a cash prize of $400, given by the Office of Research and the College of Engineering. There were seventeen total engineering entries from seven engineering departments. Special thanks to the faculty members on the judging team:

Dr. Stephen Paddison, Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
Dr. Al Womack, Biosystems Engineering
Dr. Zannatul Ferdous, Mechanical, Aerospace and Biomedical Engineering
Dr. Wes Hines, Nuclear Engineering

In addition, the project “Haitian Green Wall,” won the second annual University award for student project that best represented the concept of sustainability in all its aspects. The College of Engineering has now won this award both times it has been given. The same project also won one of the 6 all-university “best–of-show” awards.