Engineering

Computational BCC Refractory High-Entropy Alloys

This project simulated the formational energy and equilibrium phases of body-centered cubic (BCC) refractory high-entropy alloys (HEAs). Perfect crystal supercells were generated in a random and special quasirandom (SQS) atomic placement. Generated perfect crystals were modified to have either a vacancy or an interstitial carbon atom. Total energy for each structure was then calculated. After, phase diagrams were calculated for the equi-atomic HEAs. The software used for simulating included nanoHUB, BURAI, and Thermo-Calc.

Evidation

Evidation Health is a company that collects biometric data from a wide variety of wearable devices through their app, Achievement. Evidation is built upon a foundation of user privacy and control over permissioned health data. This project is in partnership with them, focusing on creating a standard data model and ETL tool for sleep and step data across the wearable devices Fitbit, Apple Watch, and Oura Ring. A successful standardization would make this data more efficient for analysis, and in turn better aid with understanding disease and human health.

Outer Ear

Hello everyone, we are the Outer Ear Team. We worked with Charlie Gutierrez for the 2020-2021 school year on designing a vibrotactile haptic feedback stabilizing vest to aid stroke patients who cannot find their equilibrium while standing. This device is made so that potential individuals can use a different feedback system and relearn how to balance.

SciTechatorium Senior Project: the Oscylinderscope

Four mechanical engineering students attending Cal Poly San Luis Obispo began a year-long journey in Fall 2020 to create an interactive, hands-on experience for the users of Bellevue Santa Fe Charter School’s SciTechatorium. Nestled in the hills of Avila Beach, California, the Bellevue Santa Fe Charter School (BCFCS) is a place where children and adults work together to create a safe, supportive, inspiring and challenging school community. The SciTechatorium is an on-campus museum filled with exhibits geared towards Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Math (STEAM) concepts. Its main purpose, to be a place where students can explore the world around them through STEAM. During this project, the team of engineers sought out to embody the BCFCS motto: “What we learn with pleasure, we never forget.” The team tailored their project to complement current curriculum and existing exhibits; ultimately, deciding to build an oscylinderscope, a spinning drum that creates a strobe effect behind a set of guitar strings. This effect reveals vibration patterns in the strings after they are plucked.

Adapted Tricycle

Tensile Testing Environmental Chamber

This project is to design an environmental chamber for an existing tensile testing machine in the Cal Poly composites lab. The sponsor for this project, Dr. Elghandour, needs to control the temperature of the environment chamber in order to test the material properties of samples under different thermal conditions. Grad students such as Marius Jatulis and Abdul Mohamed will use the environmental chamber to perform these tests, as well as any future Cal Poly student interested in learning about material properties in different temperatures.

Two teams will collaborate to create this project: one focusing on the physical structure of the chamber (Structures Team), and one focusing on the temperature control components (Controls Team).