1

Spring Merit Badge Day - Volunteers and scouts

Greetings everyone! It is now the spring quarter of this amazing year. IEEE-UCR has been given the opportunity to do some awesome things this

year, from professional development to just bonding with one another.

For some, our graduating seniors, it’s the last quarter of our college lives. The end of a chapter. But if we have learned from

being in IEEE, it’s that we never stop learning. I’m going to miss this great bunch I call my IEEE family, because that is what

we are a family. We are all going in separate directions after June. Some to enter industry and start our careers while others

to continue their education. But I know we are leaving some awesome leaders behind to

continue opening doors for the org and welcoming new members each day. We all hope

to leave something for everyone to remember us by and here it is, this newsletter. Not

all of our memories are in this newsletter but these are some of the greatest moments

that have been spent with the IEEE family.

So let’s look back at what we have done since our first newsletter because so much has

happened since then. And let’s also meet those great leaders that are to continue grow-

ing this IEEE family and lead the next generation of members.

Enjoy!

- Rosalba Anzora, 2014-2015 Public Relations

P.S. Congratulations Class of 2015! Great job on all the hard work you have done.

In This Issue

Project Updates

Merit Badge Day

Talks and Tours

New Board Bios

Upcoming Events

HIGHLIGHTS IEEE-UCR Quarterly Newsletter Vol. 2 - SPRING 2015

Created by: 2014 - 2015 IEEE Board

2

Project Updates

UAV The UAV is currently in its final phase of its de-

velopment. By the end of the April all of our sub-

systems will be fully implemented and tested.

Starting in May we will be conducting systems

integration testing, as well as writing the tech-

nical journal and preparing for the safety briefing.

In early March we passed the major milestone of

conducting the successful test flight of our first

full sized airframe prototype (Bison 1). Construc-

tion on Bison 2 is nearing completion and we

should be conducting the first test flight on April

12th. Once that is completed we will take the

lessons learned and begin production of the final competition

airframe which is scheduled to be completed on May 3rd.

The successful flight of the competition airframe (The Flying

Bison) will mark the beginning of system integration testing

phase. We will start the testing by tuning the autopilot to the

Flying Bison airframe and using Bison 2 for flight tests of the

payload and communication systems. By June 1st we expect

our Unmanned Aerial System to be fully tested and the team

to be ready for flight operations.

Also, we need help funding the transportation of the equip-

ment and the team to Maryland for the competition. If you

would like more information or would like to contribute

please go to the following link to see our campaign: http://

bit.ly/1ykGGlh.

- Andrew Olguin, 2014-2015 UAV Coordinator

Micromouse The Micromouse Robotics project is for students to design,

build, and program a mobile robot from scratch and have the

robot autonomously navigate, search, and solve an unknown

16x16 cell maze in the fastest time possible. UCR held an

internal Micromouse Robotics competition on April 5th,

which 7 teams competed in. The success of organizing and

hosting this competition has brought considerable positive

attention to the UC Riverside campus. As a result, IEEE at

UCR was nominated to host the IEEE Region 6 Southern

Meeting Micromouse and Student Design Competition,

which was previously held at UCLA.

Currently, the UCR Micromouse Robotics teams are finish-

ing up hardware designing/building and have moved on to

software development. The software implementation is cru-

cial to getting the robot to traverse and search through the

maze. To do so, sensor feedback, motor control,

as well as searching and mapping algorithms must

be executed simultaneously.

The IEEE UCR teams will be competing with ex-

ternal universities at three competitions during this

spring quarter: UCR Region 6 on May 2nd, UCLA

AAMC on May 10th, and UCSD CAMM on May

17th. Best wishes to all the teams!

- Rex Lu, 2014-2015 Robotics Coordinatior

Display Board The IEEE Display Board is an interactive

slideshow that users can control with a Kinect. It

gives

UAV Team

3

people information about BCOE news, information about

club meetings and events and even weather all updated in

real-time. The project will become a permanent addition in

the on campus cafe, Bytes, for anyone to use once com-

pleted.

The students on the team are working with web based lan-

guages to make both the slides and to program the Kinect.

The majority of students on the project are learning these

languages from scratch. So far, we have finished half of

the slides and are able to keep them updated in real-time

using a database, various APIs, and a web crawler we also

built.

The end goal of this project is to have students learn new,

useful programming languages and learn about fields such

as web-design and computer vision. They also learn to work

as part of a team to design and create a product from the

ground up, and to make something to leave for people on

campus to use years after they graduate.

- Kashyap Krishna, 2015-2016 Display Board Coordinator

Electric Car Electric Car is a brand new project that started this quarter.

Our goal is to build a car to compete in the Formula SAE

Electric competition next year in Lincoln, Nebraska. We

started recruiting to form a multidisciplinary team to design

the electrical powertrain.

As of now, we are undergoing the initial research stage. By

the end of the quarter we aim to draw a proposal, which will

include specs, simulation results, and a cost-benefit analy-

sis. Using this proposal, we aim to raise funds and collabo-

rate with SAE.

- Sonya Ragothaman, 2015-2016 Electric Car Coordinator

Talks and Tours

3D Printer Talk On February 2nd 2015, IEEE@UCR and the IEEE

Computer Society cohosted a talk by Steve Wygant &

John Olafson from SeeMeCNC about the current filed

of 3-D printing and where the field is heading. We had

over 70 professionals and students attend the event.

It was a great opportunity to learn about how the craze

of 3-D printing started, who the major players are now,

and what the field of 3-D printing will look like in a few

years. We also learned about what technical skills it

takes to design and build a 3-D printer.

After the presentation, Steven and John took us to see their

17-foot tall 3-D printer they brought all the way from Illinois.

We had a great time learning about 3-D printers, seeing

them in action and networking with some of the top dogs in

the 3-D printing field.

- Russell Perry, 2014-2015 Chair

Alumni Panel On February 3rd, 2015, we hosted our first Alumni Panel.

We welcomed back alumni that had previously been on the

IEEE board. The following attended: Eu-Jin Ooi (Class of

2014), Josh Morales (Class of 2014), Roben Van Dusen

(Class of 2014), Rosemblim Lugo (Class of 2014), and

Sean Chen (Class of 2013). All are electrical engineers

working in the industry, except Josh who is attending Gradu-

ate School here at UCR.

During the panel, each alum shared their experiences as

undergrad. As well as, how they went about starting post

grad life. While some applied for grad school others were

applying for jobs and internships. Our members took this

opportunity also to ask questions about how they chose to

3D Printer Talk

4

work in industry or go to grad school. The night ended well .

Can’t wait for next year’s.

- Rosalba Anzora, 2014-2015 Public Relations

Western Digital Tour Friday the 17th of April, saw students from IEEE@UCR visit-

ing the headquarters of Western Digital in Irvine, Ca. Stu-

dents from IEEE mingled with peers from Pomona, Long

Beach and other universities from around the area. The

Western Digital tour started with a panel of current employ-

ees of the company with various backgrounds. Panelists an-

swered student questions on different aspects of working

with Western Digital and their journey to get there. Following

the panel, a tear down of a WD hard drive began along with a

presentation and explanation of all the ways engineers and

computer scientists come together to create such an intricate

and essential device. The large group of students from a

plethora of universities was then split up into groups of

whichever form of production they were more interested in

such as circuit board prototyping and manufacturing. Overall,

it was an informative tour featuring enlightening views of the

lives of current employees and a glimpse into the future for

those who would now like to be.

- Daniel Garcia, 2015-2016 Program Chair

Silicon Valley Trip This year we got to make the most epic trip IEEE has ever

coordinated to Silicon Valley. Even though it was only for two

days, it was two days filled with exciting and adventurous fun!

The trip started on April 24th, 2015 at 3am. Most of the mem-

bers met up Friday morning to begin their 7 hour drive to the

bay area, while some who left the day before eagerly awaited

their arrival.

We all were given the opportunity to tour Facebook, arranged

by Brian Crites, which was AWESOME! We got to see how

Facebook employees eat, play, and work. We had all heard

of the great amenities Facebook employees have, but it is

much different once you get to experience it. The have an on

campus arcade with many different games. The one that got

the most attention from most of us was FIFA. The also have

a variety of restaurants where they get to eat for free. We got

to stop at their Sweet Shop, where there is a wide selection

of pastries, ice cream, and frozen yogurt. We ended our time

at the Facebook HQ taking a selfie in front of there big like

sign they have at the front of campus.

We also got to tour Google right after Facebook. Some of us

got lost at Google using Google Maps, which was pretty fun-

ny. We got to tour their visitor center, guided by UCR Alum

Chris Manghane. We were able to ask him all kinds of ques-

tions, like did he always think he would work for Google, how

did he start his career at Google, and etc. He gladly an-

swered all of our questions and told us so much about what it

was like on a day to day basis at work.

We ended our Friday having dinner in downtown Mountain

View with UCR Alum, and former board member, Andrew

Ong. He told us about his job at Raytheon and his post Grad

life. And we caught him up with all we have been doing here

at IEEE-UCR. Some of our new board was with us so they

had the great opportunity to connect with a former board

member and ask for advice for the year to come.

On Saturday, April 25th, 2015, some of us got to attend the

IEEE - Women in Engineering Career Fair in San Jose. It

was a great opportunity to network and a chance to leave our

resumes with some of the top companies in the industry. We

also learned about some of the great benefits IEEE has to

offer its national members.

We ended our trip visiting the Computer History Museum in

Mountain View. That was one place that everyone should

visit when given the chance. It was amazing to see how

much society has advanced, continues to advance, and soon

we will be apart of that advancement as well.

Apart from the great time everyone had on the tours, I think

the best part was being able to bond with one another. I got

to meet members that I hadn’t met before and got to know a

few I had seen before a bit better. So thank you to everyone

who was able to attend the trip and making it memorable.

- Rosalba Anzora, 2014-2015 Public Relations

Outreach

Merit Badge Day (Jan. 31 & Apr. 11) IEEE hosted our second Merit Badge Day of the school year

on January 31st, 2015. Over a hundred boy scouts visited

UCR and the Bourns College of Engineering to earn some

merit badges and learn about STEM (Science, Technology,

Engineering and Mathematics) in the process. January’s

event involved topics regarding Electricity, Electronics, and

Digital Technology.

Likewise, over a hundred boy scouts also attended our third

Merit Badge Day, which was held on April 11th 2015, many

of whom had attended the previous merit badge day. April

saw scouts earning merit badges on Energy, Engineering,

and Robotics.

The events have been a great success with volunteers and

scouts alike enjoying their time. Our Merit Badge Days have

5

successfully engaged boy scouts and retained their interest throughout. Our success can be attributed to our amazing and

creative volunteers.

- Daniel Garcia, 2015-2016 Program Chair

2015-2016 Board

UAV Coordinator

Brandon Lu

Chair

Alberto Tam Yong

"I'm very excited for the upcoming

school year and working with the

newly elected board. We have sever-

al IEEE projects, so I can't wait to see

how much these teams grow; and I

hope to see our IEEE family grow as

well."

Vice Chair

Jasmine Moreno

“Becoming Vice Chair is very exciting.

I cannot wait to contribute more to

IEEE, and grow closer to the board. It

is going to be a difficult position, but I

know it will be a great learning experi-

ence.”

6

Got Questions/

Comments?

For General Information:

ieeeucr@gmail.com

For Project Information:

Brandon Lu

2014-2015

Project Coordinator

blu006@ucr.edu

Kevin Yang

2015-2016

Project Coordinator

kyang014@ucr.edu

Interested in Guest Speaking, Giving a Tech-nical Talk, Providing a Tour, or Donating to the UCR Student Branch

Contact our

Public Relations Officer:

Rosalba Anzora

ranzo001@ucr.edu

Professional Development Officer:

Cody Simons

csimo005@ucr.edu

Thank you all for your time.

Upcoming Events

IEEE Region 6 Southern Area Meeting

And

Micromouse Competition

Saturday, May 2, 2015

DARPA Robotics

Challenge June 5-6, 2015