Agent Plus Environment

In late July, a solicitation went out to all the Langley summer interns requesting that ten or so people write articles about their summer experiences. It arrived in my inbox alongside the usual selection of notifications, casual correspondence, and informative messages about upcoming activities. I almost passed it by, thinking someone else will respond. It occurred to me, however, that I know how to write. I could thread a story of my summer experiences into an entertaining and cohesive narrative of 500-750 words. So I did.

The article I wrote about my LARSS internship for the Langley Researcher News is up at An Intern’s Story: A Time to Test Flying Robots.

I encourage you to take a look!

My labmate Jake and I are in the NASA Langley photo of the week!

The photographer talked to us at the summer intern poster session last Wednesday. He saw our videos of the quadcopters in flight, rightly decided that these particular aerial vehicles are awesome, and asked us if we would mind a quick photo shoot.

It pays to work with cool robots.

Summer’s end

Yesterday was my last day at NASA Langley.

As always, leaving is bittersweet. Working in Garry’s lab has been fantastic and it’s going to be hard to find a job next summer that tops it. But I’m looking forward to senior year–a good lineup of classes, my thesis, the fencing team.

If I was to pick a favorite part of the summer, it’d be this: seeing my lab transition from complete strangers the first day, awkwardly introducing ourselves over lunch, to operating as a close-knit team. Helping each other carry computers to the freight elevator, debating algorithms for autonomous quadcopter obstacle avoidance, laughing over mugs of tea in the evenings. I’ve watched group formation theories in action (such as Tuckman’s forming-storming-norming-performing theory). It may sound cheesy, but we learned to work with our differences, figured out how to combine our strengths, and the result was amazing. The amount of work we got done this summer setting up the Autonomous Vehicle Lab impressed a lot of people at Langley.

Yes, I’m nostalgic already.

I met a plethora of great people and learned so much. I have more stories to share, of course. You’ll continue hearing about my LARSS summer in the coming weeks.

The problem with most advice is that it’s too general. So I thought I’d share a few of the specific and fascinating words of wisdom I’ve picked up during my LARSS summer:

1. Don’t fall in 2Gs. One of my labmates got to ride the vomit comet because of a science project he worked on, and not falling was one of the recommendations while aboard the plane. The rationale was this: If you fall, you’ll fall too fast. You’ll try to bring your arms up to catch yourself–it usually works, but here, your reflexes will be too slow. Your face will hit the ground and your nose will smash as your arms are still moving up to catch you.
2. Astronauts have to be a certain kind of person. My mentor, Garry D. Qualls, told me about a colleague of his who became an astronaut. Evidently, they take a certain type of person. Gregarious, outgoing. Dedicated. The kind of person who, upon receiving a task, will be content doing that task day in and day out to the very best of his/her ability–astronauts have to practice the tasks they’ll be doing in space for a long time beforehand. The kind of person who can speak reasonably well to large groups and who enjoys meeting all kinds of people, since a huge part of the job is public relations.
3. Always double-check baud rates, port numbers, and IP addresses. Save before recompiling, have a common ground, make sure to use charged batteries, and give your program the right input arguments if it requires them. Installing the referenced libraries usually helps, too.
4. Stick with your federal/government job for at least three years. At the grad seminar, held in June with the goal of providing student interns with information about post-baccalaureate options, one of the speakers commented offhand that if you do become a fed, if you stick with it long enough, you’ll get reinstatement rights. I did a little googling to see what kind of rights those are: Evidently, it means you can reenter the fed workforce without competing for the job with the general public. It doesn’t mean you automatically get a job offer. There are obviously some restrictions, but regardless, good to know! That page also mentions that if you don’t work a government job for three years, you get reinstatement rights for only three years after you leave.
5. Ask about details when investigating grad schools. The grad seminar included a panel of three students (graduate or just finished) who each spoke a bit about how they had gotten to their current place in life. One of the students offered advice on good questions to ask the professors at schools you’re considering: If you’d get to do research, what would the specifics be? Not just the topic, but how much time would be spent sitting in front of a computer? reading papers? attending conferences?

I’ll continue sharing stories about what I’ve learned this summer, so be sure to check back soon!

Not your everyday summer job

This summer, I’ve been working for NASA as an intern in the Langley Aerospace Research Summer Scholars Program. In a one-sentence summary, I’m working with a systems engineering team to develop and integrate the software and hardware needed for both indoor and outdoor tests of autonomous, unmanned multi-vehicle flight control.

But what does that mean, in terms of what I actually do?

It means the past seven weeks have been spent laboring over keyboards, switching between C, C++, Java, and Processing. I’ve carried my lab’s miniature Parking Lot Exploration Rover outside in 105ºF weather to test a navigation algorithm. I’ve learned about PID controls, GPS sensors, and radio communication. I’ve evaluated ground control station software, delved into the depths of an open source flight simulator, and discovered how tricky network protocols can be. I’ve written software for 3D data display programs, data parsers, and communication links. I’ve learned that when you’re one of a team of ten interns, all tackling pieces of the same large project, communication is crucial.

I’m enjoying this internship immensely. Vassar News just released an ego-boosting article about me and my summer, which I suggest you check out.

You’ll be hearing more from me on this subject. Stay tuned.