IM体育官网 students presented their completed senior industry-sponsored projects at the Innovation, Science, and Technology building during the annual Capstone Design Showcase on April 27.
Teams of IM体育官网 seniors showed off their hard work on industry-sponsored, tech-focused projects at the annual Capstone Design Showcase on Wednesday, April 27.
The capstone program pairs interdisciplinary teams of students with corporate partners who have a real-world challenge they would like addressed. The students work on building high-tech solutions to these challenges throughout the academic year.
This year鈥檚 showcase was held at the Innovation, Science, and Technology building and featured more than 40 projects sponsored by companies or agencies such as Lakeland Regional Health, the Navy Special Warfare Center, AVRA Medical Robotics, and the IM体育官网 Space Institute/NASA Kennedy Space Center.
鈥淭his was a great experience, and it was similar to an internship because along the way we鈥檙e getting meetings, talking to clients, gathering what they want, and implementing it and getting feedback,鈥� said Davis Insua, part of a computer science duo who completed a project for fayVen, a company that connects vendors with available space to sell their goods. 鈥淚 think this is really good practice for how industry actually works.鈥�
The students added features and improvements to an existing website to facilitate the vendor-venue relationship. Insua said the project鈥檚 sponsor plans to continue moving their work forward.
鈥淚t鈥檚 a good feeling to know we have an actual, deployable product,鈥� he said.
Nearby, a team of students exhibited their project: low-visibility concealable antennas for the U.S. Department of Defense鈥檚 Special Operations Command. The team was tasked with researching emerging technologies for concealable antennas that operators could wear undetected in the field.
鈥淟et鈥檚 say there鈥檚 an operator by himself in an airport, you don鈥檛 want to draw attention with a big antenna pack or a radio with a visible antenna; you want to blend in with other bystanders,鈥� said Samuel Bell, an electrical engineering major. 鈥淭he idea with this is you can get into spaces you wouldn鈥檛 be able to get into with a more visible option.鈥�
While the team鈥檚 sponsor was primarily interested in the research, Bell and Logan Hawkins, a computer engineering major, took the project a step further and built a proof-of-concept prototype wearable antenna.
鈥淲e wanted to build it to prove the research we found was applicable and wasn鈥檛 just brainstorming,鈥� Hawkins said.
The capstone showcase was the culmination of a year of hard work, focus, and determination, and it is a requirement for all seniors before graduation.
鈥淭he experience was a blast,鈥� said Britta Thompson, an electrical engineering major whose team created a multi-mesh communication solution for managed IT services company Corserva. The students built a network to transmit information between nodes and gateways to communicate important data from hotel room locks.
鈥淚 was not too familiar with networking given my major, but I learned a lot and had a ton of fun.鈥�
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