MIT Aeronautics and Astronautics Department
enews Vol 4, #7
June 2008

In this issue:

1. Four Receive Department Annual Awards
2. Spakovskzy Named GTL Director
3. Best Paper Awards Bestowed
4. Two Alums Nominated as Astronauts
5. RASC-AL Team Cited for Lunar Living Concept
6. MIT Acronym Site Revised as WIKI

1. FOUR RECEIVE DEPARTMENT ANNUAL AWARDS

At a late May Aero-Astro 2008 awards lunch, the following honors were presented:
- Spirit of XVI Award To recognize sustained excellence by a member of the staff or a team of staff members in Aero-Astro, whose work, commitment, and enthusiasm contribute significantly to the achievement of the mission of the department. Barbara Lechner – In recognition of her caring and effective advice, help, and encouragement of the graduate students of Aeronautics and Astronautics, and her willingness to go the extra mile to help graduate students achieve their goals, all done with grace and a ready smile.

- Wings Awards To recognize an individual support staff member in Aero-Astro for excellence. Julie Finn – In recognition of her outstanding dedication to her faculty, her commitment to helping faculty and students succeed, her reliability and efficiency, and her inexhaustible good nature and sense of humor. Jean Sofronas – In recognition of her consistently outstanding performance of a myriad of complex duties supporting the faculty, research staff, and students of the ACDL, exceeding expectations on all fronts, and exceptional support of faculty teaching and department academic programs, all done with seamless efficiency and effectiveness.

- Vickie Kerrebrock Award To recognize students, staff, faculty, or others, either individually or as members of a group, who have made significant contributions to building a sense of community in the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics at MIT. Mark Drela – In recognition of his unparalleled commitment to the students of Aero/Astro, and his long history of outstanding teaching and mentoring, and fostering enthusiasm, community, and passion for aerospace among students, past and present.

Congratulations to all recipients.

2. SPAKOVSZKY NAMED GTL DIRECTOR

Professor Zoltan Spakovszky is the new director of the Gas Turbine Laboratory, assuming the role previously held by Professor Alan Epstein who is stepping down after serving as GTL director for 12 years. Aero-Astro head Professor Ian Waitz said of Spakovsky's appointment, "I look forward to working with Zolti in this role. He is a clear thinker, a strong leader, and a first-rate scholar who contributes practical advances in gas turbine engineering through developing fundamental insights into complex phenomena. I fully expect great things from the lab in the years ahead."

3. BEST PAPER AWARDS PRESENTED

Professor Moe Win was presented with the Best Paper Award at the recent International Conference on Communications in Beijing. ICC is a premier conference of the IEEE Communications Society and receives thousands of paper submissions.

Ruijie "RJ" He, Sam Prentice and Aero-Astro Professor Nicholas Roy received the Best Paper Award at the International Conference on Robotics and Information in Phoenix. The paper was titled "Planning in Information Space for a Quadrotor Helicopter in a GPS-denied Environments." Ruiji He completed his S.M. in Aero-Astro last month, and Prentice was completing his MEng in Course VI when they wrote it.

A paper co-authored by Professor Olivier de Weck titled “Assessing Risks and Opportunities of Technology Infusion in System Design” was selected as the 2007 Best Paper of the Year to appear in the journal Systems Engineering, the scientific journal of the International Council on Systems Engineering.

4. TWO ALUMS NOMINATED AS ASTRONAUTS

Dr. Paul Cefola writes that two Aero-Astro graduates have been named U.S. Air Force nominees to the astronaut selection process: Jack Fischer (MS '98) and Jim Smith (MS '99). Both were USAF Draper Fellows while at MIT. In other astronaut news, Alum Greg Chamitoff emails from his new home, the International Space Station, that he has the Aero-Astro department photo with him on the ISS and is looking forward to a videocon with AA students being arranged for this fall.

5. RASC-AL TEAM CITED FOR LUNAR LIVING CONCEPT

MIT's Revolutionary Aerospace Concepts - Academic Linkage (RASC-AL) team won a first place graduate level award for its "Living on the Lunar Surface: A Minimalist Approach" concept at a competition in Florida June 9-11. The award was presented by a panel of NASA and industry judges. According to Professor Jeff Hoffman, this was the first time that a team from MIT has entered the RASC-AL competition. "Most teams submit results of senior or graduate design courses, but the MIT team developed two concepts (the other was "A Multifunctional Lunar Robotic Assistant: A Unique Concept Enabled by Humans and Robots Working Together") without the benefit of a class," Hoffman says. Participating students included Emily Grosse, SeungBum Hong, Phillip Cunio, Wilfried Hofstetter, Arthur Guest, and Ryan McLinko. All are graduate students except McLinko and Grosse. Hoffman notes that while he was the team's advisor, "they were completely self-motivated and did all the work themselves."

6. MIT ACRONYM SITE REVISED AS WIKI

How many times have you nodded sagely as an MIT colleague drops acronyms -- without any idea to what this person is referring? Next time this happens to you, you may find some help in the newly-revised MIT Acronyms and Abbreviation Web site. Created some years ago by MIT staffer Janet Snover, the site was most recently administrated for the Institute by Bill Litant of Aero-Astro and Catherine Avril, formerly of the SoE (look it up). The site has recently been revised as a Wiki, so now you can not only decipher these initialisms, you can amaze your friends by adding your own. Instructions for editing/adding appear on the site's home page https://wikis.mit.edu/confluence/display/ACRONYMS/Acronyms+Home The first time you edit a page, keep the home page/instructions open in a separate browser window for easy reference.

If you know of events, honors, activities, or other information you'd like to see in the next issue of Aero-Astro enews, please send to wlitant@mit.edu - we'd be pleased to include it!