Payloads developed by the team are scientific experiments that take advantage of the high altitudes, extreme launch forces and micro-gravity experienced in our flight up to 30,000 ft. As Payload Lead, I led the design of a 3U CubeSat and radiation sensor suite to test material samples and detect secondary cosmic radiation passing through our rocket. Our payload was eventually selected as one of the Top 10 Payloads in the SDL Payload Challenge and won the prize for Most Professional Design at the Spaceport America Cup 2021/2022 competitions

CubeSats are a type of standardized nanosatellites. The CubeSat structure shown here was designed to be a modular assembly that minimizes the number of unique parts. Each module slides into the satellite for easy access and operation in the field. The design of this satellite was validated using hand calculations and ANSYS structural and vibrational FEA. Manufacturing was a mix of in-house student manufacturing and sponsored CNC fabrication from Demtool Inc. The final iteration of the CubeSat was flown on the inaugral flight of Leviathan of the Sky during the Spaceport America Cup 2023 competition.

I joined the Payload subteam back in September 2018 when I first joined the team. As the subteam I have spent the most time with, I have worked on numerous projects including the designing and manufacturing of the team’s 2019 payload. This experiment assessed the properties of 3D printed parts with varying infills and materials such as PLA and PET-G during the flight of our rocket. By weighing these parts down with steel and aluminum loads, we were able to conduct an analysis on the viability of integrating 3D printed parts into future iterations of our rocket. A practical application of 3D parts that we flew within the rocket was a biological capsule that housed berry seeds. This was flown to test the effects of hypergravity and microgravity on fruit seeds and experimental testing is still ongoing as the plants continue to mature.

In April 2019 I decided to join the Airframe subteam to gain experience in the design and manufacturing of the exterior of the rocket's structure. Since then, I have helped with the research, manufacturing, and assembly of our fibreglass nosecone and the team’s first carbon fibre fin can. I worked with the team in redesigning the fibreglass nosecone, selecting a Von Kármán shape and 4:1 fineness ratio to optimize the geometry for subsonic and transonic flight. I also participated in the numerous late-night wet layups where we used epoxy, carbon fibre, fibreglass, an aluminum mandrel and a vacuum to manufacture our fin can. Joining this subteam has taught me a lot about the fabrication and applications of composites materials!

For the 2020/2021 competition, I co-led the manufacturing of our new fibreglass nosecone. Using a Von Kármán geometry optimized to reduce drag in subsonic and transonic speeds, we created the part using two female MDF molds and a scarf-joint layup.

Another major composites project I participated in was the manufacturing of the rocket's fin can. While the fin can tube was created through a layup of multiple layers of carbon fibre fabric, the fins were cut from stock and then epoxied onto the tube. The fin can was finished with only minor imperfections. Ultimately these imperfections were neglible as the rocket performed outstandingly during flight, surviving near supersonic speeds without the fins shearing off.

The recovery deployment mechanism in our rocket has always been one of the least developed subsystems within our rocket. That's why in April 2019 I decided to join the subteam along with a few first years with the goal of developing the team's first fully operational recovery deployment system. During my time with the subteam, I helped design and manufacture the electronics sled and integrate it onto the aluminum bulkhead within our fibreglass nosecone. This was a key component of the subsystem as the sled contained all the recovery electronics needed to deploy our drogue and main parachutes. The design was especially challenging as this section had been moved into the nosecone, reducing the available amount of free space dramatically while additional components had been added compared to the year before.

To verify a functional design, we conducted a mock parachute-deployment test in which we loaded the section with CO2 cannisters and simulated a recovery deployment explosion. In the end the recovery section succeeded in deploying our drogue parachute during descent, however it failed to deploy the main parachute. This failure was attributed to the faulty pyrocutters that failed to sever the cord that anchored the main parachute within its body tube.

When I started with the team, I joined the Data Acquisition Team where I helped the team upgrade the hardware used to collect data on our rocket. During our cold flow and static fire tests of our engine, I worked with the team to integrate load cells and differential pressure sensors in our setup to collect data on the performance of our engine. This was made possible using a custom program made on National Instrument's LabVIEW. Furthermore, I helped the team test and troubleshoot PCBs created by our electrical team using KiCad and oscilloscopes to ensure that we collect accurate and complete data. This also involved research into op-amps, power supplies and other components to conduct a noise analysis in order to figure out the source of the loss of data from our load cells.

The hydroponics systems that exist on the market today lack automation and have a high barrier to entry for small-scale users. Planter introduces a fully automated and user-friendly consumer-oriented hydroponics system to make growing plants easy for anyone! A project resulting from my fourth-year design project!

In hydroponics systems, the roots of plants are submerged in nutrient-rich water providing them with the essential elements needed for them to grow. In comparison to traditional growth methods, hydroponics requires less water, less space to grow, and provide faster growth rates.

My focus on this project was the mechanical design and electro-mechanical integration. This included the design for manufacturing and assembly of the structure, electronics enclosure, and peripheries. As both a prototype and a consumer product, the structure was designed to be strong and durable while easy to assemble in minutes. The electronics module was in turn designed for easy access and display throughout manufacturing and testing. A full failure and tipping analysis was also conducted for the system.

Lamper Labs is a project focused on developing a robotic fish capable of gathering data in shallow ocean environments and blending into its environment for marine biology research. The robotic fish is wirelessly controlled and features a range of sensors and instrumentation to facilitate research purposes

A major component of the fish is the mechanical design of the propulsion system and enclosure. Mimicking the natural movements of a fish is challenging to replicate and has required multiple design iterations to fine-tune the caudal fin propulsion system.

The propulsion system is a continuous-rotating system where two oppositely rotating turntables (green box below) pull on a set of wires routed through the ribs of the tail seen on the left.

As the turntables rotate opposite of each other, each wire will alternate being in tension while the other remains slack, oscillating the tail similar to the movements of a tuna when swimming.

The Canadian Reduced Gravity Experiment Design Challenge (CAN-RGX) is a competition for Canadian post-secondary students to design and test a small scientific experiment on board a Falcon-20 which had been modified for reduced gravity flight to simulate the effects of microgravity. This competition was made possible through a collaboration with the National Research Council and the Canadian Space Agency.

As a part of a team of 8 students in Waterloo Rocketry's Payload division, I helped design and test an experiment that aimed to characterize the physics of ferrofluids and collodial fluids under the influence of a magnetic field in simulated microgravity. This was done with the goal of determining the potential applications of ferrofluids in commercial applications for the space industry. On July 24, 2019, I had the amazing opportunity fly aboard the Falcon-20 to conduct our experiment as one of the primary mission specialists.

Our experiment consisted of multiple geometries of 2-dimensional containers positioned on the back wall of a Pelican Case that were partially filled with ferrofluid. On the front side of the case, there was a phone camera taking videos of the fluid which were analyzed post-experiment. Magnets were added around the experiment to allow us to precisely control the magnitude and direction of the external force being applied to the system. Since in microgravity the only force acting on a fluid is its surface tension, this allowed us to see how a fluid would react to itself and the container in which it was confined within. This made it possible for us to observe exactly how external forces affected factors like contact angle, droplet size and free-surface shape.

During our design cycle, we also pursued the design and manufacturing of a solenoid-powered fluid system controlled by an STM32 Blue Pill and H-bridge as a potential space industry application for pumping liquid oxygen and satellite cooling systems without the use of moving mechanical components. This design consisted of a loop of a circular fluid loop with a solenoid stack attached on one of the sides. An identical loop without a pump was placed beside this loop to serve as a control. A flow meter was used to measure the flow rate of the fluid in the loop, and pressure sensors before and after the pump measured the pressure differential across the pump. It was discovered that this model would not be viable for commerical applications due to the low flow rates measured without the use of excessive power consumption in the system.

You can find a summary of the campagin's events and footage from the flight here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ca5r7QK3vPc

In high school, I founded a scientific news site called Newsoftheuniverse.com. This is a site where I share scientific discoveries, studies and breakthroughs that I have read online and transform them into densely-packed articles suitable for any audience. Eventually this side-project of mine expanded and it became a multi-school team project. At its peak, our team comprised of 20+ students from universities across the nation publishing articles in different fields in science including physics, engineering and the medical sciences.

Throughout this experience, I have made a lot of mistakes, resulting in personal failures like inconsistent postings and unmotivated volunteers. However, from these faults I have felt more inspired to improve upon my failures as a manager and a team member. This has resulted in better communication, more frequent company get-togethers and concise organization policies, all of which have benefited every member of the team.

In the summer of 2017, I joined the Google Eclipse Megamovie as an official project photographer. My role was to collect visual data of the solar eclipse in Wyoming while educating others at my site about the science behind the sun. On the day of the eclipse, I captured footage of the different phases of the eclipse as it progressed and also captured key events including Bailey’s Beads and solar flares. This data was later made available to the public by Google and UC Berkley which benefited scientists around the world who could use our database to further their research in solar science.

You can access the full datasets either on Google Cloud or Kaggle.