Written by Alex Undlin
Over the last few days it has started to finally feel like I really have a reason to be here. The first two weeks were mostly just filled with rushing from one meeting to another, meeting people who would hopefully have something for us to do. During the third week about half of us had jobs, but Chris, other Alex and myself were kind of left floating. We had the catapult to work on but we knew that once Friday came around we would be more or less out of things to do.
I became excited at the end of the week when I was put into contact with Dr. Camilleri, the head of the cybernetics department at the University of Malta, who was generous enough to invite me into his lab to show me the work he and his team had been doing. While it was, in my opinion, the most interesting meeting I have been to since I have arrived in Malta, unfortunately due to the fact that at the time of the meeting I only had two weeks remaining in the country this meeting did not result in a project to occupy the remainder of my time here. However during the course of our discussion he mentioned that he wanted to start an international master’s program in biomedical engineering, and it just so happened that one of the schools he was looking into partnering with was Michigan Tech. So I told him I would put him in contact with the head of our biomedical engineering department Dr. Kirkpatrick. For now I have sent off an email explaining the situation to Dr. Kirkpatrick and am excited for the potential to be a part of joining our universities.
Shortly before I was put in contact with Dr. Camilleri I sent a message to one of the groups we had met with in our first two weeks, the Formula SAE team at the University of Malta, to see if Chris and I could be of any use to them. Thankfully, they got back to us rather quickly with something we could do to help. On Monday we went in and met with Anthea, who asked if we would be interested in helping her test the tensile strength of their carbon fiber and fiberglass, we of course eagerly agreed. She told us that we would need to make three samples of each material, gave us the necessary dimensions, she told us to come back the next day with our calculations done so we could prepare the samples. She also told us that the curing process for the materials would take eight hours, and since the oven they were using had only been used once before someone would have to likely have to stay with it the whole time to make sure nothing went wrong. She asked us if we would be willing to stay and watch the oven, we of course agreed, although this time less than eagerly.
So today we went back to the garage of the SAE team, calculations in hand, ready for a long dull day. After getting the materials out of a -22 degree Celsius freezer, which felt like a refreshing taste of home to Chris and I--and unbearably cold to Anthea--we started measuring and cutting the strips of material for the test. Anthea left Chris and I alone to work, confident in our abilities to not mess up too badly. Over the next few hours we managed to measure, cut, and assemble the necessary samples. After we finished I sent a message to Anthea that we were ready to place them in the oven and begin our next phase of waiting and hoping nothing catches fire. She came and instructed us on how to place the samples and set up their home made oven. Thankfully, after the oven was prepared, she told us that she had changed her mind and did not think it would be necessary for us to stay and watch the oven as she and another team member, Kurt, would be nearby for the rest of the day and they agreed it would be unnecessary to have someone watch it the whole time and be fine if one of them checked on it once an hour or so. We said our goodbyes and Anthea told us that she would message me in the morning once the samples had cooled so we could set up time to do the actual tensile testing, which will be the really fun part of this whole experience.
Over the last few days it has started to finally feel like I really have a reason to be here. The first two weeks were mostly just filled with rushing from one meeting to another, meeting people who would hopefully have something for us to do. During the third week about half of us had jobs, but Chris, other Alex and myself were kind of left floating. We had the catapult to work on but we knew that once Friday came around we would be more or less out of things to do.
I became excited at the end of the week when I was put into contact with Dr. Camilleri, the head of the cybernetics department at the University of Malta, who was generous enough to invite me into his lab to show me the work he and his team had been doing. While it was, in my opinion, the most interesting meeting I have been to since I have arrived in Malta, unfortunately due to the fact that at the time of the meeting I only had two weeks remaining in the country this meeting did not result in a project to occupy the remainder of my time here. However during the course of our discussion he mentioned that he wanted to start an international master’s program in biomedical engineering, and it just so happened that one of the schools he was looking into partnering with was Michigan Tech. So I told him I would put him in contact with the head of our biomedical engineering department Dr. Kirkpatrick. For now I have sent off an email explaining the situation to Dr. Kirkpatrick and am excited for the potential to be a part of joining our universities.
Shortly before I was put in contact with Dr. Camilleri I sent a message to one of the groups we had met with in our first two weeks, the Formula SAE team at the University of Malta, to see if Chris and I could be of any use to them. Thankfully, they got back to us rather quickly with something we could do to help. On Monday we went in and met with Anthea, who asked if we would be interested in helping her test the tensile strength of their carbon fiber and fiberglass, we of course eagerly agreed. She told us that we would need to make three samples of each material, gave us the necessary dimensions, she told us to come back the next day with our calculations done so we could prepare the samples. She also told us that the curing process for the materials would take eight hours, and since the oven they were using had only been used once before someone would have to likely have to stay with it the whole time to make sure nothing went wrong. She asked us if we would be willing to stay and watch the oven, we of course agreed, although this time less than eagerly.
So today we went back to the garage of the SAE team, calculations in hand, ready for a long dull day. After getting the materials out of a -22 degree Celsius freezer, which felt like a refreshing taste of home to Chris and I--and unbearably cold to Anthea--we started measuring and cutting the strips of material for the test. Anthea left Chris and I alone to work, confident in our abilities to not mess up too badly. Over the next few hours we managed to measure, cut, and assemble the necessary samples. After we finished I sent a message to Anthea that we were ready to place them in the oven and begin our next phase of waiting and hoping nothing catches fire. She came and instructed us on how to place the samples and set up their home made oven. Thankfully, after the oven was prepared, she told us that she had changed her mind and did not think it would be necessary for us to stay and watch the oven as she and another team member, Kurt, would be nearby for the rest of the day and they agreed it would be unnecessary to have someone watch it the whole time and be fine if one of them checked on it once an hour or so. We said our goodbyes and Anthea told us that she would message me in the morning once the samples had cooled so we could set up time to do the actual tensile testing, which will be the really fun part of this whole experience.