MAE’s Yan Li Wins Best Paper Award

CSULB Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering Assistant Professor Yan Li has won a Best Paper Award for her research on materials properties.

The paper, “Probabilistic Fracture Toughness Prediction of Composite Materials,” was presented at the 8th International Conference on Computational Methods (ICCM2017) in Guilin, China, in July 2017.

It explores the challenge of predicting the variation of material properties such as strength and fracture toughness in material-sensitive design, and the development of an integrated computational and analytical model to predict fracture toughness in a statistical sense. Continue reading “MAE’s Yan Li Wins Best Paper Award”

Meet the Four Finalist Teams for the 2018 Innovation Challenge Awards

Innovation Challenge Awards Gravity Ball

Startups that have developed a versatile exercise ball, launched an augmented reality app, started a household battery recycling program, and are working on a prosthetic prototype for amputees have been named finalists in the 2018 CSULB Innovation Challenge.

Gravity Ball, the Battery Effect, StickUp, and Artemus Labs will present their business plans to judges at the April 12 Innovation Challenge Awards Ceremony. The top team will receive up to $50,000 in cash and business services.  Continue reading “Meet the Four Finalist Teams for the 2018 Innovation Challenge Awards”

G2 Software Systems Interviews for Open Computer Science Positions

San Diego-based G2 Software Systems is often enlisted to fix broken systems or refresh ones that are out of date. The company’s sweet spot is with the defense industry’s large, complex, and sometimes antiquated, systems. G2 was hired to create software that sends alerts throughout all branches of the military, notifies the continent’s defense and aviation organizations to suspicious aircraft, and lets military personnel be trained simultaneously around the globe.

On Wednesday, a group from G2 visited the CSULB College of Engineering to interview graduating computer science seniors for possible jobs or internships. G2’s founder, Georgia Griffiths, is a CSULB alumni and member of the Dean’s Advisory Council.

G2 General Manager Pete Keyes. COE Development Director Nicole Forrest-Boggs, and mathematician Christopher Priebe.
G2 General Manager Pete Keyes. COE Development Director Nicole Forrest-Boggs, and mathematician Christopher Priebe.

“She’s a great supporter of scholarships for the College of Engineering,” said COE Development Director Nicole Forrest-Boggs, whose office organized the event. “We’re very happy to have them here.”

The G2 contingent included general manager Pete Keyes, mathematician Christopher Priebe, and office manager Jessica Rose, a CUSLB alumni.

Priebe, who manages a technology team at G2, said job prospects are bright for computer science majors. “This is a booming industry. It’s a seller’s market. There’s a lot of competition for engineers,” he said. Continue reading “G2 Software Systems Interviews for Open Computer Science Positions”

Professional Development Speaker Series: Working as a Google Engineer

If you want to know the questions that Google interviewers ask, don’t believe the dozens of books and blog posts written on the subject. Because the minute an interview question is found to be published, it’s added to the list of banned questions, says Google software engineer Chris Clark, who was at CSULB Tuesday to talk about what it’s like to be an engineer at Google.

Clark was the top computer science student in his class at UCLA, where he double majored in applied mathematics. He won a Hewlett-Packard scholarship that guaranteed him three internships at the company.

But after completing his first summer internship there, he declined a second one in favor of internships at Xerox and then Microsoft. After his 2008 graduation, Microsoft hired him full-time. Seven years ago, he was recruited by Google.

The search engine giant, said Clark, “is very good at empowering every engineer.” The company’s open environment and support of its employees is legendary, as are its kitchens.

Clark said the micro-kitchens serve a purpose in addition to keeping employees in snacks, refreshments, and meals. “They foster communication with other people. You might go to pick up a water and overhear someone trying to solve a technical problem and end up in a conversation,” he said. Continue reading “Professional Development Speaker Series: Working as a Google Engineer”