Six CCEE Ph.D. students competed in the department’s 6th Annual Three Minute Thesis (3MT) Competition on April 10 at Fitts-Woolard Hall, presenting their research to an audience of judges and colleagues. Each student had three minutes and one static visual slide to make a compelling and concise statement about their thesis topic and its significance to society.
CCEE’s event is modeled after the international 3MT, which was created at the University of Queensland. The Graduate School at NC State also hosts an annual 3MT event in the fall, where winners have the opportunity to progress to a regional competition.
“We are very proud,” said Professor Moe Pour-Ghaz, who emceed this year’s CCEE 3MT event. “In NC State’s College of Engineering, we are the only department that has its own Three Minute Thesis Competition.”
This year’s judges included Keisha Demps, interim director of partnerships at NC State; Chris Bushnell, marketing communications at The Wooten Co.; Joel Chambers, lead engineer at Pickett & Associates; and Kim Eccles, transportation service leader at VHB.
Lucas Lima, advised by Tasnim Hassan, gave the winning presentation on using small test specimens to measure material properties in order to reduce the carbon footprint.
Second place went to Soumya Sharma, advised by George List and Billy Williams, for a presentation on the creation of a new method of incorporating e-commerce-related transportation into transportation planning models.
In addition to the judges’ picks, the audience had a chance to vote for their favorite presentation. Stefanie Starr, advised by Detlef Knappe, won the People’s Choice Award for a presentation on developing methods that safely break down granular activated carbon filters that have been used to clean contaminated drinking water.
Galib Muktadir, advised by Ranji Ranjithan, Mervyn Kowalsky and Giorgio Proestos, gave a presentation on building better bridges using optimization software. Juan Wang, advised by Eleni Bardaka, gave a presentation on transportation investment in economically underdeveloped regions. Sean W. Daly, advised by Angela Harris, gave a presentation on improving water, sanitation and hygiene monitoring by identifying current monitoring gaps.
The event also included the Spring 2023 CCEE Graduate Awards:
- Nancy Lee Alexander, advised by Detlef Knappe, won the Charles Smallwood Graduate Award.
- Yazeed Algurainy, advised by Doug Call, won the Thomas G. Coffey Graduate Award.
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Ashley Bittner, advised by Andy Grieshop, won the Thomas Griffin Graduate Award. Ashley Bittner, advised by Andy Grieshop, won the Thomas Griffin Graduate Award.
- Minerva Bonilla, advised by William Rasdorf, won the David Johnston Graduate Award in Construction Engineering.
- Chandramauli Awasthi, advised by Sankar Arumugam, won the Thomas G. Coffey Graduate Award.
- Lan Cheng, advised by Detlef Knappe, won the Thomas G. Coffey Graduate Award.
- Hyunjun Choi, advised by Moe Pour-Ghaz, won the Smith Gardner Graduate Award.
- Boris Goenaga, advised by Shane Underwood, won the Thomas G. Coffey Graduate Award.
- Jessica Gorski, advised by Casey Dietrich, won the Charles Smallwood Graduate Award.
- Yajie Liu, advised by Kevin Han, won the David Johnston Graduate Award in Construction Engineering.
- Thomas Na, advised by Brina Montoya and Ashly Cabas, won the Thomas Griffin Graduate Award.
- Ramin Niroumand, advised by Ali Hajbabaie and George List, won the Bruce E. Matthews Graduate Award for Transportation Engineering.
- Adam Schmidt, advised by Eleni Bardaka and George List, won the Bruce E. Matthews Graduate Award for Transportation Engineering.
- SM Jamil Uddin, advised by Alex Albert, won the David Johnston Graduate Award in Construction Engineering.