Hello

“Why is he always taking things apart?” was a common question among my relatives when I was growing up. Ever since I was a young child I was always fascinated with how and why things worked the way they did. I was never satisfied with only understanding how to use a particular object, rather I needed to understand how that particular object functioned. Unfortunately for my family, this resulted in a household full of disassembled devices until I was about ten and capable of putting things back together after taking them apart.

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As I grew older and my science curiosity continued to develop, I started contemplating the physics underpinning the engineering marvels that existed all around me. For instance, I have always found it amazing that a 100,000 ton cargo ship carrying 22,000 shipping containers will float in water and an airplane racing down a runway at 200 miles per hour can create a large enough lift force to carry 500 passengers 40,000 feet into the sky and transport them around the world. As a high school student, I was fortunate to participate in the MIT Splash program where I explored a variety of science and engineering topics in courses such as; The Fringes of Chaos, Hypercubes, Quantum Tunneling, Black Holes and The Weird Universe, and The Physics of Siege Weapons. These courses and the interactions I had with MIT students and faculty, in conjunction with my never-ending curiosity to learn how and why things operated the way they did, solidified my decision to pursue engineering.

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As industry and society continues to rely on engineered technologies with ever increasing degrees of complexity and connectedness, and functioning within ever demanding environments and varying circumstances, I believe that automation, robotics, and artificially intelligent systems will continue to have ever growing impacts to the future of civilization.  With my passions and interests in robotics, systems, controls, and automation, and the deep hands-on research and work experience I’ve gained, together with the unstoppable determination I’ve developed through my athletic career, I wish to be at the forefront of this interaction and integration of such technologies with people, which I believe will dramatically shape and influence future generations throughout the world.

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Exploring and participating in the development of this technology in the work environment is what will prepare me to make significant contributions to science and industry’s most difficult engineering challenges. By utilizing cutting edge research and hands on laboratory experience I hope to develop pioneering solutions for the projects I am involved with.  At a practical level, after obtaining my graduate degree I hope to join a highly advanced engineering team tackling some of the most vexing, complex, and critically important robotic, automation, and systems challenges in science and industry. These challenges would require a great degree of cross- disciplinary experience which I believe I will obtain upon completion of my graduate research and studies.  In so doing, I can imagine being part of the solution to devise multiple and/or concurrent approaches to addressing these complex challenges which would contribute to the advancement of the field, as well as solving particular problems.