RIT Robotics - Alex Sojda

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Alex Sojda

4th Year Electrical Engineering Student,

Rochester Institute of Technology

Vice President: RIT Multi-Disciplinary Robotics Club (MDRC)

My resume

alexs _at_ mdrc.rit.edu

My Blog

Interests

Autonomous robotics, computer vision, embedded systems, control systems, nanotechnology, device physics.

Current Projects

Robot Localization Board

I am working on making an IMU and RF-localization board for use with the robotics club's future plans in swarm robotics. For more information see: project website.

Intelligent Ground Vehicle Competition (IGVC)

I am the current project leader for the RIT Robotics Club IGVC team. For more information about this see: RIT Robotics Club IGVC, and Official IGVC website.

Mini-Grand Challenge

In preparation for IGVC, we are competing in the Mini-Grand Challenge, at Penn State Abington. The date of the competition is March 31, 2007. See the Competition page.

Firefighting Competition

There will be a Firefighting Robot Contest at Penn State Abington on the same day as the Mini-Grand Challenge. We decided to compete in this competition also. See the Competition page.

Floppy Stick Robot

This robot is intended to be a training platform to test control systems. It is an inverted pendulum, using a potentiometer to detect the falling of the arm. The control system is programmed on an ATmega168.For more information see: floppy stick project page.

SkyCam

The SkyCam project is a cable-array robot. It consists of three (or four) winches with the end of the cables tied together. When the winches are drawn in and out it is capable of moving something attached to the intersection of the cable in 3-d space. These are used for the skycams in football stadiums (hence the name SkyCam). For more information see: SkyCam project page, and paper on a similar design.

Micro Controller Workshop

We worked on a training workshop for our incoming freshman class. The workshop involves making a small two-wheeled robot move and avoid walls. This is done with a IR-LED and receiver. We are using an ATmega168, and robots that we built. The project page is here, look for more work on this in the summer.

Work Experience

Impact Technologies

I am currently co-oping at Impact Technologies, I am working on embedded coding (8051) and physics-of-failure (POF) models.

NanoPower Research Laboratory

When I am taking classes I work part-time as a student researcher in the NanoPower Research Laboratory in the department of physics, Rochester Institute of Technology. My adviser is Dr. Ryne P. Raffaelle. I am working on nanotube-polymer composites, specifically electrically characterizing them.

Enviromaster International

I was an intern at Enviromaster International for two summers. While there I did mechanical design with SolidWorks, designed and tested the wiring of units, and resolved problems during manufacturing.