Cañada Students to Present Research at Engineering Conference

Jesus Garcia

More than a dozen current and former Cañada College students will be presenting original research at this year's American Society for Engineering Education Pacific Southwest Conference, April 18-20, in Riverside.

Students will be presenting the results of their summer research internships funded through the NASA Curriculum Improvements and Partnership Award for the Integration of Research (CIPAIR) Program. All of the students were mentored by San Francisco State University engineering faculty during their internships.

For Jesus Garcia, the CIPAIR summer internship at SFSU focused on a phenomenon called Soft Oxide Breakdown in the performance of integrated circuits. Led by SFSU Professor Hamid Mahmoodi, the student researchers investigated whether or not Soft Oxide Breakdown could be prevented.

"If it can be prevented, the integrated circuits found in home appliances, computers, cell phones, televisions, and medical devices would last longer," Garcia said. "This would save consumers money."

Garcia and fellow student Hector Prado will present a paper at this week's conference titled, "Engaging Community College Students in Research using Summer Internship on Analysis of Performance Degradation of Integrated Circuits Due to Transistor Aging Effects in Nano-Scale." They will also present a poster describing their research.

Garcia said he's not nervous about presenting at the conference because he's presented at other professional conferences while at Cañada. "On the contrary, I'm excited and looking forward to another good experience."

Garcia said the summer internship at SFSU helped him learn how to conduct research and work with groups of researchers. "These are two very important skills for engineers," he said. "The internship also helped me become a better analyst, critical thinker, and problem solver. This internship is a perfect opportunity for students who have no previous experience to gain real-world knowledge in the field of engineering."

Two other groups from Cañada will be presenting at this week's engineering conference. They will describe their research on integrating earthquake engineering into the community college student educational experience and engaging underrepresented community college students in engineering research.

For Garcia, this is one of his final opportunities to represent Cañada before he transfers to a four-year university next fall.

"I've been accepted to Cal Poly San Luis Obispo to study mechanical engineering but I'm still waiting to hear if I've been accepted to UC Berkeley or UCLA," he said. "I'm interested in the fields of medical devices and aircraft design."

Amelito Enriquez, Professor of Engineering and Mathematics at the college, said the partnership between Cañada, SFSU, and NASA Ames that has been developed through the NASA CIPAIR Program has created opportunities for students to excel. "These students are doing research, writing, technical papers, publishing, and presenting in professional conferences - something I did not get to do until graduate school. At this upcoming ASEE Conference, they are the only community college students and perhaps the only undergraduate students who will be attending and presenting. I am really proud of what they have accomplished.

Here's the complete list of current and former Cañada students who are co-authors of three papers and three posters that will be presented at the conference.

First Name	Last Name	Major
Jose	Carrillo	Electrical Engineering
John	DeAndreis	Civil Engineering
Jesus	Garcia	Mechanical Engineering
Xenia	Leon	Electrical Engineering
Joshua	Lohse	Computer Engineering
Peter	Moala	Civil Engineer
John Louie	Paulino	Mechanical Engineering
Hector	Prado-Guerrero	Computer Engineering
Enrique	Raygoza	Mechanical Engineering
Agustin	Robles	Civil Engineering
Alam	Salguero	Electrical Engineering
Ellaine	Talle	Electrical Engineering
Jose	Valdovinos	Civil Engineering