Archive for March, 2010

Jeanine Plummer, Impacting Tomorrow’s Engineers

Posted by Erin Steigerwalt on March 30th, 2010 | No Comments »

Photo courtesy of WPI’s Faculty Directory

“Jeanine Plummer has demonstrated a remarkable passion for teaching and mentoring students since she came to WPI {Worcester Polytechnic Institute}. It is particularly fitting that her remarkable efforts are in environmental engineering. She and her students are literally engineering a better future for the planet and its people, and her skill and leadership in working with students is outstanding…” said WPI’s senior vice president, John Orr.

Plummer became a faculty member of WPI in 1999, after having received a Bachelor of Science degree in Civil and Environmental Engineering from Cornell University, and at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, a MS in Environmental Engineering and a PhD in Civil and Environmental Engineering. During her studies, she received many fellowships and awards, including a fellowship from the National Science Foundation and the United Technologies Outstanding Graduate Woman in Engineering Award. She was honored with WPI’s Board of Trustees’ Award for Academic Advising in 2005 and the Board of Trustees’ Award for Outstanding Teaching in 2006. In 2007, she became director of WPI’s environmental engineering undergraduate program. In 2008 she was named the Massachusetts Professor of the Year.

ASEE’s Prism magazine celebrates Plummer and the accomplishments she has made thus far in her career. It recognizes her dedication to her students, as shown by her advisory of numerous students. Read more about Plummer and the impact that she is having on our future’s engineers here.

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Ada Lovelace Day

Posted by Erin Steigerwalt on March 24th, 2010 | No Comments »

Ada Lovelace

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia

March 24th is celebrated as Ada Lovelace Day, a day dedicated to celebrate the achievements of women in science and technology. On this day, people across the world have pledged to blog about their favorite female scientist.

Agusta Ada King, or simply Ada Lovelace, is credited as writing the first computer program. Ada was born in 1815 and taught mathematics at an early age, helping her develop skills that would aid her later in life. In 1833, she met Charles Babbage, inventor of the Analytical Engine.

According to Wikipedia, “During a nine-month period in 1842-43, Lovelace translated Italian mathematician Luigi Menabrea’s memoir on Babbage’s newest proposed machine, the Analytical Engine. With the article, she appended a set of notes. The notes are longer than the memoir itself and include in complete detail, a method for calculating a sequence of Bernoulli numbers with the Engine, which would have run correctly had the Analytical Engine ever been built. Based on his work, Lovelace is now widely credited with being the first computer programmer and her method is recognized as the world’s first computer program…In 1953, over one hundred years after her death, Lovelace’s notes on Babbage’s Analytical Engine were republished. The engine has now been recognized as an early model for a computer and Lovelace’s notes as a description of a computer and software.”

Letters from Lovelace

Photo courtesy of www.cs.kuleuven.ac.be/…/pictures.html

Lovelace’s name is still highly well known. A U.S. Department of Defense computer language has been named after her, as well as another language named after her birth year, a sticker representing her image, and a medal in her name.

Image courtesy of findingada.com

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Queen of the Hurricanes

Posted by Erin Steigerwalt on March 19th, 2010 | No Comments »

MacGill in 1939

Photo courtesy of the National Archives of Canada

“Queen of the Hurricanes,” World War II aeronautical engineer, Elsie MacGill, was the world’s first female aircraft designer. According to Wikipedia, having grown up encouraged by her mother to study engineering, she became the first women to achieve a long list of accomplishments. MacGill became the first female Canadian to earn an aeronautical engineering degree when she graduated in 1927 from the University of Toronto. Further pursuing aeronautical engineering, she was awarded a masters degree in this field from the University of Michigan, becoming the first woman in North America to have done so.

Starting her professional career, she became an Assistant Engineer at Montreal’s Fairchild Aircraft and then later became the Chief Aeronautical Engineer at Canada Car and Foundry, “the first woman in the world to hold such a position.” She was also elected as the first woman to be elected to membership in the Engineering Institute of Canada. MacGill designed and tested the aircraft, Maple Leaf II, as well as oversaw production of the Hawker Hurricane fighter aircraft, hence the reasoning of her nickname, “Queen of the Hurricanes.” On these fighter aircrafts, she also designed solutions so this aircraft could be operated in the winter time.

Maple Leaf II, designed and tested by MacGill

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia

Elsie MacGill went on to start an aeronautical consulting business with her husband, E.J. Soulsby, and did much fighting for women’s rights in the 1960’s, all the while earning the title of ‘first woman’ to other accomplishments, including becoming the first woman to chair a UN committee. She lived from 1905-1980.

MacGill became so popular, a comic book was created about her.

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia

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Male Pipefish Behavior: A new NSF Funded Study show Male Pipefish give birth but some bond less with their offspring….

Posted by Rashida on March 18th, 2010 | No Comments »

Female Pipefish (left) and Pregnant Male Pipefish (right)

Male Pipefish and Seahorses are the only male species able to get pregnant and give birth, but a new study conducted by Kim Paczolt and Adam Jones, researchers in the Department of Biological Science at Texas A&M University have found some fascinating links on how pipefish bond with their offspring during the postnatal period. The father who usually carries the embryos in a specialized sac during the prenatal period are quite nurturing but some fish alter their relationship with offspring after birth in accordance with their fondness for the mother.

The study looked at the reasons why some offspring flourish while others do not. Almost all the studies confirmed that the offspring who survived most often the male were fond of the female.  Showing an important link between the male’s mating choice and its offspring.

“The bottom line seems to be, if the male likes the mom, the kids are treated better,” Paczolt explains.

“Why this occurs, we don’t fully understand, but our findings are quite specific about this relationship between the male pipefish and its mate. If the male prefers the female, he treats their mutual offspring better.”

Video: Male Pregnancy: The Dark Side

This research was funded by the National Science Foundation.

Filed under Education, Research


Let’s Hear It For The Girls!

Posted by Erin Steigerwalt on March 16th, 2010 | 1 Comment »

Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

According to the National Engineers Week Foundation, the percentage of female engineering undergraduate students stands only at 20%. The number of women in the professional engineering workplace is less than that, at around ten percent.

In January, American Society for Engineering Education’s President, J.P. Mohsen, attended the Roundtable on Practical Approaches to Attracting and Retaining Women in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics {STEM} Fields, sponsored by the Society of Women Engineers. A main topic of discussion was the need of continual increases in the number of minority groups, especially women, in STEM. One point brought up in the discussion of why a female presence is so important in engineering is the fact that “Diverse perspectives lead to better solutions.” It is true that there is a lot being done to celebrate women {past and present} in these fields and to encourage younger females to become involved, however, there is still more to do.

Read Mohsen’s thoughts about this topic of diversity here, in the February 2010 edition of ASEE’s PRISM magazine.

There are many wonderful organizations and groups, conferences and competitions, programs and publications that celebrate and encourage women and young girls in what they are currently doing and in what they can do in the future in the world of engineering. In an attempt to shed more light on this topic, this Engineeringand… blog will be sharing stories of women who have made or are making significant impacts in the engineering and science world, as well as about organizations and programs that encourage and support females in science and engineering.

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