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Newsmakers: College students in the news
| Concrete Canoe Team takes third
place at nationals |
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The UC Berkeley Concrete Canoe Team with the
Bearkelium
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Cal’s Concrete Canoe Team piloted their craft,
the Bearkelium, to a third-place overall finish in the
2003 National Concrete Canoe Competition held in June
at Drexel University in Philadelphia. The 13-member
team of undergraduates headed by Lacey Walker also finished
in first place for their technical paper, second for
their business plan presentation, and received the Tony
P. Chrest Innovation Award recognizing superior use
of materials and technology in construction of their
canoe. They won $2,500 in scholarship funds.
Cal teams have qualified for the national competition
14 of the 16 years it has been held, placing among the
top three 10 times and in first place four times. Sponsored
by the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), the
competition’s purpose is to inspire ingenuity
in use of materials and design to build concrete canoes
that can actually float.
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Top students win departmental and college
awards for 2003
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2003 citation awardees
(left to right) Wan, Oman, Santala, Liang, Chen, Kamrin,
and Quiter
PEG SKORPINSKI PHOTO |
The 2003 Departmental Citations were awarded to eight top graduating
seniors, one from each of the College’s eight departments.
The awardees are Peter Chen, EECS; Nathan Huebsch, BioE; Kenny
Kamrin, Engineering Science; Marc Oman, IEOR; Siddharth Patel,
ME; Brian Quiter, NE; Melissa Santala, MSE; and Mark Wan, CEE.
Two additional students were recognized for their achievement
collegewide with the Bechtel awards. They are IEOR sophomore Jengyee
Liang, winner of the 2003 Bechtel Scholarship, and EECS senior
and University Medalist Ankur Luthra, who received the Bechtel
Award.
CalSol places second at American Solar Challenge along Route 66
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CalSol team members with their solar-powered vehicle, Solar
Bear
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CalSol, the Berkeley solar vehicle team, placed
second in its class at the American Solar Challenge in July. Twenty
solar vehicles from the U.S. and Canada traversed 2,300 miles
through eight states along Route 66.
Team captain Nathan Mandernach reported that Cal’s vehicle,
Solar Bear, was close to withdrawing at the outset due to technical
difficulties. But the team borrowed a motor and controller from
the car entered by the University of Kentucky, whose car did not
qualify.
Ten days and several misadventures later, the team crossed the
finish line in Claremont, California, with a time of 110 hours.
"We are very happy with our performance," said Mandernach,
a senior double majoring in ME and MSE. "Route 66 is a punishing
road in a normal car." The competition is held every other
year to promote awareness of solar power.
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FOREFRONT takes you into the
labs, classrooms, and lives of professors, students, and alumni
for an intimate look at the innovative research, teaching, and
campus life that define the College of Engineering at the University
of California, Berkeley.
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