EW BrightSparks Previous Winners (2023 – 2017)


Let’s take a look at the previous winners of the annual EW BrightSparks awards, which started in 2017!

EW BrightSparks Supporters

We are very grateful to the companies and organisations that help support the EW BrightSparks programme, and make it possible. Special thanks to: the UK Electronics Skills Foundation.

UK Electronics Skills Foundation

The UKESF’s mission is to encourage more young people to study Electronics and to pursue careers in the sector. In the UK, the Electronics sector is big, valuable and growing; however, the demand for capable, employable graduates is currently outstripping supply. We are an educational charity, launched in 2010, with both public and private seed-corn funding. We operate collaboratively with major companies, leading universities and other organisations to tackle the skills shortage in the Electronics sector.


 

EW BrightSparks of 2023

Click on the name below to see the individual profile.

    • Sarmad Adeel, Blueshift Memory, Senior Embedded Design Engineer
      • Sarmad began to make a valuable contribution in industry immediately, working long hours to help bring a project back onto schedule, which involved very demanding leading-edge research and required true ‘out of the box’ thinking
      • During his Masters and PhD at Hamburg University of Technology, he was lead author of five peer-reviewed papers, on the subject of DSP algorithms and applications for energy dispersive X-ray detectors.
    • James Arnold, University of Nottingham, Student
      • At university, a solar race car was developed, with James’ group successfully transmitted CAN bus data from the car – speed, battery status, co-ordinates, and irradiance – wirelessly to a chase car to be processed by a MATLAB model optimising race strategy.
      • As part of his UKESF scholarship, he was involved with the ‘girls into electronics’ day hosted by Nottingham University where he acted as a helper, guiding them through the coding exercises and answering any questions, about the exercise or engineering in general.
    • Tom Bowman, BT, Apprentice Applied Researcher
      • Tom helped develop an innovative security software tool, Inflame, which is a multi-award-winning epidemiological malware propagation simulator, helping the automatic detection and response to cyber-attacks and threats before they compromise a communications network.
      • He has co-authored four patents, while an apprentice – the only BT Research apprentice to have contributed new patents to BT’s portfolio. And he co-authored a BT and Ulster University research report on AI’s use within the automation of BT sport graphical insertion.
    • Jasmine Brittan, University of Warwick / ZF Automotive, Student / Sustainability Electronics Intern
      • Jasmine was a team member in the ESA’s Fly a Rocket! Programme, building and launching a sounding rocket at the Andøya Space Centre in Norway. Her responsibilities included building the pressure sensor and writing code to compare elevation values against those predicted by OpenRocket software.
      • Her STEM involvement includes serving as the President and Outreach Coordinator for Warwick Engineering Society, working on a multitude of simultaneous activities and setting the overall vision for the 500 member society.
    • Imogen Cole, Leonardo UK, Technical Apprentice
      • Studying for a degree with The Open University, full time alongside her apprenticeship, Imogen has enjoyed the role of lab manager at the company’s “innovation hub”, a space for use by employees while learning new skills.
      • She is also leading the Leonardo input to Girls into Engineering, a 3 day residential event, where one hundred Year 10 students from around the UK come to Loughborough University and take part in the activities planned by Leonardo and other organisations.
    • Matthew Cossins, University of Nottingham, Final Year MEng Electrical and Electronic Engineering Student
      • Matthew has already received multiple engineering awards and scholarships – Arkwright and UKESF Scholarships – and received the Nottingham Advantage Award for completing three extra-curricular modules: a virtual consultancy challenge, a BP-funded research internship, and peer mentoring younger engineering students.
      • He successfully completed a 12-month engineering placement with Capgemini at the High-Integrity Expertise Centre. He worked on two industry projects: improving code-review efficiency in high-integrity (specifically aerospace) projects, and developing the first xHCI USB drivers for the secure microkernel seL4 (on Avnet Maaxboard).
    • Nathan Dickson, BT, Network DevOps Engineer
      • Nathan shone throughout his apprenticeship when he built an application providing insight into the physical UK network configuration to enable better planning. He is also part of the BT buddy system.
      • He also pitched, designed, built, and delivered an automation tool for use in the Network Integrated Test (NIT) team, putting together a three-person software squad. It resulted in the first NIT test to be fully end-to-end automated.
    • Lucy Down, Future Facilities, Technical Marketing Engineer
      • Lucy, her manager told us, is a rare quality of engineer, knowing her subject inside and out, and being a creative problem solver, and she always has time to share her enthusiasm for engineering with the next generation. She also won an Arkwright Engineering Scholarship.
      • By visiting schools and engaging with young people, especially young girls and those from a broad range of backgrounds, Lucy is passing on her passion for engineering. Her work as part of the SheCanEngineer initiative has already received accolades from teachers.
    • Claudia Ferreira, Compound Semiconductor Applications Catapult, Materials Engineer
      • As a Graduate Engineer, Claudia led the CSA’s SpaceForge project (an in-space manufacturing company developing the world’s first returnable satellite) while the project lead was away and completed it on time with quality results.
      • Claudia developed the Cu-sintering process, which is a brand-new semiconductor assembly process used for high-power electronics packaging, that can be used for applications in power electronics assembly for automotive and energy.
    • Evan Jackson, Leonardo UK, Systems Engineer
      • Evan joined Leonardo as a Technical Apprentice in 2015 and from day one has excelled in his role, a colleague told us, showing a clear aptitude for electronics and engineering in general.
      • Starting as an apprentice and becoming a senior systems technician, he’s now studying for a degree in Electrical and Electronic Engineering and has now achieved the rank of Systems Engineer.
    • Alex Jarvis, Diodes Incorporated , Application Engineer
      • For Alex to go from being a student at university to representing a global electronics company and making presentations to engineers throughout Europe in just two years is some accolade, needing both knowledge and confidence, his manager told us.
      • To assist with training events, he designed and developed a range of demonstration units to show how Diodes’ products (hall sensors and LED drivers) work in specific applications. The demo units have been used at events in Europe and for use by engineers in the USA.
    • Sam Jones, Lancaster University, PhD Student
      • Sam is an EPSRC-ICASE PhD student working on a unique collaborative project with IQE on telecoms-wavelength vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs) where GaSb quantum rings (QRs) are the source of the emission, his supervising professor told us.
      • As well as helping cohorts of undergraduate students develop their practical lab work skills, he has volunteered at university open days, showing the latest devices to prospective students and parents through the use of a demonstration kit, and providing a taster of the technology required to engineer such devices.
    • Vanessa Kandodo, Intel, Systems and Hardware Enabling Engineer
      • Vanessa has consistently demonstrated an extraordinary aptitude for engineering design, customer support, and project management, her colleague at told us. Despite graduating just over a year ago, her work has been crucial for both Intel and its customer base.
      • She played an important role in ramping promotion of Intel’s 4th Gen Xeon Scalable Processor. A demo showcasing the built-in accelerator known as Quick Assist Technology (QAT) was required and her engineering skills allowed the enabling and testing of the platform.
    • Mary Kong, University of Edinburgh, Electronics and Electrical Engineering Student
      • A member of Edinburgh’s Hyperloop Team (HYPED), Mary helped develop Greyfriar’s Poddy – a 4th generation hyperloop pod for high-speed transportation. At European Hyperloop Week 2022, her team’s design was placed top five in one category.
      • For her involvement in peer-assisted learning scheme, due to her commitment and contributions towards the Edinburgh student community, she was awarded an Edinburgh Award for Leadership in Student Opportunities.
    • Toby Lane, Amodo Design, formerly of Ignys, Hardware Engineer
      • Toby Lane was described by his manager at Ignys design consultancy as being instrumental in driving processes, taking on a test jig role and delighting customers with his involvement in idea generation workshops.
      • We were told he goes out of his way to take on new learning doing exceptional work on thermal testing with environmental test chambers, willing to take on any project that gives him the opportunity to learn.
    • Raymond Liu, EDA Solutions, Applications Engineer
      • Raymond’s manager told us he is a highly motivated and results-oriented individual, always willing to go the extra mile to get the job done and has continuously looked for ways to improve the team’s processes and procedures.
      • During his time in Warwick Racing, he worked as an electrical systems engineer and CAD manager, designing and manufacturing parts. He represented Warwick Racing at a COP26 Electric Roadshow to discuss the car’s impact.
    • Kate Lucas, Cambridge University, Student
      • Co-President of Cambridge University Robotics Society, Kate has been working ‘to make robotics accessible for all’. As well as securing funding and organising talks, she’s been planning and organising the Unibots UK 2023 competition.
      • Currently registered as a STEM ambassador, she’s been involved in a wide range of community engagement activities. For example, Zero Gravity mentoring, Apply Cambridge mentoring and being a Homerton Student Ambassador.
    • Richard Newman, CSA Catapult, UKESF Scholar, Royal Holloway, University of London, RF & Microwave Engineering Intern
      • At CSA Catapult, Richard participated in a collaborative group project amongst the other interns to help encourage young people into STEM and electronic engineering. Richard helped create a Boolean logic gate circuit game, to be showcased at the company stand at Cardiff Science Festival.
      • Winning a UKESF scholarship, he has proved adept at learning new skills and software for a variety of projects, for example designing a wideband impedance matching network for a GAN HEMT transistor at 3.5GHz in Keysight ADS, or simplifying the test and measurement process in the CSA RF lab.
    • Nyal Patel, University of Southampton, Student
      • Awarded both an Arkwright Scholarship and UKESF Scholarsip, Nayal also won the University of Southampton Zepler Prize for best academic performance in his programme.
      • As well as mentoring younger students in A-Level and GCSE years, he organised and ran a STEM workshop for a girls school in Surrey, for 40 students between the ages of 14-17, alongside two other engineers.
    • James Pickford, Siemens EDA, Software Intern
      • James has worked extensively on a hardware based cyber security solution for connected vehicles, involved with everything from initial security attach profiles to the embedded software to drive the hardware components.
      • Alongside his software abilities, James has firsts class communication and presentation skills being able to communicate complex engineering problems and solutions to a wide audience, his manager told us.
    • Soham Pramod Kale, Prodrive (Motorsports and Advanced Technology) , Composites Laminator Trainee
      • Soham has demonstrated a proficiency in a range of programming languages, software tools, development boards and lab equipment, while obtaining a Master’s in Astronautics and Space Engineering, achieving a Merit Class grade.
      • He has engaged in a range of community and extracurricular activities, for example, Social Media Manager of Global STEM Initiative UK Chapter, a Member of UMEED Foundation, and Event Head at Telecommunications Engineering Students Association (TESA).
    • Shriyansh Sapkota, BT, Digital and Technology Solutions Degree Apprentice
      • As an apprentice, Shriyansh is a reverse mentor, with his role including speaking with senior managers every month about workplace issues, suggesting ideas that would make the workplace more inclusive.
      • “Shriyansh has a very exciting career ahead of him. Not only does he focus on his own development to make himself the best engineer possible, he brings others along on the journey with him,” said one manager.
    • Daniel Schmeer, Crypto Quantique, IC Test & Verification Engineer
      • Daniel’s manager told us that he owned the testing platform for chipset validation and characterisation – making several contributions involving various complicated test setups for low-noise, pico-amp level accuracy temperature characterisation and full system QDID evaluation.
      • He also helped in preparation and setup of the FPGA-based hardware demos of CQ’s quantum-based key generation scheme at Embedded World in March 2023, requiring a knowledge of ARM’s AMBA environment and designing the peripheral communications.
    • Luisa Schrempf, University College London, Postgraduate Student
      • During her BSc thesis, Luisa worked with Edinburgh University on creating strings of conductive particles in nematic liquid crystals, a principle that can be used in EV batteries, conductive inks, or potentially organic solar cells.
      • She discovered an unknown operating regime of silicon oxide memristors, which increases the possible use-cases for the devices both in current applications (frequency combs) and future ones (neuromorphic computing).
    • Norbert Sieczkiewicz, Dyson/Lancaster University, Science and research engineer
      • It is anticipated that Norbert’s Industry 4.0 research work on a surface autofocus method for electron beam welding (EBW) could lead to higher weld integrity, better process monitoring and reduced failure rates in service, in industries requiring the most exacting standards, e.g. aerospace and nuclear.
      • As well as mentoring Graduate Engineers and volunteering for the Cheltenham Science Festival and The Royal International Air Tattoo in Fairford, he has also presented STEM activities for kids, for example he created a challenge for the James Dyson Foundation involving welding with chocolate.
    • James Stephenson, University of Glasgow, Electronics and Software Engineering Student | Research Project Assistant
      • James is the only student in the UK to receive an IEEE Undergraduate Summer Research Scholarship from the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Society valued at $3,000 – he is one of only three awardees from European universities. And he has demonstrated excellent communication skills, his manager told us.
      • An “all-round engineer”, his drive and motivation were highly evident when independently acquired flexible (F)-PCB design skills for a complex wireless system involving switched RF transmission lines, power amplifiers, and wireless SoCs for wearable multi-antenna sensor nodes.
    • Andrew Stylianou, The Little Car Company, Special Projects and Powertrain Engineer
      • Described as an energetic, resourceful and creative engineer – solving numerous design challenges – Andrew’s manager describes him as “a wunderkind!”
      • He has done a lot of outreach, often sharing engineering insights and giving tours and talks to children from local schools around Bicester.
    • Lewis Thom, GB Electronics, Design Engineer
      • His manager told us how Lewis had excelled: “It was sometimes easy to forget that throughout his four years he was still an undergraduate and studying for his degree. I am nominating him for this award as his hard work, perseverance and incredible work ethic deserves this recognition”.
      • He led the design and development of a new blood tracking system as part of a new concept for his company. Lewis carried out all of the initial research stages of this design – including visiting partnering hospitals to get feedback from users and clinicians – and he led presentations with the client.
    • Ifaz Uddin, Imperial College London, Student
      • Overcoming many hurdles, Ifaz became a self-taught student juggling numerous part-time jobs to finance his studies to get into one of Imperial College’s most competitive degrees, Joint Maths and Computer Science, where he has continued to excel.
      • He has worked as a cybersecurity intern in the summer, created two coding courses for a startup company in Dubai and created an online maths platform for a tuition company that allows for online lessons, recorded video access, exam practise and feedback mechanisms.
    • Vasiliki Georgia Xiradaki, University of Birmingham / EnSilica, Student / Digital Design Engineer
      • Successfully demonstrating a mixture of analogue and digital design skills, Vasiliki’s final year project will be the design of a high-performance Digital-to-Analogue (DAC) converter for a Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite communications chip.
      • As well as participating in many outreach activities across different age groups, she was selected to participate in the Academy Achiever’s #BeMeDigitalInclusion charity STEM event, targeted at black girls from vulnerable backgrounds.

 

EW BrightSparks of 2022

See: The EW BrightSparks class of 2022 honoured at IET Savoy Place

We were looking for young engineers who are already making a difference in the first years of their working life, or who are still studying but showing the promise to become the people behind big future innovations in electronics. And we certainly found them! Click on the names below to read the full profile.

Here is the full list of 2022 EW BrightSparks:

  • Sergio Miguez Aparicio, MEng Hons Electronics and Computer Science Student, University of Edinburgh
    • Sergio has developed two Energy Harvesting patents focused on zero power sensors and communications. STMicroelectronics expects one of them to make a strong impact in IoT.
    • President & Co-Founder of HumanEd, the humanoid robotics society at the University of Edinburgh, he has worked in the field of robotic limbs, exoskeletons, bipedal motion, and AI.
  • Simon A. Betts, MEng Electrical and Electronic Engineering Student, Cardiff University
    • Simon, while studying for his Master’s degree, has started his own company, been a student representative for UKESF, been a student mentor, and been President of the university’s electronics and technology society.
    • Among other STEM work, he developed a project that looks to teach students about measuring the blood oxygen level of an individual through an optical sensor. He also organised a STEM awareness event in Cardiff for parents and children.
  • Daisy Bristow, Digital Engineer and Content Creator/Student, University of the West of England
    • Daisy’s work spans education materials, videos and interviews with Q&As, all aiming to educate and inspire the next generation of STEM cohorts and develop people’s understanding of engineering principles.
    • She has created videos and tutorials that teach children, at primary school ages and lower secondary school, how they can use tools in Minecraft to emulate what they are learning about real world engineering.
  • Virginia Cangelosi, Electrical and Electronics Engineering Student, University of Edinburgh
    • Having taken part in Huawei’s Seeds for the Future programme, Virginia was also part of the team winning the Mach-21 CanSat competition and representing the UK at the European Rocketry Challenge (EuRoC) in Portugal.
    • She was responsible for the development of a CanSat payload for Edinburgh University’s Endeavour rocket designed to investigate fluid sloshing and particle interactions in the atmosphere.
  • Nishika Chettry, MEng Student / Embedded systems software developer, Aston University / Renesas Electronics
    • Nishika, a UKESF Scholar in a placement at Reneseas, is developing secure bootROMs for microprocessors, including an automated test system using Python, which has an interactive GUI and automates 80% of the process.
    • She has won the HKP Burt Memorial prize and the IMI Prize, and been involved with a STEM superhero campaign at Aston University. She has also been involved in the ‘Girls into Electronics’ to promoting electronics to sixth-formers.
  • Mihai Ciortuz, IC Engineer, Crypto Quantique
    • Mihai had to learn fast at this quantum-driven analogue semiconductor IP startup, getting to grips with some of the industry’s most advanced design tools and helping to significantly increase the company’s design productivity.
    • Throughout his short time with the company, his colleagues have been deeply impressed by his ability to learn quickly, identify gaps in his knowledge and correct them. He is described as ‘incredibly hard-working’.
  • Sarah Cooper, Senior Hardware Engineer, Leonardo
    • Sarah has been involved in a wide array of activities, spanning production support of Leonardo’s existing counter-measure systems, through to early concept design of next generation aircraft technology.
    • A big achievement was her involvement in complex EMC design and testing for a valuable customer. She was the main hardware engineer completing this work package and helped achieve successful results for the project.
  • Tom Culley, Networks Degree Apprentice, BT
    • Since joining BT’s Networks team in 2018, Tom has not only taken on technical challenges and improved processes as an Apprentice but has been a huge advocate for STEM Apprenticeships, both inside BT and out.
    • He has been recognised for his outstanding efforts with a certificate of merit from TechUK and was invited to speak with the Secretary of State for Education, with other BT Apprentices, at No. 10 Downing Street.
  • Shrouk El-Attar, Consultant, Shrouk El-Attar Consultancy
    • Shrouk is the Lead Senior Electronics Engineer at emm Technology working on smart menstrual health solutions that are more inclusive to transgender people and other under-represented communities in tech.
    • For her master’s thesis, she created a machine to use new methods of detecting organic compounds including certain cancers based on electron quantum spin, research that moves towards replacing bulky and expensive ESR machines.
  • Mohamed Elrayah, Electrical and Electronic Engineering Student, Southampton University
    • In an electronic engineering design module, Mohamed was responsible for designing the schematic and layout for a ring oscillator circuit and building a clock divider circuit using D-Type Flip Flops for output.
    • As secretary of a 300+ member student-led society, he was responsible for organising weekly meetings and during the pandemic helped organise high-attendance virtual events, such as a Bloomberg mental health workshop.
  • Ece Erkan, Electrical and Electronic Engineering Student, University of Sheffield
    • Ece’s academic success has been recognised by her department and she was awarded the EEE Faculty Undergraduate Bursary for her academic achievement in the first two years of her degree.
    • She is part of a student-led project Project Marsworks working on the design and development of a Mars rover to compete at the European Rover Challenge. She’s been in charge of the team’s documentation and communications.
  • Charlotte Fitzpatrick, Digital and Technology Solutions Degree Apprentice, BT
    • Charlotte led on the Remote PC access project to enable hundreds of employees to access their computers remotely due to coronavirus. She was responsible for installing and troubleshooting the new application used to remotely access PCs in the office.
    • She worked with the STEM ambassador organisation and came up with the idea of hosting a Myth busting video to spread awareness of STEM apprenticeships and address common stereotypes surrounding them. This was pre-recorded and hosted on YouTube.
  • Dr Ethan Gardner, R&D Engineer, Flusso
    • Ethan has developed into the company’s lead engineer developing gas sensing technology using thermal conductivity, using the sensors and knowledge developed during his PhD (developing technology for CMOS MEMS flow sensors).
    • Filing two patents and co-authoring on seven, he won the award for IEEE Best Paper at the 2017 International Semiconductor Conference (CAS) in Romania for his pioneering work on 2D and 3D thermal flow sensor modelling.
  • Samrudhi Inamdar, MSc Astronautics and Space Engineering Student, Cranfield University
    • Samrudhi has worked as a research fellow at the Indian Space Society, championing green/environment-friendly technologies for future satellite communication, demonstrating her commitment to sustainability within the Space Engineering sector.
    • She has been a key member of the Communications and Onboard Data Handling Subsystem in the Electrical Work package for the Group Design Project “HoneyMoon”, the design of an experiment to study the survival and reproduction of bees in space.
  • Mihai Daniel Ivanescu, Graduate Software Engineer, Imagination Technologies
    • For his dissertation for Computer Hardware and Software Engineering, Mihai created a microcontroller-based circuit as a low-cost solution to the problem of e-waste, specifically the waste of old television sets.
    • The project used a customised PCB with an ESP32 MCU, featuring PS/2 keyboard input, VGA video and headphone jack audio. As proof of concept, the interface featured a news feed, internet radio, and an app downloader. The apps were a weather tracker and Tetris.
  • Oliver Kanjoo-Parsons, Student / Student Team Director, Salford Racing, University of Salford
    • Oliver has worked as Salford Racing Team Director, helping to design, develop and build a single seater race car to compete at the IMechE Formula Student competition, impressed people with his leadership skills.
    • To help young people from diverse and low income communities access higher education, he has been involved with the GM Higher programme, showing how to convert interest in video games into careers in motorsports via engineering and computer sciences.
  • Sarah Keane, Field Applications Engineer, ADI
    • In response to the pandemic, Sarah created the ADI UK internship program to give students a chance to gain experience of the industry. She spearheaded the initiative, engaging with colleagues and universities to help establish its framework.
    • She went on to manage and mentor the interns, which resulted in several joining the company as Graduate engineers upon completion of their studies and she continues to manage and mentor all new European graduates.
  • David Kong, MEng Electronics and Electrical Engineering Student, University of Edinburgh
    • During an internship at onsemi, David wrote firmware for an automotive image sensor and developed some tools for image sensor testing, and at Imagination, he developed performance models for different processor components.
    • David has been awarded a range of scholarships, including The Royal Academy of Engineering (RAEng) Engineering Leaders Scholarship, and won both the NEC Semiconductor Prize and the Alasdair Sutherland Prize at the University of Edinburgh.
  • Sharon Kudenko, Photonics Engineering Intern / Student, CSA CATAPULT/University of Bristol
    • Sharon has shown extraordinary skills in mid-high-level software and has applied these techniques to automate photonics and RF testing, her nominator frm the CSA (Compound Semiconductor Applications) Catapult told us.
    • For STEM, she developed an activity using an optical tweezers test-kit to enrich students’ understanding of A-level physics and engage students in the field of optoelectronics, exposing students to the field of photonics at a deciding moment in their career paths.
  • Oana Lazar, MEng Electronic Engineering with Industrial Studies Student, University of Southampton
    • During her placement with Tessent Embedded Analytics, Oana successfully worked on a new product called the Embedded Software Development Kit (ESDK), satisfying a key design requirement for ESDK through creating a low-level C library.
    • She has been a Coordinator for Invent Plus, an incubator project from Southampton’s branch of Student Hubs, a national charity that shares engineering with school children from disadvantaged backgrounds, helping bridge the STEM inequality gap.
  • Janesh Luximan, Year 3 BEng Biomedical Engineering student, King’s College London
    • Janesh obtained 80% in the final year group Mechatronics project. Its theme was an environment monitor, with the Arduino project monitoring five sensors measuring temperature and humidity, turbidity, ultrasonic, TDS (Total Dissolved Solids) and water quality.
    • He also did a Water Quality Monitoring and Notification System. It simulated a reservoir system with water sensor, pH sensor, turbidity sensor and a notification system for when the water level is low and to make sure the water is safe.
  • Arturas Matusevicius, MSc Electronic Power Engineering Student, University of Northumbria Newcastle upon Tyne
    • His nominator said Arturas is one of the most talented young engineers in the UK, and one of the most motivated engineering students that he had encountered, with a high level of aptitude and diligence in electronic power engineering.
    • His specialism is in the future of battery technology and their potential for greater energy sustainability. He can master engineering design and think creatively, as well as write very clearly about abstract engineering concepts for a public audience.
  • Callum Middleton, Senior Packaging Materials Engineer, CSA Catapult
    • His nominator at the CSA (Compound Semiconductor Applications) Catapult said has been an example of professionalism and made exceptional contributions to the projects he has worked on, displaying a ‘can do’ attitude and leading on four projects.
    • Projects he has worked on include: an RF GaN diamond demonstrator, growing crystalline diamond on silicon substrates for space, a high reliability optical source for space-based quantum sensing, and a power inverter module for electric vehicles.
  • William Lee Millar, Senior Fellow, The European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN)
    • William has a PhD in RF Engineering with Lancaster University as part of the CERN Doctoral Student Programme, based at CERN, and an MEng in Nuclear Engineering (First Class Honours) at Lancaster University.
    • His community engagement includes regularly organising and providing tours of CERN’S Compact Linear Collider (CLIC) test facility for students at various stages in their education and participating in an outreach event by Lancaster University titled “Discover Engineering: Engineers and Particles”.
  • Dr Ejay Nsugbe, Founder and Chief Engineer, Nsugbe Research Labs
    • Ejay has shown scientific entrepreneurship by founding Nsugbe Research Labs where his work has applied AI technology to innovate in different aspects of modern medicine, helping to improving technology affordability where practitioners are constrained.
    • For example, Gesture Recognition for Prosthesis Control Using Wearable Sensing, addressing transhumeral amputees (the largest Upper-Limb amputee cohort in the UK). It remains challenging to design bionic upper-limb prosthesis due to the poor signal quality from the residual stump.
  • Alberto Progida, Mechanical Engineering Student, University of Edinburgh
    • Alberto is the Systems Lead at Endeavour, the University of Edinburgh’s rocketry team. Responsible for the development of Darwin III, he led the Endeavour sub-team in the development of a modular payload able to accommodate different mission profiles aboard three different launchers.
    • He won the Mach-21 CanSat competition and represented the UK at the European Rocketry Challenge in Portugal 2021, and interned as a Testing Engineer at Rocket Factory Augsburg (RFA) in Germany, working on pressurised systems and hardware like Swagelok, AN, and BSP fittings.
  • Jessica Reading, Engineering Degree Apprentice, Siemens PLC
    • Jessica’s key responsibilities at Siemens Congleton include managing a new assembly-station, supporting Value Stream 2 with any production issues and acting as LEANin-Office coordinator, whereby team savings targets must be met.
    • She also acts as a STEM Ambassador, YAAN and WISE member, tutor GCSE students in mathematics and focus mainly on promoting equal opportunity, continuous learning, and diversity and inclusion, and I hope to continue to inspire and empower others to learn about the sector.
  • Ana Claudia Reis, Senior Software Engineer, Imagination Technologies
    • As part of the application programming interface (API) team at Imagination, Ana works together with engineers and developers to deliver APIs for neural networks that run on different platforms. This helps drive optimisation for the networks as well as the software execution.
    • She has taken part in Imagination’s STEM outreach programme at Kings Langley. This is aimed at schools and provides students with the opportunity to learn coding with Lego robots through live workshops. It has had great feedback from teachers and students.
  • Amy Suddards, PhD student in radio astronomy technologies, University of Manchester
    • Amy has completed her MPhil project, “Optimising the Performance of Wideband Low Noise Amplifiers for Radio Astronomy Applications”, involving the development of high frequency waveguide-to-microstrip transition designs for use alongside Indium Phosphide MMIC-based LNA chips.
    • She was recently invited to present her design and model improvement work to the millimetre wave group at STFC’s Rutherford Appleton Laboratory in Harwell due to collaborative involvement in manufacturing the project designs.
  • Jack Tufft, Mechanical Engineering MEng Student, University of Glasgow
    • Jack is the founder of GU Rocketry, the University of Glasgow’s student-led rocket development programme. Since 2020, the project has grown from a small group of undergraduates to now having over ninety members in a range of technical and non-technical roles.
    • The team has three main goals: the Saltire rocket programme, the Chimera hybrid engine development programme, and outreach. The Saltire rocket family began with Saltire-1, reaching an altitude of just over 5000ft and was fully recovered.

 

EW BrightSparks of 2020

See: Step forward, EW BrightSparks of 2020
Here is the full list of 2020 EW BrightSparks:

 

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