Here are some projects that I am currently working on. (Not necessarily seriously.) Most of these are personal projects that I hope to finish one of these days. Some, like the satellite, are school projects that I have put lots of time into, and should be finished RSN. Starting in 2006 only completed and close to complete projects will be posted. I will leave incomplete projects that were posted before 2005.5.11 in this listing.
I spent several months in 2006 working on this project at IPFW. For now, I will only post my 2006 Indiana Academy of Science abstract.
Pattern Formation in a Reaction-diffusion System.
Noel R. Schutt and Desiderio A. Vasquez, Department of Physics, IPFW, Fort Wayne INPatterns arise in chemical, physical, ecological, and biological systems due to the interaction of reaction and diffusion. The reaction presents a stable steady state, which loose stability due to different diffusivities of chemical or biological species. In this work, we analyze numerically the two-dimensional patterns arising in a modified Lotka-Volterra model, which applies to ecological systems. We carry out a linear stability analysis for steady solutions of the reaction-diffusion system. We also solve numerically the nonlinear equations using a five-point finite difference approximation, together with an implicit Euler method for time evolution. The reaction mechanism alone (without diffusion) allows for two stable steady states. Introducing diffusion, one of the states looses stability allowing for pattern formation, while the other provides a stable homogeneous state. The interaction between the two states allows for the formation of complex patterns. This leads to the development of patterns with different wavelengths depending on the initial conditions. We also report localized patterns of very few wavelengths, confined inside a non-patterned state.
Presentation materials for an Introduction to Astronomy.
I TAed SYS310 E-Commerce at Taylor in spring semester 2004. I wrote examples for the concepts and assignments. My ecommerce TA site is a good introduction to SQL and php.
Taylor University is building a pico-satellite. Our satellite, TUSat1, is a double CubeSat. TUSat1 is an experimental communications satellite intended to be used for email in remote missions fields. I was one of three students leading the project. Most of my work was on the communications system. The satellite should be launched when the software is completed.
Go to the official site.
As part of the satellite project and my OS class, I worked on a daemon for serial (RS-232) communications over a network. The goal is to allow multiple programs to access a serial port on a Linux box. To make the program more useful, computers will be able to connect to the daemon over a network. Once this daemon is up and running, maintenance and administration of the satellite radio room at school will be much easier. The very basic version is working. I might finish this project sometime.
My AI class semester project (spring 2002) was to make a robot to play the game Merels (Nine Man Morris.)
I wrote an update to WheatBlog, an open source web journaling (weblog/Blog) program. I ran the news section of my school website on my version (0.02b) of WheatBlog. The next official release (WheatBlogApp 0.03b) is a rewrite by Wheat, the original designer. LegoBoy and I continued with my version of WheatBlog. LegoBoy eventually decided to do a complete rewrite of our version. The LegoBoy blog (now called WOG) is used in Schutt Design sites.
Sophomore year, I started on a program to do some processing of NOAA weather maps. The current version Just downloads three separate weather maps, combines them, and updates my site. The program is currently inactive.
For good satellite weather images, look at the latest GOES conus images or the GOES Project Science site.
I am slowly working on a robot that will find a radio transmitter. I have not worked on this project in a long time.
This is a very old project. I haven't worked on it since I found a deal on an amp in 2004. I'm leaving the old entry for now.
I'm working on building my own stereo system. Unfortunately, I don't have much money to spend on parts, so this is going slowly. I was unsuccessful at modifying a broken CD player, so that sets me back. I have a decent set of speakers to start with. I still need to build an amp. I have been looking at amp designs, so if I ever have enough free money and time, I'll build one. I found a deal on an old tuner/amp, so I probably won't get much further for a while.