Daniel Boyd: Engaging in Pushing the Limits of Energy Research

How did you find out about Anderson University?  

I went to high school in the Upstate, so I was aware of Anderson University. I knew that I wanted to go to a college where I’d be more than just a number and actually have relationships with faculty, staff and peers. When I first went to look at AU, I was looking at the math secondary ed program, but whenever I got there for my tour, I found out there was an engineering program and I immediately changed my plans to that route.  

Looking back on your time at Anderson, do you have any favorite memories that stand out?  

My favorite memories were working with my professors on research projects. I worked with different professors in the College of Engineering and learned a lot from working on those projects, growing deeper, stronger relationships with them in the process. The projects were great for problem solving skills-type development, and also gave me experience of jumping into the middle of an existing project and figuring out “What do I need to be doing? Where do I fit into this? What tasks are in front of me?”  

Give me an example of a project you worked on.  

One of the first research projects I did was tin whisker research. We were trying to grow tin whiskers and see if we could find a way to grow them consistently.  

Tin whiskers grow somewhat spontaneously from tin and can cause problems in electronics where they'll short things out. They're very small extrusions from the metal and they're very conductive. The goal of the research project that I was working on was to see if we could get them to grow consistently instead of just sporadically, and to the point where we could use them intentionally for different technology applications, such as in nanotechnology. It could be a lever or an antenna—something that we could perhaps grow in place onto a structure and use them for some purpose. You can’t do any of that until you can figure out why they grow, how they grow and get them to do that consistently. It was neat to come into that project and see what's already been done, based on what information we already have and what we should do going forward. 

It was a great experience of learning what it is to do research. We were trying to get them to show up by etching the surface with a scanning electron microscope. There had been previous studies done with acidic etching that had shown some sort of correlation that indicated that maybe that would be a good process. So we tried out that and got mixed results. But it was more about the process—that was the biggest learning experience.  

How long have you known that you wanted to be an engineer? 

My dad was a college chemistry professor when I was growing up. He taught at a few different Christian universities over the years. He was always building different things with the students, different reactors and tools, and that was something that I was interested in. I didn't know exactly what science I wanted to go into, but I liked building things and I liked doing things for science or to help enable science. Engineering naturally fit into that as something where I could learn the skills and the tools to build things, take what we have in terms of scientific theory and figure out how to turn that into something that actually accomplishes a task or helps facilitate further learning.  

Describe how you got into the job you’re doing. 

While I was still at AU, I had the opportunity to do an internship at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. God made the connections happen, and they just fell into place. In that internship, I got the opportunity to work on robotics and software development. It was a summer internship, and it went so well that they asked me to keep doing into the next semester. For the fall of my senior year I continued the internship remotely, and that also went well. I had an idea that they were working on putting together a job for me, but I didn't actually get any confirmation on that. I actually got the call saying that they wanted me to apply to the position as I was in the graduation processional. I said, “well, hold on. I can talk more later, but I have to go walk across the graduation stage.”  

I started working full-time at Oak Ridge last July and I've been working here since. They paid for me to move and for temporary housing while my wife and I found an apartment. Really, everything has been taken care of. God has been very good to us.  

What's a typical day for you?  

There are a lot of different things I do at the lab. My passion is designing and assembling circuit boards, but I also do a lot of programming software and firmware, system design, sensor integration and various other experiments for many different projects. In my position at the lab, they give you a base of operations to work in where there will be different projects in your group, but you're also free to do other projects in other groups. The lab will have various projects going on at any given time. Probably the most exciting work that I've had the opportunity to work on has been the US ITER Project, where I'vebeen able to assist with the development of plasma disruption mitigation systems. The ITER Project, a big fusion reactor project, is an international project worked out of France. It's the largest international science project ever done.  

Is there anything about the ITER project that's particularly exciting for you? 

It’s something that hasn't been done before. The whole project is just trying to push the limits of our technology or the science that we have today. And that's a really cool thing to be a part of. I'm doing a small part of it, which is a circuit board that helps monitor and operate a fly door for their fuel injection system. It's a combination of everyone's little efforts to push the whole goal forward, and it’s rewarding to be a part of something like that.  

What gives you the biggest sense of accomplishment in your work? 

My job at the lab is very much a service position where I'm trying to figure out what the different project managers are looking for, make sure I'm contributing what they're asking for, and, when possible, going above and beyond to really help move the project forward. I feel a lot of satisfaction and accomplishment whenever my contributions are seen to have helped the project, or help the different people who are working on it to do their job better or faster. I've learned a lot in the past year from all the hands-on experience I've been able to do, and that's really been a blessing.  

What kind of advice would you get for somebody interested in getting into engineering?  

We had a lab in the intro to engineering courses where we got a bunch of different tools, small devices—even a refrigerator—and we got the opportunity to take them apart and figure out how they worked. That was what pushed me to go into electrical engineering. While we were doing that; we came across the circuit boards that were running the electronics of those systems, and most of my classmates were like, “Oh, I don't know how that works. We'll just put that to the side.” To me, it was the magic black box and I really wanted to know how that magic box worked. I didn't like just giving it that blanket answer and throwing it to the side, so I dug my heels in, figured out how that worked, spent a lot of time researching, and that drove my passion towards electrical engineering.  

My advice is to get that hands-on experience. Take things apart, figure out how they work. If you have something that you want to make, just figure out one step at a time how you would build it. And you may build things that don't work, you may build things that do, but you'll learn from doing that exercise.  

Why choose the College of Engineering at Anderson University over other engineering programs? 

The biggest thing is the personal connection you have with the faculty. I had the opportunity of not just being known by the faculty, but getting to know them on a personal level. I got to ask lots of questions while I was doing my studies and go down the rabbit trail of where those questions lead. You don't get that opportunity when you're in a class of hundreds, and if you ask a question, they don't have time for all of that. At Anderson University, they have time for you, and that's really important to me.