R&D Mechanical Engineer

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Deborah Sigel

**** ****** **., *******, ** *1042

518-***-**** (cell)

*******.*.*****@*****.***

************@*****.***

U.S. Citizen

Experience:

Independent Consultant

Second Sight Medical Products, Sylmar, CA Aug. 2015-present R&D Mechanical Engineer

Development of Retinal Implants that Enable the Blind to See

Developed new versions of retinal array products with better apposition (fit) with a goal of short time to market. Brainstormed novel concepts. Built mockups to communicate and assess designs with engineers and clinicians.

Optimized array fit through iterative design and test at larger scale to enable engineers to physically feel and see solutions without need for a microscope. Fabricated mockup arrays using off the shelf materials and inexpensive tools. Transitioned lessons learned into full scale design iteration process.

Lead the identification, procurement, and training of a new non-contact profilometry OCT system for direct visualization and measurement of array fit on the bench. System enabled quick design iteration of arrays at full scale.

Designed and CNC machined silicone molds and thermoforming fixtures.

Implemented masks for new thin film microfabrication components in Autocad.

Designed and implemented thermal and impact tests for new cortical implant. ReDiscover Center / Tinkering School LA Jan. 2016 – Aug. 2016 Site Director, Pasadena CA

Designed and operated a tinkering-based summer day camp that encourages creativity, learning safe hand and power tool use, and building grand designs of their own invention, for kids ages 7-12. Developed, worked logistics, and operated first year of a Pasadena site of Tinkering School summer camp with 15 students and 4 staff at a new facility.

Ocean Lab, Glendale, CA Apr. 2014-Apr. 2015

Sr. Mechanical Engineer & Project Lead

R&D of Underwater Swarm Robotic Vehicles (Startup Company)

Developed detailed mission and vehicle requirements, communication schemes, data architecture, and swarming architecture. Mentored employees (most fresh out of school) on mechanical engineering, test design, interfacing with vendors, and the design process.

Developed novel underwater vehicle platforms using off-the-shelf and hobby components and quick iterative design approach with the goal of making an inexpensive ocean based scientific platform, to enable distributed sensing. Built and tested initial mobility testbed vehicle using off-shelf-hardware, Arduino microcontroller, xbee radio, and hobby motors.

Designed and performed trades on components including motor shaft seals, custom hydrophone arrays (for ranging), waterproof enclosures and seals, cabling, and lithium polymer battery safety. Performed motor characterization on hobby motors for use in motor and propeller selection & customization. Worked with industry vendors to identify ocean-compatible industrial and consumer components in our price range. Performed costing exercises for designs with different levels of vehicle reliability.

Worked with experts in the field to identify design parameters & rules of thumb for skill gaps including lithium battery safety, GPS selection, o-ring seal design, and RF noise in cabling.

Initiated a series of talks with oceanographers and ocean engineers to better understand the field and what the end user would want out of a user swarm. Pushed for the establishment of user studies. Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA May 2006-Apr. 2014 Mechanical Engineer

R&D and Proposal Development

Designed and optimized deployable RF antennas and novel solar arrays through CAD studies and the fabrication of scale mockups utilizing rapid prototype hardware, mechanically relevant material, and flight-like materials. Designed, fabricated, and tested DARE 0.75m long deployable biconical antennas. Designed and implemented RF functional trifold pop-up GNSS-R GPS radio occultation antenna for altimetry that simplified a suspended wire system into a printed circuit board with coil spring-element design. Designed and tested synchronous and sequential origami solar array designs for super-large 500m^2 space solar array. Deborah Sigel ************@*****.***

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As Principle Investigator, managed a $400k R&D program to develop and perform a properly scaled drop test in 35 ft deep water facility to extract dynamic stability coefficients of experimental Venus lander (SAGE) during descent through the Venus atmosphere. Developed requirements, test concept, and test article; and implemented test. Designed custom inexpensive waterproof camera system for use in recording drop test underwater.

Designed test and performed 5m ambient condition drop tests to simulate SAGE’s landing impact loads on Venus, and determine under what terrain configurations the lander remains stable. Designed and fabricated 0.5m diameter lander drop article with compliant outriggers honeycomb attenuator. Utilized high speed photography and accelerometers to determine landing dynamics. Validated ADAMS simulation model output with drop test acceleration data. Design to test completion in under 5 months.

Oversaw and performed wind tunnel test on 1/13th scale model of Venus lander at NASA ARC. Directed simulation team to take wind tunnel inputs and vehicle geometry and generate a full scale Venus landing simulator in ADAMS. This tool was a deliverable to the SAGE proposal.

Designed novel magnetic grapple for lifting payloads on Mars utilizing a passive permanent magnet to lift, and cancelling electromagnet to release. Worked with magnetics engineers to optimize structure for field strength and simplify design for ease of prototype. Prototype was tested successfully.

Designed and implemented wind tunnel test to determine the geometry least likely to induce wind noise on an above ground seismometer. Designed flight & fabricated flight-like model of thin shelled and softgoods deployable wind/thermal shield to protect thermally sensitive seismometer deployed on the Mars surface from a lander for INSIGHT.

Developed motor control code & designed user interface using Labview with Maxon motor control modules for IMSAH Mars coring rock drill.

Flight Hardware Design

Lead mechanical engineering effort on design of small 3DOF accelerometer flight science instrument (PMD) from concept to flight delivery with interdisciplinary team. Worked with small team to develop initial physical concept of the instrument, generate requirements, designed structure to meet launch vibration loads, closely interfaced with electrical engineering to incorporate circuit boards in a small package. Generated an engineering model (EM) stereo lithography (SLA) model. Used this model to further refine the flight design, interior electrical routing, and assembly method. Rehearsed assembly on the model. Generated flight CAD models and drawings in NX. Directed fabrication, assembly, and test of flight instruments including TVAC and vibration.

Designed and tested a highly loaded confluence pulley at the core of the Curiosity Rover (MSL) skycrane descent system.

Worked design and mechanical configuration for OPTIIX, a robotically assembled large telescope to be built at the international space station.

Flight Test Engineering

Led Verification and Validation (V&V) effort for MSL skycrane (BUD) system: specified tests to satisfy requirements, led V&V reviews, set up facilities, maintained schedule, designed mechanical support equipment, assembled test hardware, wrote test procedures, worked closely with support services (environmental testing, high speed test photography), and implemented tests. Tests included drop tests of Mars gravity scaled rovers with the skycrane and a drop test inside of a tall but narrow thermal vacuum chamber.

Designed, assembled, and programmed a remotely operated, brushless motor driven, mechanical dust dispenser for dropping small samples of ultrafine dust in a mars atmosphere wind tunnel chamber. Test determined effectiveness of Mars rover (MSL) system in preventing samples from blowing away in the wind. Hardware utilized rapid prototype (SLS) replica of rover turret with reverse engineered elements of a gunpowder powder measure.

Designed and operated remotely operated gantry and turn-table system for moving rover top deck and arm elements in a low pressure windtunnel system as part of above dust flow test. Clark Magnet High School (Glendale USD) Oct. 2011-Jun. 2013 Engineering Instructor

Taught engineering design process (hands-on), machine shop, and engineering fundamentals to 10-12th graders as a credentialed engineering teacher.

Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA Aug. 2005-Jun. 2007 Graduate Researcher

Designed a lunar surface navigation system for mobile robots using a star tracker, and researched localization schemes for autonomous vehicles on planetary bodies without atmospheres.

Participated in an autonomous lunar rover design project in conjunction with NASA Ames, GRC, and JSC. Deborah Sigel ************@*****.***

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Education:

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Swales Aerospace, Beltsville, MD Jan. 2003-Aug. 2005 Mechanical Engineer & Systems Engineer

Designed astronaut hand tools to perform on-orbit repair of a Shuttle Orbiter as part of NASA’s Return-to- Flight mission after the Columbia Shuttle failure, within an accelerated delivery schedule (less than 9 months).

Developed Laser Contour Gauge (LCG) concept, a device for measuring crack depth in shuttle tile on orbit. Lead engineering group to develop, test, and integrate electrical, thermal, structures, materials, and mechanisms into the LCG from concept to CDR. Designed and implemented modifications to COTS laser distance sensor and liquid crystal display technologies to mitigate thermal and outgassing risks for flight use.

Worked design through delivery of EVA Thermal Sensor (ETS) tool (a spaceflight repackaged Fluke temperature reader) for Shuttle mission STS-114 in under 4 months. Performed softgoods design and prototype fabrication for ETS thermal blanket.

Developed and performed Image Processing method to determine satellite image coregistration error on GOES weather satellite. Analyzed and designed method for determining and correcting satellite image shear in Matlab.

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA Jan.-Jul. 2001 Mechanical Engineer Co-op

Designed solar array mechanisms hardware, designed fixtures for drop tests, analyzed vehicle dynamics during rock collision scenarios, and presented results at PDR for MER (Spirit & Opportunity Rovers).

Performed piezoelectric drill resonance characterization experiments, designed a LabView control system, developed hardware and experiments for Ultrasonic Rock Abrasion Tool (URAT) drilling, and designed novel passively rotating grinding drill bits.

Pratt & Whitney, East Hartford, CT May-Aug. 2000

Engineering Intern

Performed and tested Electronic Engine Control reprogramming procedures.

Wrote and tested code in C to reduce EEC (engine black-box) fault dump analysis time. Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA

MS Robotics, Jun. 2007; GPA: 3.72/4.0

College Park, MD

MS Aerospace Engineering, Dec. 2005; GPA: 3.89/4.0 Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY

BS in Mechanical Engineering and Aeronautical Engineering, Dec. 2002; GPA: 3.92/4.0 Technology: CNC Machining, Softgoods design and fabrication, ESD certification, basic welding, steel brazing, torch soldering, metal lathing and milling, soldering, wood carving, woodworking, technical illustration. Computing: GD&T, Image processing, Siemens/Unigraphics NX5, Teamcenter, ProEngineer, ProIntralink, Solidworks, Matlab, Autocad 2D, Arduino, LabView, C++, Photoshop, SoftImage, Windows, Unix familiarity. Kids Building Things – Organizer. Volunteer engineers teach kids how to use tools, build, and tinker through weekend workshops. https://sites.google.com/site/kidsbuildingthings/ Glendale Woodturning Guild

Inventive Arts on Etsy Metal, wood, and softgoods fabrication. http://aerosquirrel.etsy.com CITEA (California Industrial and Technology Education Association), IAAA (International Association of Astronomical Artists).

D. Sigel, M. Thomson, D. Webb, P. Willis, P.D. Lisman, B. Trease, “Application of Origami in the Starshade Spacecraft Optical Blanket Design”, ASME IDETC Design Conference, Buffalo, NY, 2014.

D. A. Sigel et al., "Deployable antenna concepts for the Dark Ages Radio Explorer mission," Radio Science Meeting

(USNC-URSI NRSM), 2013 US National Committee of URSI National, Boulder, CO, 2013.

D. Sigel, et al. “Deployable Antenna Concepts for the Dark Ages Radio Explorer Mission.”

L. Yates, D. Sigel, M. Ouchi, C. Blodget, U. Quijano, D. Jenkins. “Application of Ballistic Range Analysis Techniques to Drop Test in a Water Tank,” ARA 2010.

Sigel, Deborah A.; Wettergreen, David. “Star tracker celestial localization system for a lunar rover,” Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems 2007, San Diego, CA, Oct. 29-Nov. 2, 2007, p. 2851-2856.

"Characterization of Transducers and Resonators under High Drive Levels," IEEE International Ultrasonics Symposium, Atlanta, GA, Oct. 7-10, 2001.

"Ultrasonic/Sonic Vibrating Rotating Tool bits" NASA Tech Briefs, NPO-30370, vol 26, No 9, p. 65, September 2002.

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