Brown School of Engineering Ph.D. candidate Mohak Patel took second place in the Society of Experimental Mechanics (SEM) Student Paper Competition held in mid-June in Indianapolis. The Student Paper Competition was established to encourage excellence in technical communication in the experimental mechanics field. The title of his paper was "Beyond DIC: Displacement Mapping via Position-based Single Particle Tracking".
"Position-based single particle tracking is a new technique for experimental reconstruction of complex kinematic fields," said Patel. "Compared to traditional methods based on digital image correlation, this approach improves the accuracy in resolving displacement fields comprising of large deformation and high spatial frequency."
The first national student paper competition was held during the 1991 SEM Spring Conference. It is held every year at the SEM Annual Conference and Exposition, and is open to any full-time student who is working on a project, thesis or dissertation. Only the top 16 submitted papers are accepted into the competition.
If the submitted paper is selected, the applicant receives a free conference registration and a ticket to the awards luncheon. Patel's second place entry came with a cash prize of $200, the Manual of Experimental Stress Analysis and an SEM student membership.
"I know from personal experience that this is a very challenging competition, and I am very proud of him," said Associate Professor Christian Franck, his thesis advisor. "Mohak gave his presentation to a packed room."
He is the first Brown University and Ivy League student to have placed in the 16 years of competition.