Hawkear 2.0
A project by John Hatfield, Dimitri Wolff, Sam Blanchet, and Jack Myers. Supervised by Dr. Stevenson, and Dr. Kloepper.
Summary
Bats use echolocation, or the use of sound waves and the reflections of those waves to locate and identify objects around them. One interesting ability in particular is the capacity for bats to travel in large, closely knit groups without having their echolocation interfere and cause them to crash into other bats. Knowing more about this solution is relevant for emerging technologies that use sonar, and as such the US Navy has expressed interest in finding a scientific solution to this problem which has been solved by nature.
Studying large groups of bats can be extremely difficult because useful data must come from inside the swarm. To do this, our team sought to build audio recording equipment that could be mounted onto a trained hawk, which will easily be able to navigate through bat swarms and collect the necessary data. Improving on an previous project, our team made modifications to include two microphones, a switch-controlled gain control feature, and more efficient data-saving strategies as well as make the package weight lighter for the hawk.
The Team
Samuel Blanchet
Sam is a senior electrical engineering major at the University of Notre Dame. Sam headed the software development that included ADC conversion, data-saving protocols, and writing to memory. After graduation, Sam will be working for Burns & McDonnell in Chicago. He is the unanimous team MVP.
Dimitri Wolff
Dimitri is a senior electrical engineering major at the University of Notre Dame. He led the board design and troubleshooting of various hardware. He will be continuing as a 5th year student pursuing a dual-degree in Electrical Engineering and Sociology.
John Hatfield
John is a senior electrical engineering major at the University of Notre Dame. He designed the boards and the gain control hardware. He also built the website. After graduation, John is commissioning as a submarine officer in the U.S. Navy. John only missed one meeting this year which is much less than the rest of the team anticipated.
Jack Myers
Jack is a senior electrical engineering major at the University of Notre Dame. Jack worked on the development and testing of the switch-controlled gain control feature. Jack helped troubleshoot issues regarding soldering/hardware. He also helped with ordering the wrong parts, and soldering stuff upside down. After graduation, Jack will be working for Booz Allen Hamilton in Washington, D.C.