Engineering grads launch careers at ONU

ADA — Jed Marquart grew up in rural northwest Ohio and he has remained there much of his life. But his work has helped make it possible to travel to farther-flung corners of the planet — or even into outer space. Marquart teaches aerospace engineering at Ohio Northern University in Ada. The program is not its own degree, but a concentration for mechanical engineering majors. Alumni who've studied under Marquart have gone on to careers at NASA, SpaceX, Blue Origin, the U.S. Air Force, and other aerospace industries and national labs. For example, three alumni played important roles in the recent successful NASA launch of the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft. Derick Endicott, a 2012 graduate, is a senior test development engineer for SpaceX who ensures that the company's components can withstand the rigors of spaceflight. Alex Strimbu, who graduated in 2017, is a SpaceX test development engineer who works on the Merlin engine — the propulsion system for the Falcon 9 booster. And NASA's Justin Littell, a 2004 graduate, conducted research in the areas of structural dynamics to ensure astronaut safety during splashdown of the Dragon capsule. Marquart studied at ONU himself, and after earning his bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering there, he worked for a time at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. When he returned to ONU to teach, he found a lot of students were interested in aerospace engineering. He began teaching a class in computational fluid dynamics, which means creating simulations using computers, rather than a wind tunnel, allowing the student to create a model more quickly and change it as needed. At the time, around 1992, Ohio Northern was the only school Marquart knew of that had an undergraduate course in the subject. Marquart also started an elective course in aircraft design. Students learn about what makes an airplane fly, then they build a model of their own and must demonstrate to the rest of the class that it can fly. Marquart said he loved working at Wright-Patterson, where he worked first for defense contractors and later as an Air Force employee. But while he and his wife were living in Dayton, they stopped on the ONU campus for a visit and Marquart learned from a former professor that another professor would be retiring. He said he hadn't really thought about teaching, but realized that if he taught other people how to be engineers, he could make a greater difference than he could as an engineer himself. ONU alumni are now working at NASA facilities like NASA Glenn Research Center and the Johnson Space Center. They're also working for the Air Force and the Navy, for Lockheed Martin, for Blue Origin and SpaceX. Marquart said whenever he sees in the news that a project a former student was involved in is launching into space, he'll email his congratulations. Marquart said students are drawn to this field because of the inherent excitement in planes and space travel. And, he said, about 20-25% of mechanical engineering freshmen, when surveyed, say they're interested in aerospace engineering specifically. In addition to the courses in computational fluid dynamics and aircraft design, other courses required for the aerospace engineering concentration include finite element analysis, advanced thermodynamics, and math courses beyond the standard curriculum in calculus and partial differential equations. Some students enter the aerospace industry upon graduating from ONU, while others go on to graduate school to pursue an advanced aerospace engineering degree. Marquart fell in love with aerospace as a child in the 1960s. His family happened to be in Florida on vacation the summer that Apollo 11 took Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin to the moon, and he has pictures of Apollo 11 sitting on the pad before the launch. He grew up on a farm not far from Bluffton and had looked at other schools but decided to go to ONU, close to home. He now, again, lives just outside Bluffton. One thing Ohio Northern's students are involved in is the annual SAE Aero Design Competition, in which competitors design and build a radio-controlled model airplane and see how much weight it can lift. "I kind of look at it as a tractor pull for airplanes," Marquart said. Marquart said he's seen public interest in space rise and fall. He said now that there are commercial companies like SpaceX and Blue Origin in the field, it's pushed NASA further — and it means more job opportunities for aerospace engineers. He said one of the rewarding aspects of studying aerospace engineering is that, while lay people may be "astounded" at a launch, he and his colleagues are in the know and understand how it works. And, of course, there is "being part of something that's so exciting." Engineering in general is a chance to make a difference by giving society something it doesn't already have, he said. If you're in a doctor's office, for example, the medical equipment that's used by the doctors has been built by engineers. And he said the field of engineering is continuing to grow, as new products are always needed. In addition to mechanical engineering, ONU offers a civil engineering degree, as well as a degree in electrical and computer engineering/computer science. Marquart said if someone wants to be a chemical engineer, they could pursue a mechanical engineering degree and take additional chemistry courses. And with no graduate engineering program, ONU concentrates on undergrad engineering education, he said. A point of pride is the new James Lehr Kennedy Engineering Building, a 105,000-square-foot facility which opened last year and includes more than 2,000 square feet for research labs. Marquart said the work includes "the wonder of being able to explore something that hasn't been explorable" before, adding "I think humans are built to explore." If he himself could explore anywhere in space? "I'd love to see Mars," Marquart said. He added that exploring under the ocean would be his second choice — another subject, he said, that it isn't hard to get people excited about.