The 2014 season was a transitional year for UMBC Racing, with many experienced members graduating and moving on to full time careers. This was balanced, however, with an influx of ambitious young members to replace the veterans, and the team grew larger overall. As a result, the 2014 team was the youngest since 2007. Despite this reduction in experience, the team banded together and worked hard to succeed. Managing to balance schoolwork and the task of running a successful Baja program, another competitive team was brought together.

Every new vehicle sees major improvements from the previous generation. As an example, one major redesign was the upright assembly. The new assembly is 25% lighter, while allowing the new system to gain 12 degrees of steering angle. As a result of the increased steering angle, the vehicle’s turning radius was reduced by 5 feet – a substantial improvement for maneuverability. After extensive tire testing, a new tire package was used this year, increasing the rear tire size to 26 inches for superior performance over rough terrain. Another large step in the 2014 season was in data acquisition. For the first time in UMBC Racing history, live telemetry was utilized during the endurance race. This gave the team beneficial insight into vehicle performance and status.

The schedule in 2014 saw 274 individual teams from around the world across three competitions. The first race was in late April, 2,000 miles away from campus in El Paso, Texas. A month later in May, the team traveled 1,200 miles to compete in Pittsburgh, Kansas. Two weeks later, in early June, the third and final competition was held 800 miles away from campus in Peoria, Illinois.

UMBC Racing travelled 8,000 miles in total, attending all three North American competitions and to compete for the Mike Schmidt Memorial Iron Team Award. The Iron Team Award is given to the team with the most cumulative points who attend all three competitions. The team has competed for the Mike Schmidt since 2010, recording a best finish of 2nd place in our first year.

Even with such a young team, UMBC Racing came away with excellent results at all three races. 2nd, 1st, and 2nd place cost trophies from Texas, Kansas, and Illinois will soon find their way to our impressive trophy collection. UMBC maintained an incredible record of never finishing outside the top 3 in overall vehicle cost. Other notable finishes were in the acceleration event, with the team coming in 3rd place in Texas, and 9th in Kansas. 

One of the best performances of the season came at the Illinois competition where UMBC Racing won the business presentation despite not having any business majors on the team. This is especially impressive considering the team was slated against schools with top ten business programs such as the University of Michigan, which is currently ranked 2nd in the United States.

When all the points came together, UMBC finished a respectable 9th in the Mike Schmidt Iron Team Award. In the end, despite the challenges of a difficult learning year, the young UMBC Racing team can stand proudly by their results from this year. Looking forward, there is much to improve, but the future is bright and the team is eager to win.

Expect to see UMBC Racing at the front yet again in the 2015 season!

Second in the series, IS 461/661 focuses on applications

IS 461/661 Health Informatics - II will introduce the senior and graduate students to the applications of biomedical informatics. The students will learn about electronic health records, health information infrastructure, management of information in healthcare organizations, patient centered care systems, public health informatics, and telehealth along with other important application areas. The information provided in this course is crucial for students who may want to participate in the health IT organizations at any capacity. The students will also gain an opportunity to gain more in-depth knowledge in a topic they choose to further explore within a team formation.

The contents of the course are as follows (the last two depending on time):

• Electronic Health Record Systems
• Health Information Infrastructure
• Management of Information in Health Care Organizations
• Patient-Centered Care Systems
• Public Health Informatics
• Consumer Health Informatics and Personal Health Records
• Telehealth
• Patient Monitoring Systems
• Imaging Systems in Radiology
• Information Retrieval and Digital Libraries
• Clinical Decision-Support Systems
• Computers in Health Care Education
• Bioinformatics
• Translational Bioinformatics
• Clinical Research Informatics
• Health Information Technology Policy
• The Future of Informatics in Biomedicine

• Best Course: Civic Agency and Social Entrepreneurship (POLI/AMST/SOCY 205)
• Best Welcome Week Activity: Convocation (including the walk there!)
• Best Dessert in the Skylight Room: Banana Cream Pudding/Pie (whatever it is, it is topped with vanilla wafers and delicious)

• Walden Circle, contact Joel Baker, jbaker13@umbc.edu
• Lakeland Young Explorers, send completed application to  Zach Pekor, zpekor@umbc.edu

Volunteer openings are still available for these programs (Walden Circle, M-Thurs) and Lakeland Young Explorers (M-Thurs). 

Dr. Narsingh Singh has been elected as a Fellow to the Royal Society of Chemistry of the UK for his multidisciplinary work in Chemistry and materials. The backbone of the Society is its Fellowship, which is made up of the most eminent scientists, engineers and technologists from the UK and abroad. Fellows and Foreign Members are elected for life through a peer review process on the basis of excellence in science. Singh is also a Fellow of American Society of Materials (ASM) International, a Fellow of SPIE-The International Society of Optics and Photonics and a Fellow of OSA- The Optical Society of America (OSA).

Congratulations on this prestigious recognition!