Contents

Learning

Basics

We use the terminal and git heavily in all of our projects. You’ll also want to dive deeper into a programming language. We primarily use Julia with an occasional need for Python, C/C++ or Fortran. Complete the starter tasks for new undergraduate researchers if these aren’t already familiar. These cover writing, reading, command line, git, programming, and a starter application project.

Online Courses

Some excellent online courses are available to help you learn more about some topics of importance in our research.

Wind Energy

Aircraft

I’ve also posted lectures for Flight Vehicle Design, Aerodynamics, and Optimization on our lab YouTube channel.

BYU Courses

Here are some classes that tend to be most directly applicable to our lab. The list below is not mandatory, they are just some ideas to help you in your course selection. I encourage you to choose courses based on your interests. PhD students will need more math than ME 505.

Foundational to our Lab:

Textbooks

Depending on what your research topic is, you might find some of the following textbooks useful to become familiar with. You should at least read the first one in each list that is relevant to your research. Links are for books with available electronic copies (either publicly available or for on-campus students through BYU’s subscriptions). For books with a star* there is an electronic copy on our shared folder in Box. The others you can purchase, borrow from the library, or borrow from me.

Communication

Aerodynamics

Optimization

Wind Energy

Flight

Journal Papers

Research

An effective way to get started in research is to find a good paper in your area of interest (ask those who work in that area for recommendations), and reproduce the results in the paper. This process will help you get up to speed in an area of interest and along the way you’ll likely have ideas for new directions or ways you can build on that work.