Author Archives: Evelina Rosser

HOW CAN I ENSURE THAT MY CAPSTONE PROJECT IS UNIQUE AND STANDS OUT FROM OTHERS

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Focus on an innovative idea, problem, or issue that has not been fully addressed by others. Conduct thorough research to identify an original concept that makes a novel contribution. Look for opportunities where further investigation could lead to new discoveries, insights, or applications. Coming up with a truly innovative idea will set your capstone apart from standard or run-of-the-mill topics that tend to get replicated across many student projects.

Approach the topic from a fresh perspective by questioning common assumptions and challenging prevailing mindsets. Look at the issue from different angles and consider alternative ways of framing or conceptualizing the key ideas. Bringing a unique lens or critical perspective can infuse fresh thinking into the work. For example, taking an interdisciplinary approach by blending theories and methods from multiple domains can lead to new insights.

Design an ambitious and comprehensive research methodology that goes beyond typical undergraduate work. Aim to produce substantive results on par with small-scale professional studies. For example, conduct multiple rounds of human subject testing, analyze large datasets using advanced analytical tools, or develop and empirically evaluate multiple prototype versions of a new technological solution. Going the extra mile methodologically can elevate the quality and impact of the findings.

Move beyond a standard literature review by critically analyzing, synthesizing and extending existing scholarly conversations on the topic. Identify limitations, inconsistencies or gaps across previous studies, and aim to address these through the capstone research. Advancing the academic debate in an original way rather than just summarizing prior work shows a higher level of scholarly rigor and critical thinking.

Consider creative modes of inquiry beyond traditional academic papers such as designing and building a functional prototype, producing an informative documentary film or theater performance, curating an experiential public exhibition, or coding an interactive data visualization application. Exploring less common genres and formats can make the final product more visually engaging and memorable for readers.

Include multimedia components to enrich the narrative and amplify specific ideas, findings or arguments. Strategically incorporate original photos, video clips, audio recordings, data visualizations, maps, sketches, diagrams and other visual materials throughout the capstone document. These assets can help express multidimensional concepts that would be difficult to convey through words alone. The multimedia additions lend uniqueness.

Ensure that any developed prototypes, products or other tangible materials can continue to be refined, implemented or studied after the formal project wraps up. With proper documentation, the research work product could potentially be continued or scaled up by other students or outside collaborators long into the future. Having a lasting impact beyond the brief capstone timeframe demonstrates higher real-world applicability and value.

Present the work in an innovative format or at non-traditional venues beyond just the university setting. For example, posters or public presentations at discipline-relevant conferences, community fairs or online forums allow interacting directly with wider audiences whose perspectives and feedback could further improve the research. Taking the dissemination process beyond standard academic channels lends pioneering spirit.

Incorporate a thoughtful reflection discussing how the process of conducting the original research project shaped the student’s intellectual and personal growth. Lessons learned, wisdom gained, and new questions inspired by pushing boundaries can highlight deeper insights beyond just presenting final static results. A insightful meta-narrative brings the “human” element that readers resonate with on a higher level.

Pursue opportunities to publish or showcase select elements of the work through external academic journals, design competitions, crowdfunding campaigns or sponsored research initiatives. Getting recognized beyond just the degree requirements demonstrates a level of ambition that inspires readers and signals the research makes a innovative contribution worthy of broader interest and support. External validation lends prestige.

Partnering with outside stakeholders such as industry professionals, public agencies, advocacy groups or community organizations from project inception through completion and dissemination stages infuses real-world relevance. Collaborating with external expertise in an integral way enriches both the work and the student’s career preparation in a fashion that makes the most of academic resources. Practical applicability attracts interest.

Developing a truly innovative concept, implementing an ambitious multidimensional methodology, pursuing creative forms of expression and dissemination through determination and collaboration are promising pathways towards crafting an impactful capstone project that will stand out prominently from all others. With passion and persistence, even the most ambitious of visions can be realized to their fullest extent through a life-changing undergraduate research experience.

CAN YOU PROVIDE AN EXAMPLE OF A DOCTORAL PROGRAM THAT REQUIRES A DISSERTATION

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One type of doctoral program that traditionally requires the completion of a dissertation is a Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) program. PhD programs are research-focused doctoral degrees that are designed to produce scholars in a particular academic discipline or professional field. The overarching goal of PhD study is to contribute new knowledge and understanding to the field through original research. For this reason, completing a dissertation is a core requirement of most PhD programs.

The dissertation is the culminating project of a PhD program where students conduct extensive independent research and scholarly work under the supervision of faculty advisors and dissertation committee members. Through the dissertation, PhD candidates demonstrate their ability to identify a research problem or question within their field of study, conduct a comprehensive review of relevant literature, utilize appropriate research methods and analysis, and make an original contribution to the body of knowledge in the discipline. Dissertations generally take 1-3 years of full-time work to complete after coursework is finished.

The dissertation process consists of several formal steps. Students first develop a dissertation proposal outlining their research question or hypothesis, literature review, methodology, and anticipated findings. This proposal must be approved by the student’s dissertation committee before research can begin. Once approved, students move forward with conducting the proposed research and analysis. Throughout this stage, regular meetings are held with advisors to discuss progress and receive guidance.

Upon completion of the research and analysis, students write a lengthy dissertation manuscript presenting all elements of the completed research project. The written dissertation typically ranges from 150-300 pages in length and includes an introduction, literature review, methodology section, results/findings, discussion/conclusion, and references. After the written dissertation is submitted, students must then defend their work orally during a dissertation defense meeting with their committee. The committee will ask questions and evaluate the quality and rigor of the student’s independent research and written work.

Upon passing the defense, making any required revisions or corrections, and gaining final approval from the dissertation committee and graduate school, the PhD candidate will have completed all requirements for the doctoral degree. The dissertation demonstrates to degree granting institutions that PhD graduates have reached the level of expertise required to independently and creatively conduct worthwhile, publishable research within their specialized field of study. It is considered a hallmark of PhD education and signifies that a student has achieved a distinct level of expertise beyond a master’s degree.

There are many specific PhD programs across various disciplines that require completion of a dissertation as the capstone project. Some common examples of doctoral programs requiring a dissertation include PhD degrees in various sciences like Chemistry, Biology, and Physics. In the social sciences fields, programs such as Psychology, Sociology, Political Science, and Economics all typically require an original dissertation as the culminating experience. Dissertations are also standard components of PhD degrees in many humanities fields including Philosophy, History, English, and Communications. Professionally-oriented PhD programs in areas like Education, Nursing, Social Work and Business also generally necessitate completion of an independent research dissertation on a specialized topic within the given professional domain.

While dissertation requirements and formats vary some between individual doctoral programs and research topics, the multi-step process of developing a proposal, independently conducting original research using accepted methods, writing a lengthy manuscript, and defending the work publicly remains consistent across most academic PhD programs in the United States. The dissertation allows emerging scholars to make an authentic research-based contribution to their specialized field of study under the guidance of faculty experts before earning their doctoral degree. It is truly the pinnacle requirement demonstrating a student’s readiness to independently contribute to their discipline at the highest level as a credentialed PhD.

A dissertation is the defining component of most PhD programs across various academic disciplines in the United States. Through the rigorous multi-stage process of developing, conducting, writing, and publicly defending a substantial piece of original research, doctoral students complete the most complex and career-defining project of their education. Earning a PhD through successful dissertation work signifies that a graduate has reached the peak of expertise in their specialized academic or professional domain and is prepared to independently further advance their narrow field of study through future scholarship and research. The all-encompassing dissertation experience is truly the hallmark final step separating master’s and PhD education.

HOW CAN ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING STUDENTS BENEFIT FROM THE GUIDANCE OF FACULTY DURING THE CAPSTONE PROJECT

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Electrical engineering capstone projects provide students with an invaluable opportunity to work on a substantial design project from start to finish while leveraging the knowledge and skills they have gained throughout their undergraduate studies. While students take the lead on their capstone projects, guidance and oversight from faculty members can help maximize the educational and professional benefits students gain from this experience. There are several key ways faculty involvement supports students throughout the capstone process:

Setting realistic and meaningful project scopes: Faculty advisors play an important role in helping students identify capstone project ideas and scope them at a level that can be reasonably accomplished within the allotted time frame. They can draw on their experience to counsel students on determining a design challenge that is ambitious yet feasible given the student’s current abilities and resource constraints. This is crucial for ensuring students take on a project they can successfully complete while still gaining relevant engineering experience.

Providing technical expertise: As subject matter experts, faculty members are well-positioned to offer valuable technical guidance, advice and feedback to students as they work through the various stages of their capstone projects. From the initial planning phases through prototype development and testing, faculty advisors can help troubleshoot technical issues, recommend design approaches, connect students to relevant research, and ensure projects adhere to safety and engineering standards. Their input and perspective as experienced engineers helps elevate student work.

Developing project management skills: In addition to the technical aspects, capstone projects aim to develop students’ engineering practices such as project planning, documentation, teamwork, and professional communications. Faculty guidance supports this learning by working with students to establish realistic schedules and milestones, reviewing regular progress reports, and providing feedback on deliverables such as design proposals, documentation and final presentations. This coaching from faculty strengthens students’ ability to effectively manage complex engineering projects.

Connecting to resources: Capstone projects often involve gaining access to specialized tools, testing equipment, facilities or expertise not readily available in undergraduate labs and workshops. Faculty advisors serve as the liaison for connecting students to the various campus or industry resources needed to support their project work. Whether securing time on advanced equipment, arranging consultations with subject matter experts, or facilitating procurement of hard-to-obtain components, faculty guidance is invaluable for overcoming resource barriers.

Ensuring safety and ethics: As the technical authority overseeing capstone projects, faculty advisors ensure student work adheres to necessary safety protocols and engineering codes of ethics. They guide students through compliance requirements, permit applications, approvals for human or animal subjects research, and handling of hazardous materials if applicable. Maintaining safety and ethics is critical for protecting both students and their institutions. Faculty oversight provides accountability on these essential project elements.

Assessing learning outcomes: Most importantly, faculty advisors leverage their experience to assess the degree to which each student has met the intended learning outcomes of the capstone experience. Through reviewing final reports and presentations, advisors gauge the level of technical competence, design and problem-solving skills, team and project management abilities, and professional communication skills demonstrated in the completed student work. Their feedback verifies what was gained from each individual experience. This personalized assessment from faculty mentors helps direct future professional and educational pathways for graduating students.

The hands-on guidance, expertise and accountability that faculty advisors provide throughout the electrical engineering capstone process are incredibly valuable for maximizing the educational impact of this culminating project experience. Their involvement supports students in developing strong technical abilities while strengthening their engineering practices. It also helps facilitate the resources, compliance and individual assessment needed to successfully complete meaningful work and achieve the intended learning outcomes. For these reasons, dedicated faculty mentorship enrichly enhances what students gain from their undergraduate capstone design projects.

WHAT ARE SOME OF THE CHALLENGES IN ACHIEVING EQUITABLE GLOBAL VACCINE ACCESS

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There are several major challenges that make achieving equitable global access to vaccines difficult. One fundamental challenge is financial – it is extremely costly to research, develop, clinically test, mass produce, and distribute vaccines worldwide. Private pharmaceutical companies take on huge financial risks and costs to bring new vaccines to market. While governments and organizations like Gavi provide some funding support for vaccines in lower-income countries, there are still many countries that cannot afford to purchase large amounts of vaccines on their own. The costs of scaling up vaccine production and building out cold chain infrastructure is also enormous. With limited healthcare budgets, many developing nations struggle to purchase enough doses to satisfy global herd immunity thresholds.

Related to financial constraints is the issue of global prioritization during short supply situations. When new vaccines are first introduced or during a pandemic, there may not be enough supply initially to meet global demand. Wealthier countries that can pay top dollar often receive priority allocation from manufacturers in the short-term. This delays access for lower-income populations, though donation and redistribution efforts through Gavi and others help to address this over time. Global coordination on vaccine production and distribution timelines is challenging given commercial and geopolitical interests at play.

Health system weaknesses pose another hurdle. Even when vaccines are donated or subsidized, delivering them effectively to populations requires robust cold chain storage and transportation infrastructure, training for healthcare workers, and systems to conduct mass vaccination campaigns. Many developing nations lack optimal primary healthcare systems and face difficulties in keeping vaccines within recommended temperature ranges during storage and transit to remote locales. They may also have shortages of needles, syringes and other supplies needed to administer vaccines safely and at scale. Community distrust and lower demand further undermine vaccination programs in some contexts.

Intellectual property policies can also inhibit equitable access. Vaccine manufacturers depend on patents and clinical data exclusivity periods to recoup R&D investments. Some argue this delays the entry of lower-cost generic competitors in developing countries. There are efforts like the COVID-19 Technology Access Pool to voluntarily pool IP, but uptake has been limited. Compulsory licensing which allows governments to override patents in emergencies remains controversial. Striking the right balance between innovation incentives and ensuring timely availability of affordable vaccines is complex with arguments on both sides.

Then there are challenges related to mis- and disinformation online which can spread quickly worldwide. Unfounded claims linking vaccines to autism or other conditions have taken root in some communities and successfully lowered immunization rates. With a deluge of health advice online, it becomes difficult for local public health officials and community leaders to combat myths and allay fears. Digital platforms are criticized for not doing enough to curb the spread of provably false anti-vaccine narratives. At the same time, censoring speech risks further alienating hesitant populations. Nuanced messaging and building trust becomes ever more crucial.

The geopolitics of vaccines cannot be ignored. Donations and partnerships are sometimes influenced as much by diplomatic goals as pure public health priorities. Some nations may donate surplus doses to curry favor with recipient countries. On the other hand, vaccine nationalism where wealthy states secure enough doses for their entire populations before supporting global distribution efforts can undermine the cooperative spirit needed. There is an inherent tension between a country prioritizing its own citizens’ health versus contributing to slowing the worldwide pandemic that ignores borders. Overall coordination at multilateral levels remains a work in progress.

The multitude of financial, logistical, technological, informational, policy and geopolitical factors pose interconnected hurdles. Overcoming them requires not only more resources but innovative cooperation between governments, vaccine developers, health agencies and community organizations. Substantial progress has been made in global vaccine access in the past two decades, but achieving full equitable distribution in a crisis demands rethinking traditional R&D and supply chain models for the long run. With political will and collective action, many of these challenges can be gradually ameliorated.

WHAT ARE SOME POTENTIAL RISKS ASSOCIATED WITH INVESTING IN CRYPTOCURRENCIES

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Cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin are highly speculative investments and come with greater risks than traditional investments like stocks, bonds, and real estate. Some of the major risks include:

Volatility Risk: The valuation of cryptocurrencies is not tied to any economic indicators and is only determined by market demand which tends to be highly volatile. This makes the value of holdings in crypto vulnerable to large swings on any given day or hour. Between 2017 and 2018, the total market capitalization of all cryptocurrencies fell from $830 billion to just $120 billion, a drop of over 85%. Such volatility means the value of holdings can crash significantly in a very short period.

Liquidity Risk: Compared to traditional assets, cryptocurrency markets lack liquidity. This means that during times of high volatility or low demand, it may be difficult to sell cryptocurrency holdings at reasonable prices. Low liquidity combined with high volatility can result in amplification of losses during downturns as sellers flood the markets looking to exit positions.

Bubble Risk: There is a persistent debate around whether the huge increases in cryptocurrency prices, particularly during 2017, represented an unsustainable bubble. Given the high speculation in the asset class and lack of economic fundamentals tied to valuation, there is a risk that cryptocurrency mania could repeat itself and result in another crash that wipes out significant value.

Fraud and Hack Risk: Cryptocurrency exchanges and wallets, which are needed to buy, sell and hold cryptocurrency, have been frequent targets of hacks and theft. Millions of dollars in digital currencies have been stolen by hacking exchanges and exploiting technical loopholes. There have also been instances of exchanges and Initial Coin Offering (ICO) projects turning out to be fraudulent. Such operational and security risks translate to potential losses of holdings for investors.

Regulatory Risk: As global financial regulators are still assessing how to classify cryptocurrencies and what regulatory framework to apply, there is uncertainty around evolving rules. Tighter regulations could limit participation and ease of conversion between crypto and fiat currencies. Contradictory regulatory stances across countries could also undermine the fungibility of digital assets. Changes in rules can impact value and market viability of certain cryptocurrencies.

Acceptance Risk: For cryptocurrencies to be adopted as a long term store of value and medium of exchange, they need to gain significant merchant and consumer acceptance. Their usage for “real economy” transactions remains limited. If major corporations, merchants, and governments show lack of interest in accepting crypto payments over time, it brings into question the long term usability and valuation proposition of these digital assets.

Technology Risk: The algorithms, protocols and software governing cryptocurrencies have not been stress tested over long periods by large scale mainstream usage. Potential bugs, security holes or technical limitations that are discovered in the future could undermine confidence in networks and result in forks or other problems affecting value of holdings.

Tax Risk: Tax laws governing profits or losses from buying and selling cryptocurrencies continue to evolve in most jurisdictions. Depending on individual country rules and the investor’s local tax laws, any gains realized from crypto investments could be treated differently than traditional assets for tax purposes, which creates uncertainty. Tax compliance on crypto transactions also poses challenges for individuals and regulators.

Competing Crypto Risk: The cryptocurrency space remains innovative, with new digital currency projects emerging regularly that aim to improve upon earlier blockchains or offer different value propositions. Older cryptocurrencies run the risk of losing market share to newer entrants over time if they fail to develop or scale sufficiently. Investments in any single crypto hold the risk of superior technology making that particular asset obsolete or less competitive.

Lack of Intrinsic Value: Unlike stocks which hold claims on real assets of publicly traded companies, or fiats which are backstopped by governments, cryptocurrencies have no intrinsic value of their own. Their worth depends entirely on self-fulfilling speculative demand without tangible assets or cash flows backing them up. This abstraction makes cryptos vulnerable if market sentiment shifts drastically away from them.

Cryptocurrencies represent highly speculative and volatile investments that carry unique and significant risks compared to traditional assets. Their long-term acceptance and viability remains uncertain due to technological, regulatory and competitive challenges. All these factors make cryptos risky proportionate bets that could result in complete loss of capital for investors. Only active traders with solid risk management and investors with strong risk tolerance should consider crypto exposure as part of a well-diversified portfolio.