Nicolas Keck

Working on Dragonfly

F23/S24/F24/S25/F25/S26 - Electronic Circuits and Analogue Devices (18-220)

Designed RTL diagram for FPGA-enabled lunar lander camera control card. Created preliminary schematic for FPGA-enabled lunar lander camera control card. Redesigned Xilinx reference LVDS to MIPI converter circuit to function in worst-case conditions. Designed and evaluated a discrete Power over Coax filter for a GMSL2 serial link. Brought 3 component radiation test boards from concept to fabrication, and wrote bring-up and test plans for each board. Completed 1 additional layout and 3 additional schematics of radiation test boards before project handoff.

Led a team of 6 in the design and manufacturing of "STEMnauts" (microcontrollers with human survivability characteristics necessary for NASA's 2024 Student Launch Competition.) Accomplished altitude within 1.8% of target by implementing PID control loop for onboard airbrakes. Set team's stringent clean code, documentation, and version control standards to adhere to NASA technical reporting standards (6 technical reports required per year of competition).

Helped develop a custom software defined radio device. Designed and wrote VHDL description for an I2C-controlled FPGA to enable and disable RF chains. Verified VHDL description through benchtop testing of FPGA development kit. Wrote microcontroller communication code in C for serial debugging. Designed and laid out a variety of supporting boards for radio device testing (power supply, MCU debug board, thermal testing boards). Simulated and tested modified RC networks in LTSpice to optimize power supply performance. Performed a variety of experiments to determine functionality of USB 3.0 Superspeed-only on SoC.

Developed best-practice methodologies and formulas for calculating offshore carbon abatement due to deployment of robotic systems. Wrote and published industry white paper to disseminate carbon abatement calculation methodologies to the wider industry. Developed an online calculator tool to quickly provide ballpark abatement figures for a specific robotic technology.