Student Spotlight: Daniyal Jamal

Upon learning that the 2020-2021 academic year would be remote, Daniyal Jamal elected to avoid completing his senior year online and used that time to gain valuable internship experience. Daniyal is a senior, double majoring in Mechanical Engineering and in Applied Mathematics and Statistics, and originally planned to graduate in spring 2021. “I tried to avoid online classes, especially during my senior year where I had so many hands-onlabs and senior design to do! It was also during this time when I heard back from the Departmentof Energy SULI program I applied to earlier in the spring. I had the choice between doing mysenior year online or a paid internship working at the National Renewable Energy Lab. I chose todo the latter,” explained Daniyal. 

In August 2020 Daniyal began an internship at National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Denver, CO, where he completed two technical research projects on wind turbines and hybrid energy systems. During this time, Daniyal helped to develop a complete and optimized techno-economic model in Python that identifies per kilogram cost of hydrogen produced by wind and solar energy systems at locations throughout the United States. 

When asked about the experience, Daniyal commented, “I worked under incredibly intelligent PhDs on problems that truly seemed significant to me and learned how to code and generate complex functional programs. The research I conducted is currently in the process of being published in the Journal of Renewable and Sustainable Energy, under the sub-topic Hybrid renewable energy systems.” 

Upon his return to Stony Brook in fall 2021, Daniyal serves as a machine shop manager for the Solar Racing team. In this role, he manages and coordinates the safety and fabrication efforts for over 30 student team members. Currently, he is leading a team on integrating steering and drivetrain systems for a solar-powered speed boat for the Solar Splash national competition in June of 2022. 

“I have always enjoyed the Solar Racing team because we have such a start-up feel. Everyone wears numerous hats, everyone does a little bit of everything, and we manage to complete our projects.” 

Additionally, Daniyal is participating in a NASA workforce development program this semester called the L'SPACE Academy. He will be working on a team composed of students from across the nation to develop a mission concept proposal for NASA's Lucy Project, the first space probe to target Trojan asteroids. As part of his senior design, Daniyal is also participating in the NASA student launch. 

“I am working with the payload team developing a drone payload that will be launched out of a descending rocket to take aerial images of the landing site - a seemingly impossible task that we intend to tackle with great determination.”

Daniyal’s decision to take a gap year and return to Stony Brook to complete his degree in person will certainly allow him the hands-on opportunities he had been hoping to experience during his senior year!