DEV Community: Sanjana Mohapatra

CHIT-CHAT With Alumni: Episode 8- Risk Is The Downpayment On Success

Sanjana Mohapatra — Tue, 05 Jan 2021 06:34:09 +0000

The SPECTRUM club is one the core technical societies of the College of Engineering and Technology, founded in 2015 by Mr. Bikram Keshari Panda (2015 batch graduate), keeping an eye on the sole motive of Instrumentation and Electronics branch having a club of its own.

Apart from being involved in a plethora of competitions and technical events, the club decided to start its very own "Alumni Talk Series" called "Chit-Chat with Alumni".

The goal is to bridge the gap between the current and previous batches of our college and increase the awareness of students in terms of work that one does in college, exposure, jobs, higher studies and of course networking. These interactive sessions are a small shot at helping college students to step out of their fish bowl life.

The first episode was first hosted on the 17th of October, 2020.

The 8th Episode was hosted on 3rd January, 2021 and the speaker for the evening was Essa Mahapatra (Batch of 2012).

Essa completed her BTech in Instrumentation and Electronics Engineering from CET, Bhubaneswar in 2012. She appeared the prestigious GATE exam in 2012 and secured an AIR 17. She then pursued her Masters in Instrumentation and Applied Physics from IISC Bangalore.
She worked as Senior Design Evaluation Engineer in Analog Devices (ADI), India for 6 years before moving to the United Kingdom in 2020.
She is currently working as an IC Validation Engineer at Crypto Quantique, UK.

In the session, Essa spoke about her life at CET. She made some good friends and lived life to the fullest. Later in her engineering career, i.e. towards her 4th year, she decided that she wants to appear the prestigious GATE (Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering) exam. According to many people, that is a late start. However, Essa was confident as she had her basics clear and knew that with a little bit of brushing up on some subjects, she could easily ace the exam and boy, she did!

After securing a very good rank (AIR 17), she got the opportunity of her lifetime, to pursue Masters at IISC, Bangalore. Essa tells that earlier she had plans of getting into a PSU (through GATE) but when this chance came her way, she could not say no.

Essa spent 2 years (2012-14) studying at IISC and she describes this experience as a challenging one. At first she struggled to adjust in such an aggressive environment but once she found her way around, there was no turning back.

In her talk, Essa shed some light on her Master's thesis, that she worked on and got published in IEEE, 2015-
An Optoelectronic Profiling and Ranging Sensor for Monitoring of Perimeters.

ABOUT THE PROJECT-
It is an electronic monitoring of perimeters and plays vital roles in homeland security, management of traffic and of human-wildlife conflict. The paper reports the design and development of an optical beam-interruption-based ranging and profiling sensor for monitoring perimeters. The developed sensor system can determine the distance of the object from the sensing units and its temporal height profile as the object crosses the system. Together, these quantities can also be used to classify the object and to determine its speed.

TO KNOW MORE (you can find the paper here)-
https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/7021885?reload=true&arnumber=7021885

In 2014, after graduating from IISC, she started working at Analog Devices, Bangalore and was a part of the company for 6 years.
As an employee in the semiconductor industry for many years, she gives us a glimpse into the ecosystem-

According to her, the Digital/ Analog Design, Evaluation/Validation and Applications domains are perfect for the students belonging to Instrumentation and Electronics branch.

Essa did some really cool work during her time at ADI.

She also played an active role in many clubs, while she worked at ADI. Essa says being involved in places, other than your company, is very important as it helps you grow as an individual.

She describes her experience at the Toastmasters Club to be the best among the rest. The club not only enhanced her speaking skills but also helped her step out of the cocoon. Essa was pretty introverted all her life.

But the lady loves her books and travelling for her is what one would call "Food For The Soul".

Essa's love for travel and adventure took her to UK in 2020, which was some trouble because of the pandemic but she went through it anyway. She decided it was time for some change and took up her current role as an IC Validation Engineer at an UK based startup called Crypto Quantique. Essa wanted to explore the startup culture and calls it exciting. You see a product being developed from ideation to application. "The project is like a baby and you see it being born. It is beautiful."

Essa leaves a very good piece of advice for all the people aspiring to work or currently working in the semiconductor industry, a hand-me-down from her former manager.
She says, "Switch roles every few years so that you get to see and understand every domain involved in developing of the product."

And just like that the session went on for an hour ending with an interactive Q&A session. The students were in awe after the session ended.

Personally, I found her talk to be one of the most inspiring ones so far. Essa is a wonderful person and I am very moved by her adventurous side.

We wish her all the good luck for her future!

CHIT-CHAT With Alumni: Episode 6- From Seeker To Finder

Sanjana Mohapatra — Mon, 07 Dec 2020 07:11:57 +0000

Apart from being involved in a plethora of competitions and technical events, the club decided to start its very own "Alumni Talk Series" called "Chit-Chat with Alumni".

The first episode was first hosted on the 17th of October, 2020.

The 6th Episode was hosted on 5th of December, 2020 and the speaker for the evening was Dr. Twinkle Tripathy (Batch of 2011).

Dr. Tripathy completed her BTech in Instrumentation and Electronics Engineering from CET, Bhubaneswar in 2011. She has done her Masters and PhD from IIT Bombay and Post Doctorate from Technion, Israel. She also spent some time learning at the Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.

My first interaction with Twinkle ma'am was full of awes. It is hard to come by people like her who leave a very strong (and lasting) first impression. The charm and elegance in her personality is something all young girls aim for.

In the session, Dr. Tripathy introduced us to her life as a researcher with quite a sense of humor.

Dr. Twinkle spoke to us about the importance of having a good idea. Having your idea industrially implemented boosts up your confidence. We, as students, should try to lower this gap between ideation and application.

A very significant part of Twinkle ma'am's career was spent in Israel studying and working on missile guidance.

Of all the missile types, AAM (Air to Air Missile) is the most complicated one.

Now, the three phases of missile engagement are-

Launch - missile clears the launch vehicle
Mid-course - approach the target
End game - hit the target!

Of which the end game is the most interesting to observe. People who invented this took great inspiration from the natural food chain (hunter and prey).

Now, the end game in missile engagement is driven by guidance concepts and a few of them are as mentioned-

Pure Pursuit- is best explained by the example of a masochistic cheetah hunting a wild but gentle gazelle. No time lost. Direct hit.
Proportional Navigation- is where things get a little spicy. A natural spectacle takes place almost every year on the eastern coasts of South Africa and Mozambique—the so-called “Sardine Run”. Long (really long) swarms of sardines are seen to migrate from one place to another. Nobody knows till date why this happens. These swarms of sardines can be several kilometres long and are clearly visible from an airplane as long as they are not too deep below the surface of the water. Such a large source of prey attracts a huge number of predators, which benefit from this wealth of food. So imagine this large school travelling underwater and suddenly large flocks of puffin birds (also known as missile birds) delve into the water surface, travel really fast and catch up with their prey (the school of sardines).

Dr. Tripathy goes on to talk about the amazing Target-Missile Defender System developed in Israel. It is known as the Iron Dome missile defense system and has been used against the Palestinian rockets. It tries to intercept and knock out enemy projectiles before they can land.

Ma'am also sheds light on the Multi-Agent System.
A multi-agent system (MAS or "self-organized system") is a computerized system composed of multiple interacting intelligent agents. Multi-agent systems can solve problems that are difficult or impossible for an individual agent or a monolithic system to solve.

Dr. Tripathy lightened the air by citing interesting examples to explain the models.
A very popular scene from the movie Lion King, where King Mufasa is killed by the pack of wildebeasts (the movies used some inspiration from the multi-agent gatering algorithm, aligning all the hyenas in the same direction). It was for the first time ever that movies took inspiration from such a source.
Another example to better understand the Multi Agent System is the school of fish swarming in the sea to find Nemo in the movie Finding Nemo.

Talking to fellow CETians about finding their passion, Dr. Twinkle said, "It’s important to find a job that you’re passionate about as the right job helps you cope better with work pressures”.

Dr. Tripathy also told us about the importance of 'me-time' and no matter what we do, we should remember to have fun.

And just like that the session went on for an hour followed by an interactive Q&A round with the audience.

"The session was informative, interactive and inspiring. It made me feel pumped with motivation. A big thank you to Twinkle Ma'am for sharing her journey", says Suchismita Swain, a third year student of CET, Bhubaneswar.

Dr. Tripathy's curiosity, love for adventure and eagerness to learn led her down this path. We believe she has found what she had been seeking.
We wish her all the best for all her new adventures!

Create Your Own Solar System Using Python

Sanjana Mohapatra — Sat, 28 Nov 2020 09:02:00 +0000

Hi,
If nobody told you about the many wonders Python can do, then you are in for a treat. I am going to tell you how I made my own solar system from scratch using Python.

Python offers you a great selection of graphic libraries and allows you to plot all major types of graphics so that you can visualize your data.

Here, I will be using a combination of Plotly Scatter3D and Plotly Surface plots to create an entire solar system inside a graph. In this article, I’m going to introduce you to the Python code that will allow you to recreate it yourself.

You can find the code here:
https://github.com/sanjanamops8752/Create-Your-Own-Solar-System-Using-Python

For more information on the project, visit:
https://medium.com/analytics-vidhya/create-your-own-solar-system-using-python-6ff550dbf099

10 Must Reads From My Library

Sanjana Mohapatra — Wed, 25 Nov 2020 16:34:54 +0000

Hi,
Yes, this is my study/ mini library and before you quiz me about the number of books I own…fun fact: I have read more than I own and I own more than I shelve. Hehe, they are a little more than a 100.

Books are man’s bestfriend for a reason and rightly so. They make you get lost in almost a magical sort of way and travel to lands unknown. A good writer always makes you feel as if you’re watching a movie.

So here are 10 MUST READS that everyone must read, at least once in their lives, to attain a place somewhat close to nirvana!

1. Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, by J.K. Rowling

I’m willing to bet you’ve heard of Harry Potter, but have you read the books? Join Harry Potter as he begins his journey into the world of magic, where he is the celebrated Boy Who Lived. Visit Hogwarts, meet your favourite characters and watch Harry grow into the one of the most famous literary characters in the world.

2. The Hobbit, by J.R.R. Tolkien

Although the movies are inexplicably long, The Hobbit was originally written as a short children’s book. Meet your favourite characters for the first time as the unforgettable Bilbo Baggins traverses the harsh landscapes of Middle Earth to challenge a dragon.

3. The Lord of the Rings, by J.R.R. Tolkien

Middle Earth is a wonderful, expansive fantasy world filled with turmoil, heroes, evil and innocence. Although our protagonist Frodo Baggins’ quest seems impossible to complete, this trilogy is a tale of triumph in the most impossible circumstances.

4. The Diary Of A Young Girl, by Anne Frank

Unforgettable and deeply influential, Anne Frank’s diary is a raw account of a young girl’s life as she hides from the Nazis. Despite her circumstances, Anne believes that people are still good at heart and that the world is full of beauty: she will change your life.

5. The Book Thief, by Markus Zusak

Set in Germany during 1939, The Book Thief follows Liesel as she rescues books from the tyranny of Nazi rule. Meanwhile, her family has hidden a Jewish fighter in their basement and death looks down on the family, narrating our tale. Experience bravery that is rarely found in the world, and friendship that is formed in the most unlikely of situations.

6. Animal Farm, by George Orwell

First of all, you MUST have a good sense of humor to appreciate the goodness of this book. This famous 1945 satire, examines the realistic risks of revolution and the dynamics animals will inevitably give in to.

7. Gone with the Wind, by Margaret Mitchell

Set in The South during The Civil War, chances are if you love the movie you’ll love the book. Although the main character and the world she lives in is loathsome, readers’ opinions are twisted as this novel dishes out a fated justice when both Scarlett and The South lose their wars.

8. Wuthering Heights, by Emily Bronte

Published in 1847, this passionate and harrowing story of love, rivalry and revenge follows Catherine Earnshaw and her father’s adopted foundling Heathcliff as they grow into very different adults.

9. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain

Often titled The Great American Novel, The Adventures Of Huckleberry Finn is a deep and complex tale of friendship, adolescence and shifting societal norms.

10. The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, by Douglas Adams

Grab a towel and accompany human Arthur Dent on a fantastic adventure across the galaxy. Learn not to take the universe so seriously and forget any meaning you’ve applied to anything in your life, because we all know the real meaning of life is 42.

Happy reading!

CHIT-CHAT WITH ALUMNI: Episode 5- Find Your Passion And Stick To It

Sanjana Mohapatra — Sat, 21 Nov 2020 17:30:39 +0000

Apart from being involved in a plethora of competitions and technical events, the club decided to start its very own "Alumni Talk Series" called "Chit-Chat with Alumni".

The first episode was first hosted on the 17th of October, 2020.

The 5th episode was held tonight (21st Nov, 2020) and allow me to introduce you to the star of the evening- Mr. Sourav Agarwal.

Mr. Agarwal is a 2013 graduate from Instrumentation and Electronics Department, CET Bhubaneswar. He is currently Senior Engineer at Honeywell Automation. He was earlier working at Siemens and Praxair Inc. before that.
His previous experience includes 5 years at Paradeep Phosphates Limited (PPL).

When I first spoke to Sourav Sir, I was elated to see how enthusiastic he is about instrumentation.

In today's session, he spoke extensively about his work experience.
He got placed at Paradeep Phosphates Limited (PPL) through college placements and worked there for 5 years since 2013. Mr Agarwal said it was a great learning opportunity despite the hard circumstances of industrial life and living in a not-so-modern city.

Life at PPL involved a lot of field work and he learnt a great deal about control system, DCS (Distributed Control System) and process instrumentation. Having a chance to finally implement his theoretical knowledge meanwhile exploring various verticals over the years, his interest in the avenue only grew.

He later had the chance to implement all that he learnt at Praxair Inc. followed by Siemens and now Honeywell. His previous experience and sound understanding of the technology worked in his favour while working in the R&D Department. It gave him the upper hand in making the product more flexible, more compatible for the end user.

"What kind of technology are you working on these days?", asks Pratyush Mallick, an alumnus of 2020 batch, CET.
Mr. Agarwal is working on making Distributed Control System(DCS) more advanced for the petrol industry.

What does that mean?, one might ask.

For example, when we need to measure temperature of a substance we can either use an RTD or Thermistor or Thermocouple according to our requirement. With the help of some functional blocks this information can easily be available to the end user on laptop or phone. Mr. Agarwal carefully explains the importance of these functional blocks and that their working should be as smooth as possible so that the end user can use it with utmost comfort.

Mr. Agarwal quite nicely pointed out to the fact that it is NOT IMPORTANT to do higher studies (if you are looking for a career in core companies, in a technical role) and assures that it will not be a hindrance to anyone in terms of promotion or job switching. You can go for management courses if and when career demands but masters should be done only when you have the enthusiasm to delve deeper into a particular subject.

So my question was, "If every company has their own set of technologies to work on, how did you manage to build your CV while working?"
Mr. Agarwal replies that he had the occasion to work (during his time at PPL) on the control system technologies designed by Honeywell, Siemens and Yokogawa and process instrumentation technologies by all possible vendors in the world. After having his fill at learning all that he had to at Paradeep Phosphates Limited (PPL) he finally moved onto his next ventures.

As the session went on, we experienced questions from various career avenues by the enthusiastic audience.

To sum it all up, Sourav Sir's kind advice to anyone and everyone from (Instrumentation and Electronics branch) looking forward to pursuing a career in the technical line, "Be patient. Do not compare yourselves with people from other branches who seem to be getting success sooner in life. Spend at least 3 years in a core company to learn the work and no, location should not be a criteria in choosing that company."

When asked about his future goals, Mr. Agarwal says, "I have always wanted to have a patent in my name. So I will be working towards that."

And just like that the session went on for more than an hour with the crowd responding back with great energy.

"It was great to hear from a person with so much experience in the corporate world and really insightful with all the great key points. Truly a wonderful session.", says Suryansu Dash, a 3rd year student of CET.

5 Steps To Get Your Student/Professional Life Back On Track

Sanjana Mohapatra — Fri, 20 Nov 2020 07:31:54 +0000

Hi,

Here is a confession. I am very careful with my choices especially when it comes to the things I want to work on. So when I start doing something, I am full of passion and commitment…in the moment I JUST LOVE what I’m doing and I want to do NOTHING all day and night but stay put on my new found love...however the energy eventually dies out within a few days (if not less) and I find myself back on the couch with a bowl of popcorn, staring away (all my time) at Netflix.

C’mon, lets deal with it. None of us are saints. We find ourselves in a similar no-motivation situation more than just a few times and I say its perfectly normal.
Bottom line is…how do we deal with it? More importantly…how do we NOT QUIT?

First off, shut down everything and take a deep breath before you start following these…

1.Make a list of Pros and Cons

We lose motivation when we lose sight of the vision that we had when we first started.

Sometimes we ask ourselves, “Why should I even continue?”
Well, we already know the answer to the WHYs and WHY NOTs…we have just forgotten them.

So make a list of all the pros of doing this task and the cons of not doing it and stick it up on the wall.

This way, you will stay put.

2. Make A Calendar And Plan

A handmade calendar can do fireworks, if used wisely.
Whip one up and plan out your tasks for the next few days or weeks.

This will give you a goal and a strong will to resume work…because you can physically see on the calendar how easily you can do the job.

(Trust me there is no greater pleasure than crossing off the Things-To-Do with a pencil.)

It will also help you relax, especially when you decide to take a break. You will not go paranoid with the fear of things waiting to get done.

3. Take A Break BUT Know When To End It

Taking a break or two is often considered healthy BUT like everything else, set a time limit.

How do you STOP enjoying a break?

Whatever you do, DO NOT THINK. Just shut down whatever you’re doing and get back to work. Make sure you sit at for a minimum of 5 to 10 minutes…once your interest is developed there’s no going back.

4. Start From The Beginning

You MUST finish what you’ve started (even if it was just an experiment). Making peace with the subject is most important. So if you find yourself lost, confused, irritated because you don’t understand or whatever your deal is…just start from the beginning.

Things are easier on that end and will make more sense. Starting for the 2nd time makes you see things from a different perspective.

5. Make A Book Of Mistakes

Yes, this is for real and it TOTALLY works. Writing down your mistakes gives you a chance to solve the problem again and understand better. Keeping a track can be of great help when you are revising or come across problems of the same kind…the number of ways this can help you are endless.

These are some tricks I discovered by trial and error. While I find myself a victim of lack-of-motivation way more often than I would prefer, here are a few things that keep me going.

I hope you found these useful.
If you liked my article, give me a thumbs up. And let me know if there’s room for improvement.

10 Things To Motivate You Out Of Bed.

Sanjana Mohapatra — Tue, 17 Nov 2020 04:53:42 +0000

Sometimes we feel so sad about our lives that we dread waking up in the morning and sometimes its just laziness. Either way, getting out of bed is one of the hardest tasks of our day. But trust me, I have been in both situations and a little more frequently (than I would like) in this quarantine.

Allow me to share a secret with you, my MOST favorite thing to do in the morning is get out of my bed only to turn off the alarm and fall back to sleep again. I can assure you that I have the capability of waking up 5 times to turn off the alarm and sleep again…the alarms are set in 5 minute intervals. Sometimes things are so bad that I rely on new episodes of a TV show to cheer me to step out of the sheets. Well, as much as we try to stay mentally and physically fit in this lockdown, we keep running out of options sooner or later.

So, I have figured out a few tricks on how to keep yourself going, feeling positive and excited about every other day and not just slashing dates off the calendar, praying God to end 2020 asap.

1. Correct that irregular sleep cycle.
Get at most 9 hrs of sleep everyday and uninterrupted sleep at night. I don’t want to sound like your Dad preaching “sab theek ho jayega, tum jaldi uth ke toh dekho” but here is the catch, if you wake up early, the day tends to look longer and you will feel more productive…which brings me to my next point..

2. Squeeze in a quick workout.
You are no stranger to the benefits of physical exercise so I’ll skip that part. The best way to get the workout done (instead of waiting for motivation to strike) is just wear those gym shoes and get going. DO NOT THINK. Once you are out in the open, sweating it out in the fresh air…you will feel more optimistic about the day.

QUICK HACK: Once it settles in your head that you need to workout the next day AND get all your work done in time, you will start getting up early automatically.

QUICK HACK Pt2: If you have a light workout before going to bed, you will sleep better (coz you’ll be tired).

3. Skip watching TV shows or Movies at least 15 mins before you go to bed.
It is practically impossible for most people these days to skip the late-night Netflix binge but hey, sleeping at the right time is important too. You will feel fresher the next morning. Talking of feeling fresh..

4. Clean your room before going to bed so that you wake up to a NOT_MESSY_AS_MY_LIFE_IS surrounding.

5. Make your bed after waking up, gives you a sense of accomplishment.

6. It's time to use those dusty post-its and make a list of the TOP 3 things to do from your list of a thousand other things.
Do this before you go to sleep, you will have something to look forward to.

7. DO NOT check messages right before and after bed.

8. If you have the habit of checking your phone too often (some people do it throughout the night), I suggest you put it on charge somewhere away from the bed.

9. Tell yourself: Everyday is a new day, there is ALWAYS a possibility of something new.

10. Read a book before sleeping.
It shuts out the world around you, if you sleep with happy thoughts, you wake with happy thoughts.

I still have a hard time following the rules BUT they help me out on my hardest days.

CHIT-CHAT WITH ALUMNI- Episode 3: Not-A-Category

Sanjana Mohapatra — Sun, 08 Nov 2020 05:14:46 +0000

The SPECTRUM club is one the core technical societies of the College of Engineering and Technology, founded in 2015 by Mr. Bikram Keshari Panda (2015 batch graduate), keeping an eye on the sole motive of Instrumentation and Electronics branch having a club of its own.

Apart from being involved in a plethora of competitions and technical events, the club decided to start its very own "Alumni Talk Series" called "Chit-Chat with Alumni".

The first episode was first hosted on the 17th of October, 2020 with Mr. Zignesh Biswal (Batch of 2015) as the speaker followed by Mr. Chinmoy Mishra (Batch of 2017) as our guest for the 2nd episode.

The third episode was held on 7th of November, 2020. Allow me to introduce you to our special guest- Ingenieur Tworit Dash (Batch of 2016).

"I joined a PhD position at TU Delft in the microwave sensing, signals and systems group (Ms3) in September this year. I graduated (summa cum laude/ with distinction) from the master program of TU Delft from the same group in August this year. Before that I worked for Robert Bosch India as a Calibration Engineer from 2016–2018. Graduated from CET Bhubaneswar in 2016."

Last night (Nov 7, 2020), we had the pleasure to meet the real life Sheldon Cooper living in the body of a curious Minion (like he called himself in the presentation). Tworit Dash is a person of supreme intellect and motivating personality. The audience (consisting of the present batches of CET and alumni from 2018 batch) was moved by his deeply inspiring life. As an engineering student, the guy had no chill. He wanted to do everything starting from hardware to software, wanted to know the physics behind every instrument he touched, maths behind every algorithm he saw and BOY HE DID!

As a core member of ZAIRZA, he did more than just learn and teach. He travelled abroad to be a part of bigger events and finally met the guy who was in the core team inventing RUBY (the love of his life).

But his motive of college life was NEVER to "get placed". Skill building is of utmost importance to him. Hence one would always find him doing hobby projects on the side of his real ones because "nothing that you learn ever goes waste".

His curiosity to explore and love for physics took him to Robert Bosch, where he worked as a Calibration Engineer. With no hard boundaries, the job helped him to explore the work in domains of electronics, mechanical and computer science. But like I said, the guy has no chill. He was working 17hrs a day with a side hobby of sketching till 5AM and going back to work the next day.

He says he had enough of a robot life and wanted to do something more with life. He says, "Knowing when to say NO is important". So denying the offer to go to Robert Bosch Japan, Tworit Dash decided to go for his Masters. He spoke about his amazing life at TU Delft and of course, "Life During Master Thesis with ASTRON" and "Life Now as a PhD Student" were the highlights of the evening.

"This guy is literally contributing to the vanguard of human knowledge!", says Rishav Agarwal (Batch of 2018), mentee and friend of Tworit Dash.

Man's curiosity takes him to places and with that Ir. Tworit Dash says his learning journey is not yet complete…he has not found what he was looking for, so maybe (just maybe) he might do ANOTHER Masters! The guy never fails to surprise us!
And just like that, the session went on for 1 hr, ending with an hour long fun filled and very insightful Q&A session with the juniors.

"Take Away from the session- 'Take time to find your passion' ", writes Shobhit Panda, a 3rd year student of CET.

I hope you found this article helpful. If yes, please give us a thumbs up!