From getting you to your favorite island, to getting man to the moon, flight control systems are vital to say the least. Flight control computing systems in a way run the world. Essentially they are used to keep an aircraft or projective on course. A computer gathers a bunch of data such as altitude, pitch, roll, yaw and velocity, then it compares the constant flood of data to a plotted course. If the aircraft or projectile is deviating to far from the chosen course then it will use the data to make self-corrections to bring it closer to the targeted path.
I was definitely expecting to get extremely good information from scholastic and primary sources, and I most certainly did. The scientific papers i found were really jam packed full of information. There were plenty of algorithms for processing data and basic fundamentals of flight control. I was very pleased to find this amount of information on this topic. What surprised me is the lack of secondary sources. I don't know exactly what I was expecting, but it seems that there was hardly any relevant information that even made the news on flight control specifically. The most interesting thing pertaining to flight control involved Russian missile testing. I really was not expecting to be this underwhelmed with secondary source information on something like this. However, I guess the subject is kind of a snooze fest to most people. Oh well!
“The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars. We are made of starstuff.”
― Carl Sagan, Cosmos
It is fair to say that not everyone knows exactly what they want to do for the rest of their life, just before they get out of high school. That certainly was the case for me at least. I had no idea what I really wanted to do with my finite amount of time on this planet. I knew that if I tried, I could learn how to do anything. I had this ability to learn. I always enjoyed engineering, however I also liked cooking. I got really good with 3D modeling, but then again, I always found cyber security fascinating. It took me several years after I left high school to set my eyes on a dream and really go for it.
So, now I am on a journey. It is very warming to know that there are still professors that truly do care about the success of their students and encouraging their students to work hard to achieve their goals. I am very proud to be a student again and learn from professors like Albert Wu. I hope there is a day that I am able to reflect on my adventure and thank all those whom believed in me.
Now, allow me to take you on our vary own journey into the Cosmos.
