College of Science, Engineering and Technology

After GCU’s Robotics Club came back from its first-ever competition, team members decided to give their friendly little ‘bot a major upgrade. The 23×23-23-inch Thunderbot 2.0, complete with a vacuum-type arm, is ready to make itself known at its next competition, this weekend’s southwest Vex U Regional Qualifier.

GCU wants to become a major player in cybersecurity education and is doing just that, having formed a partnership with the Arizona Cyber Threat Response Alliance, adding an online master’s degree program in cybersecurity and recently becoming the site of the new Arizona Cyber Warfare Range-Metro Phoenix. That new cybersecurity focus falls in line with the University’s push to advance science, technology, engineering and math education.

The first annual Dr. Kevin McClean Research Colloquium began, quite properly, with a tribute to the retired Colangelo College of Business professor. He was grateful for the honor — and for the continuing interest in showing the research that GCU faculty members are doing.

Everyone on the Grand Canyon University campus is invited to the Dr. Kevin McClean Research Colloquium, scheduled for 3:30 p.m. Wednesday in Building 57, rooms 221-223. There will be eight presentations demonstrating research done by GCU faculty.

When a team of undergraduate biotechnology researchers in the College of Science, Engineering and Technology heard about the high number of amputees in Rwanda, they wondered if they could improve on the design of those prosthetics so are working on creating a low-cost, 3D-printed arm. They also are using 3D printing technology to create a bandage to treat wound infections that might prevent those amputations.

It was like a scene out of “CSI” on Thursday on the fourth floor of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences, when multiple crime scenes came to life as six theater students from the College of Fine Arts and Production turned in unusual performances – as fatal crime victims – so forensic science students could photographically document the bodies for a class project.

Biochemistry professor Dr. Tiffany Mealman always had a positive attitude even though she had reasons not to. Her joyful disposition, her faith and her dedication to her students is what those students and her fellow faculty members in the College of Science, Engineering and Technology will remember most about her. Mealman passed away Sunday after a five-year battle with cancer.

Not everyone knows what goes on at the Arizona Cyber Warfare Range-Metro Phoenix. But GCU employees got a chance to learn about the cybersecurity training center and do a little password cracking, network forensics and more during the Cyberfest open house on Tuesday.

“LIVE MARRIAGE PROPOSAL,” the sign read, and everyone on the Grand Canyon University campus was invited to watch it at the appointed time Thursday afternoon. Sure enough, it drew a big crowd. Here’s how Levi Conlow pulled it off and what his stunned fiancee, Rachel O’Brien, was saying afterward.

You might have built a few Lego cities in your time. But mechanical engineering students in Li Tan’s solid mechanics class last semester went way beyond Lego cities. They broke out their K’Nex sets and set about building suspension bridges to study concepts such as force and weight distribution. The challenge? The bridges had to support 200 pounds.