Professional Statement
Yi Yue
I began to experiment with different areas within Electrical Engineering after I went to college as a electrical engineering student, eight years after the first time I soldered an integrated circuit chip on a printed circuit board.
I joined Purdue Solar Racing team in my freshman year and I picked up quite a few hands-on skills, team working experiences. The researches I did on the differences and applications of various types of batteries and programming microcontrollers allow me to have a head-start on designing an electric system while most of my classes were still on circuit analysis. During the first summer break, I did an internship in the power management department of Analog Devices, where I designed my first printed circuit board. That circuit board was used as a part of the testing and validation project of a power management chip. In my junior year, I did some research in financial engineering under the supervision of Professor Pollak, and it was an excellent experience in interdisciplinary research. In this research project I worked with a grad student and two other undergrads to write a program that accurately calculates the theoretical Russell 1000 Index data before its constitution date using the stock market information available to us. This project allowed me to walk out of my comfort-zone as an electrical engineer, and gain confidence in doing things that are not familiar to me, such as reading financial documentations. I have also done an internship at AMD in its customer support service department during my third summer break, where I followed through the design and testing phases of a laptop, and helped to solve the issues encountered by computer designers and manufacturers.
Those experiences have broadened my horizon greatly, but none of them made me feel like I want to do it as a career. Then I decided to look beyond the classical electrical engineering. Meanwhile, I discovered my interest in the biomedical related EE. The Ted-Med speeches I watched, the articles on medical informatics and medical electronics I read in IEEE spectrum, and the Traditional Chinese Medicine knowledge such as acupuncture and the theory of meridians my grandmother taught me has all inspired and encouraged me to learn more about this area.
After my career interest became clear, I started to take relevant classes in order to further develop this interest and also prepare myself with the necessary skills and knowledge. I took Measurement and Stimulation of the Nervous System, which covers neuro-anatomy, how sensing and motor functions work, electrical and magnetic stimulation, neuro-imaging, disorders of the nervous system, and the development and refinement of sensory prostheses. It forced me to read tons of papers on cochlear implants, brain computer interface, and all the other fascinating researches on how electrical systems can be used to provide better treatment or improve the quality of life. Along with this course, I also took Neurobehavioral Psychology as part of my psychology minor. Right now, I am also doing a research project on Computer Vision and Robot Navigation, supervised by Professor Pizlo. What I do in this project is mainly translating existing computer vision algorithms into C++, and allowing robots to navigate in an environment with obstacles.
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