UCF in the News

With the Space Coast in our backyard, researchers at the University of Central Florida are hard at work developing the next generation of space technology. One of those projects focuses on hypersonic propulsion. Kareem Ahmed is a Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Associate Professor. His team is working on propelling rockets at speeds even faster than sound. “This is Mach 5 inside. Outside, the vehicle will be flying at Mach 6 to Mach 17,” Ahmed said. They are working to get people to outer space much faster and reduce emissions along the way with one-of-a-kind technology. “It’s a supernova-like explosion that you’re harvesting the energy that are coming out of it to propel you forward,” he said.

The University of Central Florida and Disney are teaming up for an exclusive job recruitment event. It comes at a time when our entire hospitality industry is desperate for new workers. “Labor force shortages, you know, that is the situation we are still dealing with,” said Youcheng Wang, dean of UCF Rosen College of Hospitality Management. It’s one of the reasons the UCF Rosen College of Hospitality Management is holding its student and alumni recruitment event Wednesday with Walt Disney World. Not only is Disney the largest employer in Central Florida, it employs the most UCF hospitality management graduates.

A partnership between UCF and NASA is helping students launch their career with Kennedy Space Center. As a kid, Bryce Frase looked at the moon through a telescope — hoping to work in the aerospace industry. “NASA was the big dream that I never thought would happen.” After serving in the military, Frase enrolled at UCF, studying electrical engineering. In his first semester, he heard about NASA’s Pathway Program — a paid internship program awarded to current university students to work in federal agencies while also studying in school. NASA says 385 students have gone through the program since its creation back in 2013. Frase graduated last month, and is now employed full time at Kennedy Space Center. Since March of last year, NASA has added 52 interns to the program, with another 16 starting this month. UCF says around 30 percent of Kennedy Space Center employees are UCF alumni.

Researchers at the University of Central Florida are working to design the next generation of space technology. From advanced propulsion systems to lunar landing pads, this technology could help expand our knowledge of the solar system and beyond. Some of the projects include improvements for interplanetary travel and better landing capabilities on extraterrestrial bodies.

If you were beaten and bullied as a child, if you lived for nine years in constant fear of being tortured or killed, if you and your family fled your home, losing everything, and were forced to live in a tent, would you call yourself “lucky”? Abraham Pizam does. For eight decades, Pizam — founding dean of UCF’s Rosen College of Hospitality Management — did not speak publicly of the terror of his youth. In the big picture of things, he said, he didn’t think it mattered. After all, he survived. Six million Jews did not.

After a journey of nearly a million miles, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) reached its final destination on Monday: orbiting the second Lagrange Point of the Earth. The L2 milestone was celebrated by scientists across the world, including at the Florida Space Institute, which is based at the University of Central Florida. Dr. Noemí Pinilla-Alonso, a planetary scientist at FSI, is leading an international team on one of the observation missions that will take place over the first year of Webb’s lifetime. Her team’s proposal for observation using the JWST was one of only 286 chosen by the Space Telescope Science Institute (STSI) out of the more than 1,100 proposals sent in from 44 countries.

The University of Central Florida ranked No. 7 overall. UF and UCF also garnered high rankings for several online majors. UCF ranked No. 6 for online bachelor’s degrees in psychology and No. 8 for the online bachelor’s in business. It also ranked No. 8 for online bachelor’s programs for veterans and No. 9 for online master’s in criminal justice programs for veterans. Tom Cavanaugh, UCF vice provost of digital learning, also credited faculty for the high ratings. “They take the time and effort to create a positive, engaging learning environment for all of our online students and have helped distinguish UCF as a leader in digital learning,” he said in a statement.

Key players in Central Florida’s startup and entrepreneurship ecosystem spoke at Orlando Inno’s 2022 Startup Outlook panel on Jan. 20.Michael Weiss, associate director of research programs and services, University of Central Florida Business Incubation Program, said: “I work with a lot of entrepreneurs, a lot of early-stage technology startups. What I've seen as a challenge is a well-rounded team. They either have a very talented technologist who is afraid of sales, or they have a business development person who can't develop their product. It is a real struggle. They turn to investors, but it's too early for them to invest. So it's a real chicken-and-egg scenario.”

When it comes to pandemic trends, the proof is in the numbers. Florida’s latest COVID status report shows improvement with the number of new cases plummeting last week compared to the week before. “We’re heading in the right direction,” said UCF epidemiologist Elena Cyrus. Cyrus said she is seeing the same pattern. She starts off every week with a COVID update call with the National Institutes of Health and said she is taking note of Florida’s improving new case positivity rate.