[Music]
everyone good afternoon and thanks for
coming to my talk for those of you who
don’t know me I graduated in 2016 with
my mechanical and aerospace engineering
degree I’m currently a graduate student
here but I live in Chicago so it’s
always good to get back to campus and
share a little bit of my experience I
was a student athlete here and I was a
student entrepreneur but I was a pretty
lousy student so I’m pretty happy that
they still invited me back to talk here
and I can definitely a was not one of
the requirements for being a speaker
here but this I’m glad you guys laughed
I wasn’t really bad but you know this
whole journey started about seven years
ago when I came home from practice and
asked my dad hey Dad you know kind of
asking for a friend do we have good home
insurance
yes sir like you know what did you blow
up this time but because I was working
on my high school science fair project
and I wanted to make sort of a model of
a jet engine combustion chamber and see
if we can improve combustion using
plasma terms that you can sometimes that
would happen so it’s good that I asked I
ended up taking this project to the
International Science Fair which I
always compared to the Olympics of
science as narrative that sounds and
when I was flying back one of my
teachers point out the winner and said
can you imagine if in 10 or 15 years
every aircraft flying is more efficient
because of something that you invented
pretty cool so when I came here it’s the
case I started thinking of ways to
continue to develop this technology and
originally I was leaning it’s just a
pure research project right you know
sitting in the lab getting grants with a
professor and then maybe writing some
papers but I was really quickly
persuaded by some of my mentors that the
best way to pursue this was going to be
more like a startup write a
commercialization play something that
would let me keep you know one eye on
developing the technology and then one
eye on making sure I was doing something
practical that people would care about
and hopefully by so I got some funds
from our innovation center here called
pink box built a prototype with lots of
hot glue and started looking at ways of
how plasmon flames interacted in you
know actual practical settings right
what can we actually do with this
technology and it turns out that one of
the most critical applications of
combustion are jet engines so as you can
imagine it takes a lot of energy to you
know push us through the air at 35,000
feet and 500 miles an hour because it
takes a lot of energy it takes a lot of
fuel
lots of fuel cost lots of money so
that’s like 15 billion dollars and uh 30
billion dollars in 2015
right so Airlines care a lot about
reducing their fuel expenditure even a
little bit so anything you can do to
improve their fuel efficiency an improve
their bottom line you know could be a
really commercially attractive idea so
it’s that was sort of the starting point
but it turns out that jet engines are
really good at burning fuel really
efficiently anyway you know they’re
designed really to do three main things
number one to never ever ever shut off
for any reason right because if they do
and you’re flying over the ocean and
everyone’s going swimming and that’s bad
people don’t pay for that number two –
you know generate the thrust that you
need to take off fly around etc and
number three is to be at their maximum
efficiency at your design point which is
cruise right when you’re flying around
and the captain says you know you know
the fasten seatbelt sign is off now
that’s where you spend most of your time
fly and that’s what engines are really
designed for but we’ve all been flying
and we’ve you know all been stuck when
we’re lap number 26 for departure and
you might be waiting 45 or 30 minutes or
even an hour on the runway and that’s
just like being at a stoplight right
your engines are still running still
burning fuel but you’re not going
anywhere and it turns out that it’s not
really easy to shut off those engines
and then start them back up sort of like
the new cars do so you know there’s
really an issue here where you’re
burning fuel and you’re not getting
anything good out of it and if you can
solve that you know that might be
something that’s important to the
airlines and it turns out that you know
you can sort of compare a jet engine to
a gas stove actually probably a gas
stove with a hairdryer so don’t try this
at home because take my word for it I
did it I actually did it with my
sister’s hair dryer you essentially jet
engines they suck in a bunch of air they
compress it they mix it with fuel where
it burns right and they just shoot it
out the back and it’s really difficult
to keep a flame lit in this environment
so that’s where the stove comes in let’s
say you know you let your stove when you
turn it to full power if you point a
hairdryer at it you know there’s a good
chance that when you’re at full power
you’re probably not gonna be able to
blow out that flame but if you turn down
your stove right let’s say to the lowest
setting it’s definitely gonna blow out
so it’s the same thing that happens in
engines right it’s really difficult to
keep flames lit especially when you’re
at low power settings like on the ground
and because of this you know jet engine
manufacturers have only really one
to play with to control how these
engines run right essentially you can
only do tricky things with the
aerodynamics to make sure you always
have a place where the flame can stay
lit because you only have one knob to
turn you know if you turn it one way
right to maximize safety to make sure
this thing never shuts off then you’re
gonna sacrifice optimum performance
right you’re gonna give up some of your
fuel consumption at idle right which
makes you waste fuel when you’re sitting
on the ground at an airport but if you
cheat and add another knob right you can
design better engines right because if
you have another way to keep the flame
lit then you can make sure the end in a
safe and efficient at you know all
points in the flight and it turns out
that we can get this you know other knob
from using plasma so if you’ve ever seen
you know a lightning storm you’ve seen
plasma we don’t get those too much in
Ohio but in Florida whereas from we
definitely do so plasma is the fourth
state of matter think you have solid
liquid gas and if you keep adding energy
to that gas you start taking off
electrons off of those atoms right and
then you have essentially a soup of
charged particles which has a lot of
energy and it’s really good at bumping
into things and breaking them that’s
important for us in combustion because
in combustion you have these really
large organic fuel molecules that need
to break up into smaller pieces before
they burn right so it’s equally a
simpler example it’s sort of like
playing with LEGOs if someone gives you
they you know lego house and ask you to
build a car from those pieces what’s the
first thing you have to do you have to
take apart those pieces you know block
by block until you end up with you know
all the blocks disassembled and then you
can build something new that’s going to
take you time and it’s going to take you
energy so if you were to hit that block
with a marble right then you end up with
all of your blocks individual and then
you can grab them and build whatever you
want that’s basically what we’re doing
with plasma we’re using you know set of
marbles we’re using high speed electrons
to bump into large fuel and air
molecules and those break them up into
smaller pieces which burn quicker and
more efficiently cool you know that’s
sort of been known by science for a
while that plasmas can do that and you
can generate plasmas in the lab pretty
easily if you have a high voltage power
supply it’s basically just an electrical
discharge across air but the challenge
is really how we get something like this
or that into you know something that
looks like this right an incredibly
complex machine that’s designed really
well and doesn’t
much tolerance for change what I settled
on with my team was figuring out ways to
integrate this technology into a part
that’s already on the engine right so
what we settled on was a fuel injector
that’s a part that injects fuel right
it’s it’s in the engine it’s sort of
like a showerhead that sprays fuel into
the combustion chamber and we
essentially worked on figuring out a way
to put a plasma into this part right a
part that already exists in the engine a
part that you could potentially retrofit
easily and and then you you know you
have your plasma exactly where you need
now that had somewhat been tried before
but there had been some practical
problems and where you put the plasma
how you integrate you know this with a
current fuel injector design how you
make sure this thing doesn’t you know
last 30 minutes when you need to have
thousands of hours of flight time you
know we think we’ve cracked most of
these problems we did a lot of tests
here at case and as well as NASA Glenn
Research Center we have a patent on this
technology and we’re still working on it
but we think we’re we’re pretty close
the challenge here was really taking
this fundamental science right and
putting it at the service of a
technology and so that’s sort of what
your job is as an engineer right take
scientific knowledge and use it to solve
a practical problem I mean the next step
was to take you know that solution and
put it at the service of a product right
to actually get it into something that
can go into the real world and hopefully
make something better for someone that
part of the journey was really what I
always thought of as entrepreneurship
but more and more I realized that you
know engineering an entrepreneurship
sort of blend because it’s not enough to
develop a solution you also have to do
the work of carrying it across the
finish line and that means that
entrepreneurship has to be involved at
the beginning so you know that so you
know what the solution has to look like
at the end and engineering has to also
be involved at the end so you know what
you can actually put in an engine so
I’ll show you a little bit of what this
actually looks like and I think this is
going to autoplay basically you know we
start a flame just like you would in an
engine and as soon as you you know we
turn off the plasma we start decreasing
the amount of fuel right going so this
is sort of what you would have when
you’re at low power waiting in an
airport you see the flame starts to get
really unhappy it bounces and rounds
right and eventually it extinguishes so
everyone’s going swimming we’re able to
turn it on with plasma and then we can
actually keep that
same flame right or that same flame with
even less fuel lit and what we can
actually do is if we can extend the the
limits of operation of a flame buyer at
60% somethings we can run a flame with
about 60% less fuel than it’s currently
possible in real life this could
translate to saving between 1 and 5
percent on fuel consumption for an
actual airline you know there’s still a
lot of work to do I traded my garage for
a lab at Argonne National Laboratory
through Department of Energy funded
program and this sort of my my day job
but it’s been really unfamiliar
territory right fundamentally I’m an
engineer not really an entrepreneur so
I’ve had to learn all of that and I’ve
always wanted to compare you know this
unfamiliar entrepreneurship thing to
something that was much more familiar to
me
right and that’s swimming that was at
least 20 hours of my week for the past
over 10 years and actually a reporter
asked me once you know how do you how do
you think swimming gets you ready for
you know all your public speaking you do
is an entrepreneur and standing in front
of big crowds and I was like well yeah
you know in swimming I stand in front of
many more people wearing nothing but a
speedo so when I get to do it in a
business suit you know it’s it’s much
easier this was one of those quotes that
really doesn’t play well in a serious
article at all so then I learned that
anything you say on the record you know
can actually go in an article so lesson
lesson definitely learn but I’ll leave
you guys with with your for concrete
points of what I have taken from my life
as a student athlete to my life as a
student entrepreneur and hopefully I’ll
graduate and be just an entrepreneur
number one is always be the most
prepared right anyone can tell you to be
prepared but you really have to be the
most repair and right in assuming when
you step up on the blocks at meat you
have to know that you did more than
anyone else in your heat right than any
of your competitors to get ready and
that’s the same in entrepreneurship when
you walk into a meeting you have to know
more about your technology your market
your financials and your product than
anyone else in that meeting if not it’s
just not going to work out well right
there’s there’s no faking that you get
in front of enough smart people they’re
going to know when when you’re making
things up number two surround yourself
with a great team
see some in the back here obviously was
really fortunate to have a great team
here and I’ve also built a great team at
FTC plasma actually three of these are
student athletes and
unfortunate to work with other great
teams at other institutions that we’ve
we’ve done some testing with you know
fundamentally the idea is to complement
skills that you don’t have and surround
yourself with people that are going to
push you
number three is be passionate right
entrepreneurship like being a student
athlete is really really hard so if you
don’t have this internal drive that’s
pushing you towards achieving your goals
you’re never gonna do it when things are
getting tough right you know when you’re
sore and you can’t get out of bed or
when you know things start breaking in
the lab in front of really important
people that needed to see this work if
you don’t believe in what you’re trying
to do and you’re not very passionate
about it you’re not going to be able to
get through all the obstacles and the
fourth and the most important one it
doesn’t make much sense now but I’ll
I’ll get to it it’s get after it right
there’s something our coach would always
say to us here and you know once one so
you you have passion right but then you
have to apply that passion into doing
something and getting after it in this
context really means using sort of
everything you have to go after your
goal and you can do that because you’re
passionate about it we’re getting after
it is the actual you know activity the
actual verb of doing that right so in
the pool it means giving everything you
have and in entrepreneurship it means
putting in lots of sleepless nights you
know giving up social events trying to
work as hard as possible to turn your
technological vision into a reality now
you know I absolutely love being an
entrepreneur but I think the thing to
take away from this talk is that you
know there’s things that are applicable
to every you know possible career path
that you can have here as engineers we
learn about you know different
conservation laws right conservation of
energy conservation of mass conservation
of species but I think in this context
there’s there’s another one and it’s
conservation of hard work right so if
you put in hard work anywhere and you
focus on being better than your
competitors right doing things better
and harder than anyone else you know
eventually those results will come they
might not be when you expect they might
not be you know when you want but
eventually they’ll come so I think you
know even though being entrepreneur is
great you can take that lesson to
anywhere in your life because you know
not everyone should be an entrepreneur
just like
not everyone a team should be a sprinter
as much as I would have loved to be a
sprinter as a distance swimmer you know
that’s not how you win meats you know
not everyone commune intrapreneur not
everyone can be a doctor
not everyone can be a lawyer because we
would have terms and conditions on
everything you know I think everyone has
has their the role to play in this world
where your your your passions and your
talent align with some sort of you know
common good but the things to take away
from entrepreneurship is how you push
forward new innovative ideas in complex
organization so an entrepreneurship that
means selling people on funding you on
partnering with you and buying your
technology but it can also mean you know
selling your boss on starting a new
project it can mean selling your pie on
a new angle for research could even mean
selling your professor on giving you an
extension on an assignment right
fundamentally all those things are types
of entrepreneurship as President Obama
told me once you know entrepreneurship
is all about having an idea work and
working to make it a reality and that’s
also the essence of the American dream
but I think that’s also the essence of
what we do as athletes right we have an
idea so a goal and we work every day in
practice to make it a reality
and you know this is not just about
being a Salesman
right it’s it’s about generating value
and communicating it effectively so
although you know while what I talk
about this plasma stuff airplanes jet
fuel that sounds really cool
you know fundamentally make a really
small part of a really complex system is
it going to do important things for
aviation hopefully is it going to be a
game-changer and how we think about
combustion and other industries maybe do
I get really fired up about it
definitely yeah some people are growing
because they’ve heard me make that joke
at least once a week but you know the
ideas are only part of the work right
the the real essence of the problem is
actually you know doing the work anyone
can have a good idea all of you can
absolutely have a good idea and you know
tackle these sort of big problems in our
world but remember to follow that with
with hard work right I think there’s a
lot of romanticized ideas about
entrepreneurship but you know those can
definitely be motivational but that’s
maybe not the best motivation right I
think we should definitely look for for
those areas in which we can do
meaningful work right you know I hope
our generation as Millennials we’re not
just known for making apps and creating
companies that turn into unicorns you
know there’s there’s big problems that
we can tackle together think clean
energy national security and sustainable
development terrain diseases right
that’s that’s all something that that we
can do if we choose to to you work hard
and solve problems that are meaningful
even if they’re difficult
so I guess my my challenge to you guys
is to you know find the big problems
work to solve them and get after it so
I’ll leave you with that
everyone good afternoon and thanks for
coming to my talk for those of you who
don’t know me I graduated in 2016 with
my mechanical and aerospace engineering
degree I’m currently a graduate student
here but I live in Chicago so it’s
always good to get back to campus and
share a little bit of my experience I
was a student athlete here and I was a
student entrepreneur but I was a pretty
lousy student so I’m pretty happy that
they still invited me back to talk here
and I can definitely a was not one of
the requirements for being a speaker
here but this I’m glad you guys laughed
I wasn’t really bad but you know this
whole journey started about seven years
ago when I came home from practice and
asked my dad hey Dad you know kind of
asking for a friend do we have good home
insurance
yes sir like you know what did you blow
up this time but because I was working
on my high school science fair project
and I wanted to make sort of a model of
a jet engine combustion chamber and see
if we can improve combustion using
plasma terms that you can sometimes that
would happen so it’s good that I asked I
ended up taking this project to the
International Science Fair which I
always compared to the Olympics of
science as narrative that sounds and
when I was flying back one of my
teachers point out the winner and said
can you imagine if in 10 or 15 years
every aircraft flying is more efficient
because of something that you invented
pretty cool so when I came here it’s the
case I started thinking of ways to
continue to develop this technology and
originally I was leaning it’s just a
pure research project right you know
sitting in the lab getting grants with a
professor and then maybe writing some
papers but I was really quickly
persuaded by some of my mentors that the
best way to pursue this was going to be
more like a startup write a
commercialization play something that
would let me keep you know one eye on
developing the technology and then one
eye on making sure I was doing something
practical that people would care about
and hopefully by so I got some funds
from our innovation center here called
pink box built a prototype with lots of
hot glue and started looking at ways of
how plasmon flames interacted in you
know actual practical settings right
what can we actually do with this
technology and it turns out that one of
the most critical applications of
combustion are jet engines so as you can
imagine it takes a lot of energy to you
know push us through the air at 35,000
feet and 500 miles an hour because it
takes a lot of energy it takes a lot of
fuel
lots of fuel cost lots of money so
that’s like 15 billion dollars and uh 30
billion dollars in 2015
right so Airlines care a lot about
reducing their fuel expenditure even a
little bit so anything you can do to
improve their fuel efficiency an improve
their bottom line you know could be a
really commercially attractive idea so
it’s that was sort of the starting point
but it turns out that jet engines are
really good at burning fuel really
efficiently anyway you know they’re
designed really to do three main things
number one to never ever ever shut off
for any reason right because if they do
and you’re flying over the ocean and
everyone’s going swimming and that’s bad
people don’t pay for that number two –
you know generate the thrust that you
need to take off fly around etc and
number three is to be at their maximum
efficiency at your design point which is
cruise right when you’re flying around
and the captain says you know you know
the fasten seatbelt sign is off now
that’s where you spend most of your time
fly and that’s what engines are really
designed for but we’ve all been flying
and we’ve you know all been stuck when
we’re lap number 26 for departure and
you might be waiting 45 or 30 minutes or
even an hour on the runway and that’s
just like being at a stoplight right
your engines are still running still
burning fuel but you’re not going
anywhere and it turns out that it’s not
really easy to shut off those engines
and then start them back up sort of like
the new cars do so you know there’s
really an issue here where you’re
burning fuel and you’re not getting
anything good out of it and if you can
solve that you know that might be
something that’s important to the
airlines and it turns out that you know
you can sort of compare a jet engine to
a gas stove actually probably a gas
stove with a hairdryer so don’t try this
at home because take my word for it I
did it I actually did it with my
sister’s hair dryer you essentially jet
engines they suck in a bunch of air they
compress it they mix it with fuel where
it burns right and they just shoot it
out the back and it’s really difficult
to keep a flame lit in this environment
so that’s where the stove comes in let’s
say you know you let your stove when you
turn it to full power if you point a
hairdryer at it you know there’s a good
chance that when you’re at full power
you’re probably not gonna be able to
blow out that flame but if you turn down
your stove right let’s say to the lowest
setting it’s definitely gonna blow out
so it’s the same thing that happens in
engines right it’s really difficult to
keep flames lit especially when you’re
at low power settings like on the ground
and because of this you know jet engine
manufacturers have only really one
to play with to control how these
engines run right essentially you can
only do tricky things with the
aerodynamics to make sure you always
have a place where the flame can stay
lit because you only have one knob to
turn you know if you turn it one way
right to maximize safety to make sure
this thing never shuts off then you’re
gonna sacrifice optimum performance
right you’re gonna give up some of your
fuel consumption at idle right which
makes you waste fuel when you’re sitting
on the ground at an airport but if you
cheat and add another knob right you can
design better engines right because if
you have another way to keep the flame
lit then you can make sure the end in a
safe and efficient at you know all
points in the flight and it turns out
that we can get this you know other knob
from using plasma so if you’ve ever seen
you know a lightning storm you’ve seen
plasma we don’t get those too much in
Ohio but in Florida whereas from we
definitely do so plasma is the fourth
state of matter think you have solid
liquid gas and if you keep adding energy
to that gas you start taking off
electrons off of those atoms right and
then you have essentially a soup of
charged particles which has a lot of
energy and it’s really good at bumping
into things and breaking them that’s
important for us in combustion because
in combustion you have these really
large organic fuel molecules that need
to break up into smaller pieces before
they burn right so it’s equally a
simpler example it’s sort of like
playing with LEGOs if someone gives you
they you know lego house and ask you to
build a car from those pieces what’s the
first thing you have to do you have to
take apart those pieces you know block
by block until you end up with you know
all the blocks disassembled and then you
can build something new that’s going to
take you time and it’s going to take you
energy so if you were to hit that block
with a marble right then you end up with
all of your blocks individual and then
you can grab them and build whatever you
want that’s basically what we’re doing
with plasma we’re using you know set of
marbles we’re using high speed electrons
to bump into large fuel and air
molecules and those break them up into
smaller pieces which burn quicker and
more efficiently cool you know that’s
sort of been known by science for a
while that plasmas can do that and you
can generate plasmas in the lab pretty
easily if you have a high voltage power
supply it’s basically just an electrical
discharge across air but the challenge
is really how we get something like this
or that into you know something that
looks like this right an incredibly
complex machine that’s designed really
well and doesn’t
much tolerance for change what I settled
on with my team was figuring out ways to
integrate this technology into a part
that’s already on the engine right so
what we settled on was a fuel injector
that’s a part that injects fuel right
it’s it’s in the engine it’s sort of
like a showerhead that sprays fuel into
the combustion chamber and we
essentially worked on figuring out a way
to put a plasma into this part right a
part that already exists in the engine a
part that you could potentially retrofit
easily and and then you you know you
have your plasma exactly where you need
now that had somewhat been tried before
but there had been some practical
problems and where you put the plasma
how you integrate you know this with a
current fuel injector design how you
make sure this thing doesn’t you know
last 30 minutes when you need to have
thousands of hours of flight time you
know we think we’ve cracked most of
these problems we did a lot of tests
here at case and as well as NASA Glenn
Research Center we have a patent on this
technology and we’re still working on it
but we think we’re we’re pretty close
the challenge here was really taking
this fundamental science right and
putting it at the service of a
technology and so that’s sort of what
your job is as an engineer right take
scientific knowledge and use it to solve
a practical problem I mean the next step
was to take you know that solution and
put it at the service of a product right
to actually get it into something that
can go into the real world and hopefully
make something better for someone that
part of the journey was really what I
always thought of as entrepreneurship
but more and more I realized that you
know engineering an entrepreneurship
sort of blend because it’s not enough to
develop a solution you also have to do
the work of carrying it across the
finish line and that means that
entrepreneurship has to be involved at
the beginning so you know that so you
know what the solution has to look like
at the end and engineering has to also
be involved at the end so you know what
you can actually put in an engine so
I’ll show you a little bit of what this
actually looks like and I think this is
going to autoplay basically you know we
start a flame just like you would in an
engine and as soon as you you know we
turn off the plasma we start decreasing
the amount of fuel right going so this
is sort of what you would have when
you’re at low power waiting in an
airport you see the flame starts to get
really unhappy it bounces and rounds
right and eventually it extinguishes so
everyone’s going swimming we’re able to
turn it on with plasma and then we can
actually keep that
same flame right or that same flame with
even less fuel lit and what we can
actually do is if we can extend the the
limits of operation of a flame buyer at
60% somethings we can run a flame with
about 60% less fuel than it’s currently
possible in real life this could
translate to saving between 1 and 5
percent on fuel consumption for an
actual airline you know there’s still a
lot of work to do I traded my garage for
a lab at Argonne National Laboratory
through Department of Energy funded
program and this sort of my my day job
but it’s been really unfamiliar
territory right fundamentally I’m an
engineer not really an entrepreneur so
I’ve had to learn all of that and I’ve
always wanted to compare you know this
unfamiliar entrepreneurship thing to
something that was much more familiar to
me
right and that’s swimming that was at
least 20 hours of my week for the past
over 10 years and actually a reporter
asked me once you know how do you how do
you think swimming gets you ready for
you know all your public speaking you do
is an entrepreneur and standing in front
of big crowds and I was like well yeah
you know in swimming I stand in front of
many more people wearing nothing but a
speedo so when I get to do it in a
business suit you know it’s it’s much
easier this was one of those quotes that
really doesn’t play well in a serious
article at all so then I learned that
anything you say on the record you know
can actually go in an article so lesson
lesson definitely learn but I’ll leave
you guys with with your for concrete
points of what I have taken from my life
as a student athlete to my life as a
student entrepreneur and hopefully I’ll
graduate and be just an entrepreneur
number one is always be the most
prepared right anyone can tell you to be
prepared but you really have to be the
most repair and right in assuming when
you step up on the blocks at meat you
have to know that you did more than
anyone else in your heat right than any
of your competitors to get ready and
that’s the same in entrepreneurship when
you walk into a meeting you have to know
more about your technology your market
your financials and your product than
anyone else in that meeting if not it’s
just not going to work out well right
there’s there’s no faking that you get
in front of enough smart people they’re
going to know when when you’re making
things up number two surround yourself
with a great team
see some in the back here obviously was
really fortunate to have a great team
here and I’ve also built a great team at
FTC plasma actually three of these are
student athletes and
unfortunate to work with other great
teams at other institutions that we’ve
we’ve done some testing with you know
fundamentally the idea is to complement
skills that you don’t have and surround
yourself with people that are going to
push you
number three is be passionate right
entrepreneurship like being a student
athlete is really really hard so if you
don’t have this internal drive that’s
pushing you towards achieving your goals
you’re never gonna do it when things are
getting tough right you know when you’re
sore and you can’t get out of bed or
when you know things start breaking in
the lab in front of really important
people that needed to see this work if
you don’t believe in what you’re trying
to do and you’re not very passionate
about it you’re not going to be able to
get through all the obstacles and the
fourth and the most important one it
doesn’t make much sense now but I’ll
I’ll get to it it’s get after it right
there’s something our coach would always
say to us here and you know once one so
you you have passion right but then you
have to apply that passion into doing
something and getting after it in this
context really means using sort of
everything you have to go after your
goal and you can do that because you’re
passionate about it we’re getting after
it is the actual you know activity the
actual verb of doing that right so in
the pool it means giving everything you
have and in entrepreneurship it means
putting in lots of sleepless nights you
know giving up social events trying to
work as hard as possible to turn your
technological vision into a reality now
you know I absolutely love being an
entrepreneur but I think the thing to
take away from this talk is that you
know there’s things that are applicable
to every you know possible career path
that you can have here as engineers we
learn about you know different
conservation laws right conservation of
energy conservation of mass conservation
of species but I think in this context
there’s there’s another one and it’s
conservation of hard work right so if
you put in hard work anywhere and you
focus on being better than your
competitors right doing things better
and harder than anyone else you know
eventually those results will come they
might not be when you expect they might
not be you know when you want but
eventually they’ll come so I think you
know even though being entrepreneur is
great you can take that lesson to
anywhere in your life because you know
not everyone should be an entrepreneur
just like
not everyone a team should be a sprinter
as much as I would have loved to be a
sprinter as a distance swimmer you know
that’s not how you win meats you know
not everyone commune intrapreneur not
everyone can be a doctor
not everyone can be a lawyer because we
would have terms and conditions on
everything you know I think everyone has
has their the role to play in this world
where your your your passions and your
talent align with some sort of you know
common good but the things to take away
from entrepreneurship is how you push
forward new innovative ideas in complex
organization so an entrepreneurship that
means selling people on funding you on
partnering with you and buying your
technology but it can also mean you know
selling your boss on starting a new
project it can mean selling your pie on
a new angle for research could even mean
selling your professor on giving you an
extension on an assignment right
fundamentally all those things are types
of entrepreneurship as President Obama
told me once you know entrepreneurship
is all about having an idea work and
working to make it a reality and that’s
also the essence of the American dream
but I think that’s also the essence of
what we do as athletes right we have an
idea so a goal and we work every day in
practice to make it a reality
and you know this is not just about
being a Salesman
right it’s it’s about generating value
and communicating it effectively so
although you know while what I talk
about this plasma stuff airplanes jet
fuel that sounds really cool
you know fundamentally make a really
small part of a really complex system is
it going to do important things for
aviation hopefully is it going to be a
game-changer and how we think about
combustion and other industries maybe do
I get really fired up about it
definitely yeah some people are growing
because they’ve heard me make that joke
at least once a week but you know the
ideas are only part of the work right
the the real essence of the problem is
actually you know doing the work anyone
can have a good idea all of you can
absolutely have a good idea and you know
tackle these sort of big problems in our
world but remember to follow that with
with hard work right I think there’s a
lot of romanticized ideas about
entrepreneurship but you know those can
definitely be motivational but that’s
maybe not the best motivation right I
think we should definitely look for for
those areas in which we can do
meaningful work right you know I hope
our generation as Millennials we’re not
just known for making apps and creating
companies that turn into unicorns you
know there’s there’s big problems that
we can tackle together think clean
energy national security and sustainable
development terrain diseases right
that’s that’s all something that that we
can do if we choose to to you work hard
and solve problems that are meaningful
even if they’re difficult
so I guess my my challenge to you guys
is to you know find the big problems
work to solve them and get after it so
I’ll leave you with that
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