- Carnegie Mellon University
Carnegie Mellon University, College of Engineering (RD) — Mechanical Engineering
An AP student ranked in the top 30% with no SAT/ACT, admitted to CMU Engineering on drone design, an IEEE paper from research at Tsinghua and an 800-member aviation club.
- Major
- Mechanical Engineering
- Round
- Fall 2024 RD
- Curriculum
- Public high school international division, AP (four 5s and one 4)
- GPA
- Top 30%
- TOEFL
- 111
- SAT / ACT
- None
Activities
- Drone design for urban emergency supply delivery: designed a blended-wing-body tilt-rotor drone for vertical take-off and landing; 70% better energy efficiency; 80-page report.
- President of the SDSZ TOGA aviation club: connected over 4 cities and 800 members into a national alliance; organised 12 aircraft-design workshops and published 16 articles on the club’s WeChat account (600+ subscribers).
- Research at Tsinghua: researcher and first author on drone path-planning algorithms; designed the ED-YOLO algorithm, improving path-planning capability 2.3×; improved conventional obstacle avoidance; paper published by IEEE.
- Photographer and member of an AI art group: 7 years of aerial photography, supplying stock images and footage to VCG; 100+ uploads, twice editor’s choice; profile with 210,000 views.
- Research on two aero-engine materials: improved conventional machining with ultrasonic-vibration hole-making; analysed wear mechanisms; surface smoothness improved 23%.
- “Gateway” project: helped communication with deaf children by designing speech-to-text glasses using ASR deep learning and AR; prototyped with 3D modelling and printing.
- Cycling team captain: 10 years of cycling, 46 rides across 3 provinces (4,700+ km in total).
- Aviation history research: the development of Chinese civil aviation, focusing on three post-1949 changes in administrative structure and their lessons; 19-page paper.
- Organised 10 members from 4 schools to write 22 articles on AI painting, the MU5735 crash and discrimination against international students; 16,000 readers.
- Team leader in the LaunchX entrepreneurship summer program.
Awards
- Space City finals, winning team
- British Physics Olympiad, top gold
- PhysicsBowl Division 2, gold
- RWDC drone competition, national second place
- HiMCM, first prize (Meritorious)
Recommendations and additional information
- Recommenders: school physics teacher, English teacher, Tsinghua research mentor, Pioneer mentor
- Two paper abstracts
- Link to a photography portfolio