More than 300 people and about 20 Indiana composite materials companies celebrated the opening of the $50 million Indiana Manufacturing Institute, based in the Purdue Research Park of West Lafayette. Research and development on composite materials to increase energy efficiency for the vehicle production, wind, aerospace and other industries will be conducted in the facility.

AAE Master's student Emily Zimovan is spending her summer as an intern with NASA Johnson Space Center in Houston, TX.

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos founded Blue Origin in September 2000 to develop rockets and spaceships that will dramatically reduce the cost of safely and reliably flying people into suborbital space. When it comes to hiring for his space company, Bezos turns to Purdue.

AAE junior Tristan Zabicki is spending her summer on co-op with GE Aviation in West Chester, OH.

AAE grad student Kate Fowee (BSAAE '16) is spending her summer as an intern at Northrop Grumman in California.

AAE senior Benjamin Vernhes is spending his summer as an intern at The Boeing Company in Renton, WA.

A team of AAE students recently completed a conceptual spacecraft design for a next generation mission to the outer planets and presented its results to an audience of experts from NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). The study was part of an intensive two-week engineering exercise lead by AAE Visiting Assistant Professor Sarag Saikia.

AAE Associate Professor Timothée Pourpoint is head of the multidisciplinary team designing and assembling the Indiana Bicentennial torch. He says there are several stages in torch production to complete all 130 torches for the torch run and other purposes.

Meet AAE senior Aleksandra Dervisevic, who is spending her summer on co-op with Rockwell Collins in Cedar Rapids, IA.

An experiment by Purdue AAE professor Steven Collicott ended with success aboard the first suborbital rocket research flight by private company Blue Origin. Prof. Collicott is one of three scientists asked by Blue Origin to work with the private company as it tested and perfected its suborbital rocket design.