STUDENTS FROM TEXAS A&M ENGINEERING ACADEMY AT BLINN-BRENHAM AMONG FINALISTS IN NASA COMPETITION

  

Two students from the Texas A&M Engineering Academy at Blinn-Brenham are reaching for the stars — or at least the moon  — as part of a prestigious team selected as finalists in a NASA-sponsored aerospace competition.

Freshman Victor Guadarrama from Toluca, Mexico, and sophomore Ismael Magana from Magnolia are members of a 13-student team from Texas A&M University competing in NASA’s 2025 Revolutionary Aerospace Systems Concepts–Academic Linkage (RASC-AL) competition. Their innovative lunar robot project is one of only 14 chosen from more than 150 university entries nationwide, competing alongside institutions such as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

As Texas A&M Engineering Academy at Blinn-Brenham students, Guadarrama and Magana are co-enrolled at Blinn and the Texas A&M College of Engineering.

“When we got the email telling us we were finalists, it was one of the best moments of my life,” Guadarrama said.

“I had just gotten out of a class with Victor,” Magana said. “We were jumping up and down. It’s pretty cool.”

The team’s project, called the Robotic Autonomous Maintenance System for Extraterrestrial Environment (RAMSEE), aims to create a lunar robot under 500 kilograms (about 1,100 pounds). Designed for use on the moon’s surface, RAMSEE will perform vital tasks like connecting umbilicals, swapping payloads, inspecting lunar equipment, and monitoring environmental conditions.

Team members are divided into specialized subteams:

• Mechanical Team: Magana (subteam leader), Mehek Patro, Basudha Chilkoor, Joshua Wheeler
• Power Team: Trey Love (subteam leader), Braxton Gerstein
• Maintenance and Servicing Team: Joseph Harb (subteam leader), Trey Love, Rohil Vinnakota
• Communications, Autonomy, and Navigation Team: Diya Dev (subteam leader), John Elmore, Cyrus Mende, Floria Xu

Finalists now advance to the next stage of the competition, preparing detailed technical papers describing their designs and anticipated impacts. Up to eight team members will then travel to Cocoa Beach, Fla., June 2-4 to present their proposals to a panel of NASA scientists.

“The first-year Texas A&M University College of Engineering students involved in RAMSEE designed a suite of innovative thermal, battery, advanced manufacturing, robotic, and AI-based technologies to enable the sustainable operations of a lunar rover which will maintain and service NASA’s Artemis Lunar Base,” said Dr. Sivakumar Rathinam, a mechanical engineering professor at Texas A&M and advisor to the team. “The selection of their design in a nationwide NASA competition among all universities is a testament to their out-of-the-box thinking and dedication.”

“This year’s RASC-AL projects are not just academic exercises; they will contribute to real solutions to some of the most pressing challenges we currently face,” said Daniel Mazanek, RASC-AL program sponsor and senior space systems engineer with NASA. “The competition continues to highlight the importance of innovation and interdisciplinary collaboration in aerospace.”

Each finalist team receives a $6,500 stipend from NASA to help cover travel expenses for the Florida presentation. Additionally, Guadarrama and Magana launched a GoFundMe campaign to raise an extra $2,750 to cover project and travel costs.

Two teams from the Cocoa Beach presentations will advance to showcase their projects at ASCEND (Accelerating Space Commerce, Exploration, and New Discovery), one of the world’s largest aerospace conferences, in Las Vegas, July 22-24.

For more information regarding Blinn’s Engineering Program, which includes co-enrollment partnerships such as the Texas A&M Engineering Academy at Blinn-Brenham and Texas A&M Engineering at Blinn, please visit www.blinn.edu/engineering.

(Story courtesy Blinn Information)