HELLO WORLD!
ABOUT ME
Nick Lopac
Originally from Westwood, NJ I grew up with a passion for emerging technologies such as virtual reality, wearables, and personal transport. My love for innovative technology drew me to the spaceflight industry. After witnessing the innovations of SpaceX and their first recovery of an orbital booster in 2015, I committed to steer my career towards the resurgence of human spaceflight. Along with human spaceflight I have a passion for exploration and discovery which I have maintained through my world travels. With over 5 years of spacesuit and astronaut undergraduate research, I am ready to dedicate my full time career to help humans get back to the Moon and onto Mars to stay. Fun Fact: My birthday is Star Wars Day, so May the Fourth Be With You!
EDUCATION
EMBRY-RIDDLE AERONAUTICAL UNIVERSITY
Daytona Beach, Florida
BS: SPACEFLIGHT OPERATIONS
Minors: Human Factors and Computer Science
The Bachelors of Science in Spaceflight Operations is an innovative, one of a kind program created by ERAU to specifically address the recent boom of spaceflight activity over the last decade. The interdisciplinary courses cover a range of topics such as orbital mechanics, mission planning, life support systems and more. I decided to take additional engineering courses such as computer drafting, statics/solids/dynamics, and physics to bolster my technical interests. Along with these courses I also sought minors in human factors and computer science where I learned to apply my technical skills to the human centered design of hardware and software.
STUDENT EMPLOYEE OF THE YEAR AWARD: 2019
ERAU Daytona Beach Campus
In 2019 I was nominated for and received the student employee award for the entire ERAU Daytona Beach campus. My role at the ERAU S.U.I.T. Lab as a paid research manager lead to my nomination by my principal investigator. I believe my passion for spaceflight, dedication to my role, and empowerment from my employer allowed me to be successful enough to have earned this honor. Since I was pivotal in the build up of the S.U.I.T. Lab, I felt a high sense of responsibility and accountability for the success of the lab. This drove me to strive for greatness and work hard to constantly grow the reputation of our lab from humble beginnings.
OUTSTANDING STUDENT AWARD: 2020
Spaceflight Operations
2020 was certainly an interesting year, but at the time of the onset of the pandemic I was at the high of my career. I had recently completed my first NASA internship, I was invited back for another in spacesuit engineering, and we had just presented and published another research paper. I was also continuing to create new opportunities for other students through our participation in NASA design challenges. The University decided to recognize my accomplishments in the form of the Outstanding Student Award for my degree program, for which I am honored to have been awarded.
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EXTRACURRICULARS
ERAU S.U.I.T. LAB
Research Manager
When I was an undergraduate freshman I applied to an on campus job opening for the Spacesuit Utilization of Innovative Technology Laboratory (S.U.I.T. Lab). I was unsure if I would actually earn the position since I had very little experience as a freshman. However, to my surprise after an interview I was hired for my passion and technical aptitude. Since then I rose to become the research manager of the lab and a world of opportunities were opened for me. Please click below to learn more about my experiences leading the S.U.I.T. Lab.
PROJECT POSSUM
Citizen Scientist Astronaut Trainee
During my time leading the S.U.I.T. Lab, Embry-Riddle awarded me a grant to attend the Project POSSUM Citizen Scientist Astronaut Training program. The training program included instruction on the aspects of human spaceflight such as aerospace physiology, flight simulation, and science instrumentation. The program also exposed me to hands on experiences that included spacesuit operations, high-g acrobatic flight, and hypoxia training in a hypobaric chamber. In 2019 I was the first student in the history of program to earn a perfect score on the final exam for certification.
SKILLS
ENGINEERING
During my NASA internships and design challenges I learned to utilize CAD software such as Fusion 360, CATIA, and CREO to bring my ideas to life. I often used Cura to slice my models for 3D printing to rapidly prototype my designs. I also read and wrote engineering requirements throughout my work. For multiple projects I authored and presented technical reediness reviews to NASA safety boards prior to any real-time operations with crew testing.
PROGRAMMING
I first picked up programming in the form of MATLAB to aid in my S.U.I.T. Lab research to visualize motion capture data. Then, during my computer science minor I learned object oriented Java. At my first NASA internship I applied my new object oriented skills to create Python code that integrated with Blender to visualize motion capture data in 3D. In 2021 I participated in the NASA SUITS challenge where I learned C# and Unity from scratch to help my team create an Augmented Reality spacesuit user interface.
HUMAN SPACEFLIGHT
Throughout all my research, design projects, and internships I have been focused on human spaceflight. I have first hand experience operating in, and designing for critical environments where redundancy, ease of use, efficiency are of paramount importance. I have had multiple opportunities to conduct real-time operations for spacesuit and SCUBA testing where clear communication has been critical. I have been growing my knowledge of the subject by working with and receiving mentorship from as many industry professionals as possible with the goal of becoming a subject matter expert myself.
CONTENT CREATION
Before I was so immersed in spaceflight, I was an avid videographer and graphic designer. My content creation skills have been a constant benefit to me and the teams I have supported over the years. I am skilled in Adobe Premiere Pro, Illustrator and Photoshop. These skills have allowed me to create instructional/promotional videos, mission patches, and hand crafted presentations. Along with managing spaceflight research I was the creative director for the S.U.I.T. Lab, where most of the logos, videos, and posters were of my design.