Zack Murry
B.S. student in Computer Science and Mathematics
University of Missouri
About
Hi! I'm Zack, a second-year undergraduate student in Computer Science and Mathematics at the University of Missouri. I work as a student research assistant in the Virtualization, Multimedia, and Networking (VIMAN) lab, where I study computer networking, drone navigation, and edge computing. This past summer (2024), I did an internship at the University of Chicago researching distributed computing using Raspberry Pis. Outside of research, I also enjoy full-stack web development, compilers, and robots!
Research
VIMAN
My work in the VIMAN lab is focused on creating solutions for autonomous drones. For example, we're currently working on a route generation software for package delivery using drones and delivery trucks via Reinforcement Learning (RL) with a Deep Q-Network (DQN). Additionally, I run experiments on the NSF-funded Aerial Experimentation and Research Platform for Advanced Wireless (AERPAW) testbed, which facilitates experiments with autonomous drones and 5G networks. Specifically, I study computational offloading and control networking for video transmission applications, as well as truck-drone package delivery systems. We published a paper at an IEEE workshop earlier this year with experiments on the AERPAW testbed, which is available here.
University of Chicago
At my internship, I collaborated with the Agricultural and Rural (ARA) Wireless Living Lab to deploy six Raspberry Pis in and around Ames, Iowa across farms and Iowa State buildings. These devices are connected to ARA's 5G radio infrastructure, and I conducted distributed computing experiments across these 5G links using Apache Hadoop to run MapReduce workloads.
Web Development
I started making websites in my freshman year of high school, which was at the start of the pandemic. By following a few free, online courses, I taught myself the basics of the Java Spring framework and React. Since then, I have continued learning through creating projects. A few highlights are listed below, with more projects (both web and non-web) and information on the Projects page.
ChesSRS is an interactive chess learning website that uses a flashcard-like spaced-repetition system (SRS) for practicing opening moves.
Docs Hotkey is a Chrome extension for Google Docs that allows the creation of complex shortcuts. It has over 4,500 weekly users and a 4.9-star rating.
Sigma Scoring is a web app that allows for visual scorekeeping for the 2022-2023 FIRST Technology Challenge (FTC) game. I was a programmer for my high school's FTC robotics team for two years, and I currently volunteer at local tournaments to help score matches.