Daniel Lerma Email & Phone Number

Texas, United States

Arlington, Va, Us

- Integrated product team lead for the Electro Optical (EO) and High Energy Laser (HEL) groups at RTX. Taking ownership of scheduling, tasking, funding and planning for all activities (software and firmware) from conception (pre-bid) to production.- Managed a team of 8+ engineers on rotation across multiple programs. Working with leadership to ensure needs where met and the team expertise grew among the HEL and EO product lines.- Implemented Agile methodologies using Atlassian tools such as Jira and Confluence to ensure prompt resolutions to customer requirements and problems. Saved hundreds of hours of engineering time by removing old waterfall planning/ execution.- Designed the CI/CD architecture used to ensure the elimination of human error during official build releases. Reducing on field problems and improving reliability. - Lead the design and implementation of the new HEL and EO product FW/SW architecture. Ensuring cross platform compatibility of technologies. Allowed rapid bring up of new capabilities with minimal expense to RTX.- Ensured programs met their financial obligations within budget. On average each program receiving $4 million+ funding for the FW/SW teams that have not overran under my leadership.

Arlington, Va, Us

- Lead Digital Design Engineer for the Raytheon DAS (EODAS) internal research and development (IRAD). Later, continued deliverable efforts as a critical senior engineer member core to the bringup of the project to production.- Prevented a multi-million dollar circuit card assembly (CCA) redesign by re-architecting the firmware memory interface to meet bandwidth requirements. Memory throughput improved by over 40% and bandwidth by 300%.- Assisted with determining program specifications, characterizing and ensuring verification of contract requirements. Improving program planning, allowing me to better distribute workload and improve team agile methodology efficiency.- Designed, implemented, and debugeed both embedded C code/ drivers and VHDL on a Xilinx Ultrascale+ with an ARM Cortex-R/A. Core focus on modularity, DFT, and expansion of the product ecosystem was kept in mind throughout planning and execution.- Introduced RTOS bootup sequences, internal algorithms, and a refined embedded software architecture that allowed for quick turnaround of features. Personally taking care of hardware bringup, board validation,and schematic analysis to facilitate the team’s rapid prototyping.

Chief AI Platform Architect w/ Motus Labs - Under NDA FPGA Accelerated SW Architect w/ Twitter - Under NDA

El Segundo, California, Us

- Designed the second generation 4U-Link processing firmware architecture. Its robustness has allowed next generation endoscopic cameras to have never before seen configurability and mode operations.- Introduced and implemented continuous integration processes in Jenkins that improved reuse efforts by providing confidence in KSI IP testing. Reduced server load by over 80% as builds are kicked off only if a change is detected.- Identified project requirements and assisted in the generation of detailed FRS (requirements) and FVP (verification) documentation.- Lead efforts within the software team to change legacy poling routines into interrupt based routines that greatly improved performance and removed a plethora of issues faced during system operation. Firmware integration efforts of advanced modules simplified by easing runtime coefficient calculations during frame blanking time.- Created a video retimer module that eliminates jitter, protects against interference, and creates HDMI/ Display port video timings.- Developed a new frame synchronization pulse functionality that eliminated a decade long feedback loop problem.- Introduced reconfigurable modular designs such as a runtime reconfigurable UART capable of running at Mega BAUD rates, with configurable interrupt conditions and easily integrated as it is compatible with the default Xilinx drivers.

Arlington, Va, Us

-Lead Digital Design Engineer for the Emerging Infrared Technologies group. Tasked with the design, implementation and completion of all next generation high density IR camera programs and the Raytheon DAS sensor. - Designed an Agile based DFT architecture that allowed firmware and embedded software tasks to be completed in a fraction of the bidden time, saving Raytheon hundreds of program hours. - Created and implemented various VHDL algorithms for the IR high density sensors including but not limited to configurable data unpacker, 32 bit non uniformity correction, Real time dead pixel replacement, and Chebyshev Inequality based dead pixel flagging. - Also designed the embedded software routines needed for the IR camera and various drivers needed to run the FPGA system. - Saved days of test engineering time by designing a test set based around the DFT architecture and Xilinx ZCU102 UltraScale +, preprocessing the data through real-time fabric algorithms to decrease test software capture and data processing time. - Redesigned legacy embedded processing routines and processor (ARM) interfaces to allow for modular software designs that greatly improved system bring up time allowing for better use of program hours to implement per program unique VHDL.

- Biometric dev w/ Heart ID: Assisted a team of 5 engineers design a sensor capable of detecting users through single source ECG. Led algorithm development and applied machine learning to help improve user detection overtime. The team managed to be one of the 10 of over 100 teams to be selected to be part of Startup Aggieland. Agreements with hospitals in the Bryan/ college station area where in place to help data mine and improve the sensor. Effort was cancelled due to 3 engineers backing out due to PhD workload being too high to continue.- Hardware Design w/ Warm Wiz: Helped bring up initial prototype, assisting with PCB layout and debugging. Introduced the team to Git versión control and design reuse architecting. Also provided startup feedback to help guide efforts and funding. Contract completed and effort was continued with a full time focused team.- System bringup time w/ M. Goldman: Gave recommendations on how to brainstorm and test initial prototypes. Showed how to work with micro controllers to test out logic and hardware configurations. Helped save days of design time and considerable funding by allowing quick testing of different devices. Contract completed.- Large-scale DNA data analysis w/ A&M Research: After graduation was contacted to help assist further development of my DNA transcription algorithm for the A&M biophysics research team. Contract completed and allowed the team to publish their findings. - others...

College Station, Tx, Us

• Designed, Simulated and verified the fabrication process of microelectronic devices using the Synopsis Sentaurus TCAD tool. • Carried out the fabrication of designed devices performing Oxidation, Diffusion, Masking, Ion Implantation, Photolithography, Etching, Chemical Vapor Deposition, Epitaxy, and Metallization at the A&M nanofabrication facility.• Characterized each device to confirm they met design parameters at probe stations.

College Station, Tx, Us

Working under supervision of Dr. Sam Villareal in collaboration with Yajie Zeng and Alyse Judilla• Led a team of 3 engineers through the research, design, and development of a portable IR enhanced facial recognition system.• Predicted improvements on current PCA based facial recognition algorithms using IR imaging through Matlab.• Obtained unlimited funding, up from $500 limited funds, and a $3,599 DRS Infrared (IR) camera through meetings and project presentations with Capstone Coordinators. As predictions, tests, and prototypes showed promising results.• Programmed the developed IR facial recognition algorithm using C++, OpenCV, and Python in Linux.• Coded and compiled a Linux kernel module (Driver) for the Tamarisk 320 DRS Infrared Camera.• Designed and 3D printed the project casing using 3D AutoCAD tools. • Built the system carrying out soldering, assembly, and Bluetooth communication setup.

College Station, Tx, Us

• Designed and built a MIPS pipelined processor using Verilog to demonstrate prowess in computer architecture.• Compiled, simulated, and debugged using the Synopsys VCS DVE and utilized waveform data to improve design.• Coded and ran Verilog test benches to verify design parameters, signals, and improve the hazard detection unit.

College Station, Tx, Us

Working under guidance of Dr. Peng Yu in collaboration with Chenxi Qiu and Ashley Murray• Managed a team of 3 engineers through the research and development of a script automated analysis pipeline using existing NET-seq data that would facilitate the quantification of DNA transcription errors in vivo.• Programmed the script using Samtools, Awk, SED, Ggplot, and R in a Linux environment.• Saved days of experiment-time as the script allowed the analysis of data in roughly 2 hrs instead of the 3+ days of legacy methods.

Huntsville, Tx, Us

Working under the guidance of Dr. Hui Fang.• Synthesized a new cathode material (Li(1-4y)Ti(y)FePO4) for lithium-ion batteries• Characterized the material through X-ray diffraction, X-ray absorption spectroscopy, & electrochemical impendence spectroscopy• Analyzed data using MAUD software in order to accurately find the optimized Ti doping performance eliminating impurity variable. • It was found that doping of Ti causes a decrease in charge and discharge capacities. However at higher C rate, the charge discharge capacities are improved. We found that Li(0.96)Ti(0.01)FePO4 exhibits the optimized electrochemical performance.

Huntsville, Tx, Us

• Planned, Organized and set up labs of up to 40 students so they could study and observe different Physics phenomena under my tutorage. These ranged from Intro to Astronomy, Classical Mechanics, and Modern Physics.• Carried out astronomy demonstrations to classes of up to 60 students as part of a non-majors astronomy course.• Graded each individual student performance to assign a grade that reflected the students’ performance within labs.

Huntsville, Tx, Us

Tutored students in both physics and math from different level courses up to senior level classes.

Bachelor Of Science (Bs), Electrical Engineering

Bachelor Of Science (Bs), Physics

Bachelor Of Science (B.S.), Electrical Engineering