Solar-Powered Fixed-Wing Aircraft Design / The Impact of Surveillance Technology on Anti-Latinx Discrimination Near the U.S.-Mexico Border

Advancements in surveillance technology have created powerful tools capable of monitoring people continuously and at unprecedented scales. While these technologies can be very beneficial in protecting national security and citizens, there are a lot of ethical and moral concerns surrounding surveillance. My two thesis projects are connected by this ethical dilemma, with the technical project being a solar-powered aircraft capable of flying for up to 60 days, and the STS project examining how the expansion of surveillance technology near the U.S.-Mexico border has disproportionately affected Latinx communities. Together, these projects explore how the development and deployment of surveillance technologies can blur the line between innovation that can be beneficial to defense and security and how it can harm certain communities.

My technical project focuses on the design of the Solar-Powered Autonomous Reconnaissance Craft (SPARC). SPARC is a fixed-wing, solar-powered aircraft intended for long-endurance missions such as environmental monitoring and surveillance. The project was motivated by the need to explore alternative energy systems suitable for flight. The aircraft is designed to be modular, adaptable, and capable of integrating different payloads based on mission profiles. By charging the plane during the daytime during flight, we are aiming for at least 60 days of continuous flight. Our project is just a starting line for solar-powered aviation at UVA, as we have designed everything from scratch. As a result, we were not able to go very far in experimental testing this year, only being able to do a winglet study and airfoil testing using the water and wind tunnels in the Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering building. However, we were able to finish a full CAD model of the plane during the spring semester. The SPARC project not only pushes forward solar-powered aviation, but also raises important questions about how aircraft like it can be used for surveillance purposes and the ethical concerns surrounding it.

In my STS research paper, I analyze how surveillance technologies deployed along the U.S.-Mexico border contribute to anti-Latinx discrimination, using Actor-Network Theory (ANT) as a framework. The paper explores the history of anti-Latinx discrimination within the U.S. and the history of different surveillance technologies used by law enforcement. I use ANT to understand how human actors, like Border Patrol agents, policymakers, and immigrants, and non-human actors, such as patrol vehicles, immigration checkpoints, and legal policies interact to form a network that reinforces racial profiling and civil liberties violations. Through case studies such as U.S. v. Brignoni-Ponce, U.S. v. Martinez-Fuerte, and Melendres v. Arpaio, I highlight how technologies intended for national security are often applied in discriminatory ways. The first two cases show how patrol vehicles and checkpoints may target Latinx drivers traveling on the Interstate Highway System and how the rulings affect where racial profiling may be enforced. The third case shows how local law enforcement can be biased against Latinx drivers and the dangers it presents to the Latinx community. All together, the result is a system where Latinx individuals are disproportionately surveilled, stopped, and detained just for their ethnicity and potential to be undocumented. ANT helps understand how these technologies interact within sociotechnical contexts to affect Latinx people living in the U.S.

Looking back on the year, both the technical and STS projects reached meaningful milestones and reflected strong growth from where the work originally began. The initial goal for the SPARC project was to build and fly a sub-scale remote control model of the aircraft during the spring semester. While the team wasn’t able to reach that stage, largely due to the complexity of designing a solar-powered aircraft, the majority of the work went into developing a detailed and thoughtful CAD model. This process still proved rewarding, especially as I was able to use prior summer research experience for experimental testing. The STS project also started from scratch this semester but quickly developed into a topic that was interesting to me and relevant today. The final paper successfully connected historical and present-day case studies to broader sociotechnical themes through a thorough meaningful analysis. Moving forward, future capstone teams working on the SPARC project may have the opportunity to build the sub-scale model and further refine the payload bay, which was a core part of the design we couldn’t fully develop. Future researchers interested in ethical concerns around surveillance could also examine case studies on advanced surveillance technology such as drone usage.

School of Engineering and Applied Science

Bachelor of Science in Aerospace Engineering

Technical Advisor: Aldo Gargiulo

STS Advisor: Kent Wayland

Technical Team Members: Miles Beam, Victoria Camacho, Michael Chou, Graham Guerette, Declan Long, Nathan Ong, Christopher Recupero, James Richard, Defne Savas, Adam Snyder, Muhammad Vasal