About Urban Mining Co.
There is no company like Urban Mining Co. (UMC) in the Western Hemisphere.
UMC is a leading US producer of Rare Earth based magnetic materials, used in a range of everyday applications including automotive, electronics, renewable energy and air conditioning sectors. UMC is a young company with a strong R&D focus. Current R&D activities include setting up a magnet manufacturing plant in San Marcos, Texas. This plant will manufacture NdFeB-based permanent magnetic materials using a proprietary recycling technique producing high performance magnetic materials without the environmental penalty typically associated with these materials. Until the manufacturing plant’s completion, we will be operating in a temporary facility in Austin that is predominantly used for laboratory work such as materials characterization and analysis. We also have a machine shop where we build components and prototypes, and modify existing pieces of equipment. In conjunction with these R&D, and manufacturing activities, UMC is also very active in the computer science and computer engineering spaces. From software design and implementation to automation, the intersection between technology and manufacturing is key to our business.
Below are sample projects that interns can get involved in, broken down by discipline. Please contact us for more information about any of these. Please Note: the candidate does not need to be able to perform all of the tasks in this list.
What We Are Looking For — Computer Science & Computer Engineering
We are looking for students from the Computer Science and Computer Engineering departments to conduct internships at our company. The tasks span multiple areas of computer science and are chosen together with the interns to best benefit them. Some of the tasks include:
– Programming in PHP to develop web interfaces that communicate with MySQL databases for storing, retrieving, searching, filtering, updating, and deleting data; basic knowledge of HTML and CSS is required here as well; JavaScript and JQuery is a plus.
– Programming in Python or Perl to write various scripts that take data from text or xml files and store it in MySQL databases; basic knowledge of pattern matching and regular expressions is required here.
– Setting up a local search engine (Lucene-based or equivalent) on an Ubuntu platform, and program necessary changes in Java to improve the functionality of the search engine; background in natural language processing, information retrieval, and text mining is a plus.
– Setting up a network infrastructure and optimizing existing installations, writing scripts on both Windows and Unix-based machines to automate various processes, including sending files between computers.
What We Are Looking For – Materials Science & Engineering
UMC is also looking for motivated students from materials science and other engineering disciplines to participate in internship opportunities at UMC. As UMC is involved in the manufacture of high tech materials, requiring a high degree of process control during manufacture, there are a number of potential areas for motivated students to expand their experience and skills. Current areas include:
– Microstructural studies and investigation into metallic systems, this will require the preparation of metallographic samples and the use of SEM analysis.
– Analysis of trace metal contamination in process material; this will require the use of a range of analytical analysis equipment.
– Measurement and assistance with developing magnetic composites; this will require the use of magnetic characterization equipment and the use of resins/ polymers.
– Evaluating a novel 3D printing technology for the rapid prototyping of magnetic circuits.
Students engaged in these projects will get hands-on experience working in a true, cutting edge R&D environment that might include learning how to run a variety of sophisticated analytical instruments ranging from: inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectroscopy (ICP), scanning electron microscope (SEM/FIB), elemental analyzer, mass spectrometer, and particle size analyzer. In addition, interns will be part of and observe firsthand the working relationship between cutting edge scientists, and a variety of engineers. This will provide valuable future technical skills needed to operate within such environment or to become technical entrepreneur.
If you have questions or would like to apply for a position, please contact Michele Leonelli at michele@urbanminingco.com!
“Urban Mining Company seeks to foster an open environment where interns are free to creatively problem solve a variety of challenges. Their interns are assigned to tasks where they gain experience with different industrial-level technical equipment and form connections with people from a range of academic backgrounds and roles, all while learning about the inner workings of a startup. As an intern, I learned the ins and outs of centrifugal disk finishing and applied my new knowledge to better remove magnet surface coatings. I had many opportunities to run experiments, communicate with subject matter experts from other companies, and professionally present my results. Urban Mining Company loves the fresh energy and unique perspective that interns bring them!”
-former BDP intern at UMC
