Clay Swackhamer

Experience

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  Lennilea Farm

  Jan 2008 - Jan 2011

  Farm Employee

  - Hay production- Operated Massey Ferguson 285 with tedder and rake

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  Penn State University

  Aug 2012 - Nov 2013

  - Quantified impact of feedstock variables on performance and product quality of small-scale biomass pelletizer- Presented research poster at Penn State undergraduate research exposition, won third place in engineering division- Presented research poster at Northeast Agricultural and Biological Engineering Conference (NABEC), summer 2013- Co-authored, "Farm Scale Biomass Pelletizer Performance for Switchgrass Pellet Prodution. 2015. Applied Engineering in Agriculture. 31(4): 559-567 (doi: 10.13031/aea.31.1083). Show less

  • Air Blast Sprayer Technician, Department of Pesticide Education

    May 2013 - Nov 2013

  • Undergraduate Researcher, Department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering

    Aug 2012 - Jun 2013
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  IGEM

  May 2014 - Oct 2014

  Undergraduate Researcher: Penn State iGEM team

  - Wrote original MATLAB scripts to redesign genes for fluorescent protein at codon level- Carried out bench level microbial cloning, restriction digests, and PCR- Presented at iGEM conference- Our team received the gold medal from independent panel of judges

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  McCormick & Company

  May 2015 - Aug 2015

  Intern, Materials Process Engineering Group

  - Measured physical properties of dry seasoning mixes (gravy mixes, taco seasoning, steak seasonings) using 5 instruments in food powder technology platform- Determined powder flowability and compaction properties- Quantified link between blend time and product bulk density- Helped create plan to achieve $160,000 annual cost savings by reducing overblending, which can increase product bulk density and lead to overfill losses- Collaborated with McCormick engineers in 3 countries

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  Penn State University

  Aug 2015 - Dec 2015

  Teaching Intern, Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering

  - Teaching intern for course BE 301: Mathematical Modeling of Biological and Physical Systems- Held weekly office hours- Ran review sessions and helped troubleshoot student MATLAB code

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  LignoLink, INC.

  Jan 2016 - Aug 2016

  Engineering Intern

  - Conducted aqueous ammonia pretreatment and enzymatic hydrolysis reactions on 98 biomass samples (corn stover)- Designed, constructed, and validated High Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC) assay for 5 sugar monomers in hydrolyzed biomass samples- HPLC development included equipment selection, purchase, installation, calibration, and development of semi-automated data analysis routine using MATLAB- Created the first logo and website for a faculty-led startup company, funded by the National Science Foundation-Small Business Innovation Research (NSF-SBIR) program Show less

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  UC Davis

  Sept 2018 - Mar 2022

  - PhD student in Food Engineering Laboratory supervised by Dr. Gail Bornhorst- Identified and quantified mechanisms of food structural breakdown during mastication and digestion (fracture and erosion)- Created 4 standardized, model solid foods using whey protein hydrogels- Determined how the mechanical properties of solid foods influence their breakdown during digestion (in a nutshell, particles that are too strong to fracture can only break down by erosion, until they get soft enough to break into pieces)- Used Arduino and Raspberry pi to automate data collection and control process variables of the Human Gastric Simulator, a dynamic, in-vitro model of gastric digestion (aka robot stomach)- Applications of this work could be the design of foods with controllable release of nutrients or drugs- Built a multiphysics Computational Fluid Dynamics simulation for the fluid flow inside a digestion simulator, then experimentally validated it using optical particle tracking Show less - Responsible for two lab sections every academic quarter (ca. 22 students each)- Served as a teaching assistant for 9 quarters working with about 400 students in total- Taught basics of circuit building using Arduino and Raspberry Pi-Topics included circuit prototyping on breadboards, writing Arduino and python code, interfacing with analog devices, and troubleshooting circuits using a multimeter- Built circuits to interface with sensors measuring temperature, weight, light, moisture, color, humidity, dust level, carbon dioxide concentration, pH, and water flow rate- Built circuits to interface with devices such as servo motors, DC motors, solenoid valves, Raspberry Pi camera- Taught engineering design topics including the iterative process of design, prototyping, decision matrices, and effective presentation techniques- Directly advised ca. 90 student teams as they created original design projects- Participated in the emergency transition of this highly hands-on course to remote teaching in the spring of 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic. Helped conduct research on student learning outcomes. Published peer-reviewed paper on our findings at the American Society of Engineering Education conference and won the best paper award in the division. Show less

  • Graduate Student Researcher

    Sept 2016 - Mar 2022

  • Teaching Assistant for ENG 3: Introduction to Engineering Design

    Mar 2019 - Feb 2022

  • Teaching Assistant for EBS 1: Foundations of Biological Systems Engineering

    Sept 2018 - Dec 2018
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  Purdue Food Science

  Aug 2022 - Mar 2025

  Postdoctoral Researcher

  I was a postdoc at Purdue in the department of Food Science supervised by Dr. Bruce Hamaker. Our project is investigating the effect of dietary fiber structure on the taxonomic composition of the gut microbiome. My funding is from a 2-year postdoctoral fellowship through USDA-NIFA.

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  Oregon State University

  Mar 2025 - now

  Research Associate

  Currently working in the lab of Dr. Dave Dallas (https://health.oregonstate.edu/research/dallas-lab) to use in vitro models of digestion to study the biology of milk and its behavior in the gastrointestinal system. Here are two research questions that I'm particularly interested in:What is the effect of different processing technologies (such as holder pasteurization as compared to treatment with UV light or HPP processing) on the bioactive components of milk?How do glycans in milk promote or inhibit certain types of microorganisms in the gut? Can mathematical models (like the more "mechanistic" consumer-resource models, or more "black box" AI models) be used to better understand and even predict these effects on the microbiome? Show less