Hello! I’m Aram Dergevorkian

I’m an Electronics Engineer at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Since August of 2021, I have been working on the Digital Backend Electronics for the MEM (Microwave Electrojet Magnetogram) instrument for the EZIE (The Electrojet Zeeman Imaging Explorer) mission as the Digital Backend Electronics Cognizant Engineer. I started my time at JPL in 2016 as an intern and was fortunate enough to be able to return several summers and continue to develop low power instrument control electronics into flight ready solutions. Upon finishing undergrad and being hired, I was proud to deliver the culmination of several year’s work in the form of a custom motor controller, and command and data handling system on the PREFIRE (Polar Radiant Energy in the Far-InfraRed Experiment) CubeSat as Motor Electronics Cognizant Engineer.

For the last two years, I’ve also been working as an independent contractor designing and setting up animatronic control systems for Artistic Entertainment Services for a number of their Rose Parade float entries. I also continue to consult with self-built (volunteer operated) entrants in the Rose Parade such as the La Cañada Flintridge Tournament of Roses Association where I volunteered from 2011 to 2019 and was responsible for the development of their new animation system, as well as the Cal Poly Rose Float which I worked on very briefly during my time at Cal Poly Pomona.

In late 2023, I joined the Los Angeles Live Steamers Railroad Museum. The railroad is unique in that it’s the only fully signal controlled scale railroad in the United States - as we like to point out: we’re a real railroad, just a small one. I enjoy repairing and upgrading signal infrastructure with friends, and, of course, operating scale trains! In addition to a few contributions to Signals 2.0, as we’re calling the new fully networked digital control system. I’m also working on a train defect detector, which I hope to make a post about once it’s developed a bit further.

From 2017 to 2018 I worked part time at Artistic Entertainment Services developing TwinkleWorks LED lighting products. The scope of my work also involved UL 508A industrial control panel work for various entertainment industry applications.

Though not a UCLA student at the time, I spent a summer, in addition to time part time during the schoolyear, working on UCLA’s ELFIN (Electron Loses and Fields Investigation) CubeSat from 2015 to 2016. As part of the communications subsystem team, I tested the spacecraft’s prototype and flight radios, performed antenna testing in the field, and aided in tests between spacecraft models and UCLA’s ground station.

A current resume can be found here.