User:Lgv4

About Me

My name is Loukianos Varsamis. Before coming to Duke, I lived in Houston, TX. While I am a born American citizen, my first language is Greek. I like long walks on the beach, pina coladas, and getting caught in the rain. I also like physics. I currently plan to double major in biomedical engineering and physics.

Name Pronunciation

There are a few different relevant pronunciations of my name. My full name, Loukianos Georgios Varsamis, can be said in both English and Greek, and it changes slightly. The English way is phonetically as follows: loo-key-AH-noess gee-OR-geos ver-SAUM-us. The Greek way is low-keya-NOS yiOR-gos ver-SAUM-us.

Generally, I go by Luke Varsamis. Luke (like Duke) ver-SAUM-us.

Grand Engineering Challenges

Here is an interview on the feasibility of space-based solar power, from the grand engineering challenges page:

• Interview with William Maness, Lee Billings, Seed Magazine, published 28 July 2009, accessed 8 September 2012 (Making Solar Power Economical)

MATLAB presentations

I particularly enjoyed the Traveling Salesman demo, as it seemed immediately useful and very quickly accomplishes a task (finding the shortest distance through a number of cities) that would otherwise take a lot of time and effort.