Gaspar Montoya | Portfolio

Professional Career

Internships, research, and milestones during my college career.

July 2025 - Jan 2026

Student Senator For Howard Hughes College of Engineering - UNLV Student Body

Represented engineering students by advocating for funding, leadership opportunities, and greater involvement in research and campus organizations. Served on the Internal Affairs and University Initiatives committees to improve student government accountability and campus life.

Jan 2025 - Present

Undergraduate Research Assistant | Drone Systems & Robotics – Dr. Venki's Lab

Designed, built, and tested UAVs for wildfire research. Now developing LiDAR mapping with a Unitree Go2 quadruped and preparing two manuscripts for submission regarding my work with UAVs and quadrupeds.

View More About my Postion

August 2024 - May 2026

Engineering Peer Mentor – UNLV Howard Hughes College of Engineering

Led weekly Engineering 101 labs for 35 first-year students, guiding team projects, grading work, and providing support during office hours. Created workshops on Python, soldering, and resume writing to build technical and career skills.

Summer 2024

Computer Engineering Intern – NV Energy (Nevada's Power Company)

Built a Management of Change app used across 18 power plants with Power Apps, Power FX, SharePoint, and Outlook. Worked with plant engineers and technicians to improve change tracking and approvals, and gained field experience in welding and maintenance inspections.

August 2023 – June 2024

Event Coordinator - UNLV Satelite Club

Organized weekly school visits with a three-person engineering team, teaching space and physics concepts to groups of 30–40 students. Created presentations, 3D-printed CubeSat models, and hands-on rocket demonstrations.

Sept 2023 – June 2024

IT Assistant - UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law

Provided IT support to more than 400 students, faculty, and staff, resolving Wi-Fi, printing, and classroom technology issues. Prepared moot courtroom audio and video systems for mock trials and uploaded recordings to the cloud.

Personal Projects

Explore some of the engineering and software work I've done.

Hardware Projects

Embedded systems, circuits, and things I built with my hands.

Arduino SpiderBot prototype V1

Designed and programmed a spider robot using Arduino and stepper motors to navigate autonomously.

C++ Embedded 3D Printing View More

Autonomous Rover

Built and desinged an autonomous rover using an ATmega328PB and a Ultrasonic Sensor

C ATmega328PB DC Motors View More

High performance Custom PC

I built this custom white PC with a focus on clean cable management, s trong airflow, and quiet cooling. It uses a liquid-cooled system with multiple fans and is designed for high performance in gaming, multitasking, and future upgrades.

Hardware assembly Custom PC building Component compatibility planning View More

Overdrive Guitar Pedal

I designed and built a custom distortion pedal (overdrive), using resistors, capacitors, and a breadbaord. I tested live using my guitar.

LT Spice Software simulation Circuit Design View More

Arduino Radar System

I Built a radar system using an Arduino Mega and a micro servo motor. I used a UltraSonic sensor to detect nearby items.

Arduino Servor Motor UltraSonic Sensors View More

Teaching to Walk, Map, and Explore: quadruped robot

I’m developing a quadruped robot that uses reinforcement learning to walk, map, and explore autonomously while operating safely around people.

Mujoco Reinforcement Learning Walking Policy Human Safety View More

Software Projects

Machine learning models, computer vision, and data-driven work.

Handwritten Digit Recognition - Machine Learning Project

Built a Handwritting Recognition machine learning model using the MNIST Data set using tensorFlow.

Python TensorFlow OpenCV Numpy View More

Fruit Detection Model - Machine Learning Project

I developed a fruit detection model using my own data set with YOLO and PyTorch.

YOLO Pytorch Self-Made Data Set Python View More

Gaspar J. Montoya