At the booth, members explained what the club builds and how they and test aerial robots, including blimps and drones, for both research and competition.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Peng said the Defend the Republic competition reminds her of Quidditch from the \u201cHarry Potter\u201d series, which is like \u201cplaying a real-life video game.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/Screenshot-2025-10-29-at-9.29.37-PM.jpg\")
A student works on one of the drones built by Lehigh\u2019s Aerial Swarms Club. The club brings together undergraduate and graduate students to research, design and test aerial robots. (Courtesy of Diego Fernando)<\/p>\n
Collaboration between graduate and undergraduate students is central to the club. Peng said she learned that many projects are inspired by Ph.D. student-led research in Lehigh\u2019s Swarm Lab.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Undergraduate members often test and adapt those ideas through design and flight experiments, gaining hands-on experience that connects academic research with real engineering practice.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cEveryone can come to learn new skills or listen in on the Ph.D. students\u2019 research,\u201d Peng said. \u201cOur goal isn\u2019t for everyone to have a lot of experience. We just want people to be interested in our club.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jiawei Xu, \u201825G, a former club mentor, said the group benefits from its diverse student backgrounds.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Xu said every member of the club contributes to one part of the project, so communication is key between members.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Diego Fernando Salazar D\u2019Antonio, \u201825G, another former mentor, compared the club to a small company where members from different disciplines work toward a shared goal.<\/p>\n
\u201cEveryone learns how to work together, connect with others and develop both soft and hard skills,\u201d D\u2019Antonio said. \u201cThe hard skills come from coding and soldering, while the soft skills come from communication and teamwork.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
He said developing these skills helps students think differently and prepares them for their future careers. During his time as a mentor he advised about 20 students, many of whom later pursued Ph.D. programs or worked at robotics companies.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Xu said students should take initiative in their education through both classes and the club.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe things you can learn from projects or materials in class are always limited,\u201d Xu said. \u201cIf you want to make a real contribution to your own growth or to the club\u2019s growth, you have to be proactive and do research on your own.\u201d<\/p>\n
The club has faced challenges in past competitions. In the week leading up to the 2022 Defend the Republic competition at George Mason University, members discovered that the blimp\u2019s mylar \u2014 the polyester film material used for its body \u2014 was broken and could no longer hold its structure.<\/p>\n
In the following years, members shifted their approach and rethought their strategy. This past November, the club won the Defend the Republic competition, and members were invited to President Joseph Helble\u2019s house for a celebratory dinner.<\/p>\n
Xu said that moment captured the essence of the club \u2014 students from different generations learning, contributing to the blimp projects and helping each other grow technically and organizationally.<\/p>\n
Peng said she loves supporting the club, learning from the difficulties and successes of the group and teaching new members about robotics and drones.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re building everything from scratch, and it\u2019s a great community where everyone can get involved,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Every Friday, students gather at Building C on Mountaintop Campus to plan experiments and fly aerial robots.\u00a0 For…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":21076,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[153,155,154,5400,1197],"class_list":["post-21075","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-bethlehem","tag-bethlehem","tag-bethlehem-headlines","tag-bethlehem-news","tag-clubs","tag-feature"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21075","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21075"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21075\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21076"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21075"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21075"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21075"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}