This is the second time in as many years that SGT has selected a GT-AE senior to receive this honor, which includes a $250 stipend. Last year,Amanda Grubb received the 2014 Outstanding Undergraduate Award. She is currently pursuing her doctorate in aerospace engineering at Georgia Tech.

A native of Overland Park, KS, Bottoms was recently accepted into a graduate program focusing on bio-astronautic engineering for human spaceflight at the University of Colorado. Over the summer, she plans to work on a NASA rocket in Houston, TX, where she has accepted a job with Boeing.

"Eventually, yes, I would like to be an astronaut, so I am doing everything to make that possible -- applying to the astronaut corps and taking the right career steps," she said.

"If that doesn't work out, I will still be doing something that I'm interested in."

During the last two years Bottoms has conducted research with GT-AE's Dr. Robert Braun - first, on the supersonic inflatable decelerator, and, more recently, on the thermal analysis of small re-entry devices that record break-up data.