CI-XP Student Presentations at the Envision Center
The Rosen Center for Advanced Computing (RCAC) recently hosted its annual CI-XP Student Program Lightning Talks, giving RCAC students a chance to showcase their projects and accomplishments to peers and staff within the organization.
The CI-XP (Cyber Infrastructure-eXPerience) 
Student Program provides work opportunities and an authentic workplace experience for students with the goal of enhancing education through the development of professional skills, responsibilities, habits, attitudes, self-confidence, and self-development. The program comprises graduate and undergraduate student workers in RCAC, the Envision Center, the Scientific Solutions Group, and the Anvil REU programs. RCAC staff serve as mentors to the students.
During the 2025 CI-XP Lightning Talks event, 36 students gave two- to four-minute presentations highlighting their projects and what they’ve learned throughout the school year. Each student gave a brief overview of themselves: their background, course of study, likes and dislikes, and plans after graduation. They then moved on to their accomplishments and takeaways from working at RCAC.
“Being part of the CI-XP program has been an amazing experience,” says Vivek Karunai Kiri Ragavan, a CI-XP program graduate who successfully defended his Master’s thesis based on his work on the Anvil supercomputer at RCAC. “I got to work on exciting projects like AnvilGPT and the Purdue GenAI Studio, where we focused on building scalable AI inference systems within the Kubernetes ecosystem. Presenting at the Lightning Talks was a great chance to share my work and learn about the incredible projects my peers have been contributing to. I’m thankful for the mentorship and the real-world experience I’ve gained. RCAC has helped me grow so much, both technically and professionally, and I will take those lessons with me wherever I go.”
The range of projects the CI-XP students worked on was impressive, with very few seeing any overlap. Some students helped to develop and improve different aspects of the Envision Center’s virtual learning programs, including the newly created Collab XR platform. Others worked alongside our Research Software Engineers and high-performance computing (HPC) experts on a variety of hardware- and software-based HPC projects. A few of the students’ projects even related to Anvil, our nationally-allocated HPC resource and one of Purdue’s most powerful supercomputers. But a unique characteristic that all the CI-XP projects have in common is that they are not just for show, as is often the case with “practice projects” given to students. The work that the CI-XP students conduct is implemented into RCAC systems and utilized by our users. No matter which domain the students work in—VR, HPC, or even communications—their efforts help to advance the organization as a whole, an aspect that truly offers them an authentic workplace experience.
“It’s so great to see all of the different projects from students across the CI-XP program,” says Laura Theademan, the Director of Center Operations and Visualization at RCAC. “The annual Lightning Talks give everyone an opportunity to learn about the amazing work these students do and helps to reaffirm why this program is special. It is definitely one of my favorite events we host each year.”
After presenting, students who are graduating this semester were recognized by their mentors. This year saw 11 total graduates from the CI-XP program. Seniors completing undergraduate degrees and students completing graduate-level programs were among the group. RCAC was thrilled to hear the impact the CI-XP program made on their educational journey and wishes these students all the best as they move forward in their lives and careers.
“To all of the graduating CI-XP students, we would like to thank you for your hard work and dedication while at RCAC,” says Theademan. “We have enjoyed seeing each of you learn and grow throughout your time in the program, and cannot begin to express our appreciation for the many wonderful contributions you’ve made along the way. Good luck to you all—we know you’re going to do great!”
To learn more about the CI-XP program or to apply for a student position at RCAC, please visit: https://www.rcac.purdue.edu/ci-xp
Written by: Jonathan Poole, poole43@purdue.edu