Jennifer Celeste, a mechanical engineering junior at Michigan Technological University, had barely encountered acoustics two years ago. She is now a 2026 Barry Goldwater Scholar whose research sits where acoustics meets artificial intelligence. Working in Professor Bhisham Sharma’s Mechanics, Acoustics and Dynamics Lab, she has presented at NOISE-CON and at the Acoustical Society of America meeting in Honolulu, and spent the summer of 2026 as an artificial intelligence research associate at NASA Langley Research Center, supported largely by the Michigan Space Grant Consortium. She is one of thirteen Michigan Tech students to have received the Goldwater Scholarship. Celeste plans to graduate a semester early, begin a doctorate at Michigan Tech, and eventually run a lab of her own.