From Classroom to Published Researcher: How Sam Vinson Made the Most of Biological Engineering

Sam Vinson is graduating this May from the U of A with two majors - biological engineering and Spanish - three minors, a Walmart internship and something most engineers don't accomplish before they receive their diploma: a first-author publication in a peer-reviewed journal. 

None of it was the plan when he arrived on campus.

"Biological engineering was absolutely not on my radar," Vinson said. "I was actually going to study electrical engineering or computer science."

What changed his mind was a First-Year Engineering program information session, the same one that has steered so many students into the department. For Vinson, it wasn't just the content that resonated. It was the sense of purpose behind it and a personal connection he hadn't expected to find in an engineering major.

Growing up visiting his grandparents' cattle farm in Siloam Springs, he spent countless hours outdoors, developing a love for living systems and the natural world. At the same time, he was always drawn to programming and technology. When the biological engineering information session highlighted sustainable water, food, energy and agricultural systems, he saw a way to bring both worlds together.

"I wanted to make a positive impact with my career, and biological engineering seemed like the perfect way to do that," Vinson said.

Once in the department, its open-door culture made him feel at home quickly. "I realized I could email almost any professor and get a meeting," he said. "They would always be willing to guide me in the right direction. That made a big difference early on."

Vinson threw himself into the Biological Engineering Student Club from his first semester, building relationships with classmates and older students that he credits as foundational. Over the years, he served in various positions in the student club. He helped organize career fair prep workshops, resume coaching and company visits designed to connect first-year students with industry professionals.

His most defining experience, though, came in the lab. Midway through his sophomore year, Vinson met with faculty to explore research opportunities. He was pointed toward Dongyi Wang, an assistant professor in the Biological and Agricultural Engineering Department, whose lab was working on a USDA-funded project that turned out to be a natural fit, using artificial intelligence and computer vision to automate beef grading.

"I already had experience in programming and wanted to apply it to biological systems," Vinson said. "And it tied back to the great memories I had spending time on my grandparents' cattle farm."

The work tackled a real industry challenge. In the U.S., beef must be USDA graded either USDA Prime, USDA Choice or USDA Select, based on fat marbling, a process traditionally done by human inspectors. Computer vision models offer an automated alternative but tend to fail when moved between facilities due to environmental differences. Vinson's research with Wang's lab applied unsupervised domain adaptation to solve that problem, training a model to generalize across facilities the way a person learns a new language through immersion rather than a textbook.

"My host mom in Mexico during my study abroad trip only spoke Spanish, so since I needed to communicate with her, I had to speak her language," he said. "The model works the same way. It learns core patterns in one facility, then adjusts those skills to a new environment instead of relearning everything from scratch."

The path to publication wasn't straightforward, as Vinson spent months working through the editor's revisions to the paper while juggling his coursework. Throughout it all, Wang's mentorship kept him on track.

"He always somehow knows how to guide you in the right direction," Vinson said. "He's super supportive. It made me want to work hard for him because I didn't want to disappoint him."

On Feb. 3, 2026, the paper was accepted for publication in the Journal of the American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers, with Vinson listed as the first author.

"It is a super rewarding experience to come up with something original and have it be successful," Vinson said.

That research experience opened the door to his internship with Walmart, where he worked as a quality engineer analyzing logistics in the rollout of an automated robotic system at a distribution center in Searcy. This summer, he returns to Walmart for another internship in Lancaster, Texas, as an operations manager, a deliberate step toward the Master of Business Administration program he'll begin at the Sam M. Walton College of Business in August.

U of A Biological and Agricultural Engineering Department head, Terry Howell Jr., said Vinson made the most of every opportunity during his time in the department and is leaving well-prepared.

"Sam is the first sophomore that I met when I arrived in the fall of 2023. He made an incredible impression on me. It has been a treat to see him execute this complicated plan to complete these majors and minors, all while serving other students and becoming an accomplished researcher," Howell said.

For students considering the major, Vinson's advice is straightforward.

"Don't feel afraid to try biological engineering," he said. "Our major reaches across multiple different sectors in food, water and energy, and we learn to become highly effective communicators. There's more stability in that in the long term than people realize."

He came to the U of A as a self-described "hardcore engineering and math" student who struggled to carry on a conversation about anything else. Four years later, he's a published researcher, a student leader, a Spanish speaker and a person who can, as he puts it, "strike up a conversation with anybody about anything."

That transformation, he says, is what the department gave him.

"The potential for growth here is unmatched because there's so much support around you," Vinson said. "If you can take advantage of it, you can get to the moon."