Co-CEO of EMA, we simulate lightning, arcs, plasma and EMC for aerospace, autos, and semis, and build Physics-AI on models that match real-world tests. Denver.
Greater Denver, CO
Joined October 2024
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That's a wrap on #ICOLSE2026! Great week in Charleston with people at the top of their fields. Day 3 highlight: SpaceX keynote Nick Christensen on EMA's lightning testing support for Starship. Thanks to everyone who made it happen!
Tim McDonald retweeted
The LI-900 silica tiles used on the Space Shuttle were such poor heat conductors you could grab them with bare hands seconds after pulling them from a 2200 degree oven. Source: bit.ly/2I7k683
What if you could set up an EM simulation just by describing it?
Nov 18, 1pm ET: watch EMA3D Connect Plus agents set up a PCB EMC study and a Maxwell to Charge Plus magnetron plasma run, live.
Register: events.gov.teams.microsoft.u…
Tim McDonald retweeted
America’s capital markets are an underrated strategic weapon.
Anduril CEO Brian Schimpf on turning that edge into a tool for national priorities:
"The US capital market structure is, it's not like it's 10% better than anyone else, it's like several thousand times better than anyone else. Like it is just wildly better."
"If you're leaning into that and saying, 'Hey, we actually have great capital allocators that know how to underwrite companies and lean in on these things.' Great, let's just use the capital stack in a way that is aligned with national priorities around certain industries, certain capabilities, things like that."
"Where else could you finance $200 billion of data center investments with like basically no real revenue to show for it? Like it's crazy."
@SchimpfBrian @eriktorenberg
EMA3D Charge part 4: seed electrons. The electrons that start a discharge avalanche matter in the lab and in simulation. Charge Plus computes them with surface emission models, so the electron supply tracks the computed surface field and the applied waveform. #EMA3D
EMA3D Charge part 5: plasma chemistry. Getting the right answer depends on the reactions. In PIC they run through Monte Carlo cross sections, and N2 alone needs 72 of them. EMA can help you pin those down, and Charge Plus has a reusable plasma library. #EMA3D
EMA3D Charge part 4: seed electrons. The electrons that start a discharge avalanche matter in the lab and in simulation. Charge Plus computes them with surface emission models, so the electron supply tracks the computed surface field and the applied waveform. #EMA3D
EMA3D Charge part 5: plasma chemistry. Getting the right answer depends on the reactions. In PIC they run through Monte Carlo cross sections, and N2 alone needs 72 of them. EMA can help you pin those down, and Charge Plus has a reusable plasma library. #EMA3D
Tim McDonald retweeted
Christian McCaffrey's grandpa was the fastest man on Earth, and at the 1960 Olympics he was quietly helping the CIA try to flip a Soviet athlete.
That's the family tree behind this jersey swap, and the rest of it is even better.
His name was Dave Sime. He showed up at Duke on a baseball scholarship as a premed kid, taught himself to sprint by reading every track book in the library, and in 1956 he tied the world record in the 100-yard dash. Sports Illustrated called him the world's fastest human and put him on the cover.
At the Rome Olympics he lost the 100 meters in a photo finish and took silver. On that same trip he was working on getting a Soviet long jumper to defect.
Pro baseball teams wanted him and the Detroit Lions drafted him, but he went to med school and spent his career in Miami doing more than 10,000 eye surgeries.
Then his youngest daughter Lisa went to Stanford to play soccer and fell for a wide receiver named Ed McCaffrey. Ed played 13 years in the NFL and won three Super Bowls, the first one with the 49ers.
Ed and Lisa had four boys, and all four played big-time college football. Max played receiver at Duke, the same school where his grandpa set records. Christian was the Heisman runner-up at Stanford. Dylan played QB at Michigan. Luke, the youngest, was a quarterback at Nebraska who transferred to Rice, switched to receiver, and got drafted 100th overall in 2024.
Three of them made the NFL. Christian had played with or against every brother except Luke, which is why he said going into Monday that this game would complete the cycle.
Luke has one thing on his famous brother too. He ran a 4.47 forty at the 2024 combine, and Christian ran a 4.48 back in 2017. So the fastest McCaffrey brother, by one hundredth of a second, is the kid who spent most of college playing quarterback.
The 49ers won 23-17 and Christian punched in two touchdowns. After the whistle Luke was already out of his Commanders jersey while Christian pulled off the one with the captain's C.
The man who said no to the Lions ended up grandpa to three NFL players. He died in January 2016, before any of them had played a down.
Tim McDonald retweeted
I just blind signed my tax returns without reading them.
I checked a box saying I read them, but I really didn’t.
On this glorious day we are all Donald Rumsfeld.
Tim McDonald retweeted
It's embarrassing to admit that I grew up with Adam West Batman reruns in the 1980s and as a kid thought the show was funny but embarrassing & corny. Now I find it completely delightful & realize the writers knew exactly what they were doing.
Tim McDonald retweeted
Colorado has something awesome called the Taxpayer Bill of Rights. Among other things, it protects a simple principle: everyone pays the same state income-tax rate. If your income doubles, your tax doubles. Seems reasonable, right?
Amendment 87 would repeal that protection and nearly double the top marginal state tax rate while modestly reducing the lowest rates.
Under the new rules, doubling your taxable income could mean a state income-tax bill nearly four times what you’d owe on your current income today.
To me, this looks like a blatant attempt to buy votes: the majority votes themselves a tax break funded by much higher taxes on a small minority.
And it hits startups especially hard. Founders and early employees often spend years building something before receiving a substantial payoff from selling their shares after an IPO or in an acquisition. A decade of work with no guarantee of success can produce a payout counted as income in a single year—and taxed at much higher rates.
I’ve spent a decade building Boom in Colorado, on track to create hundreds of high-paying jobs. Colorado’s tax fairness was one reason I chose to build here. Now voters are being asked to change those rules and take a much larger share of a potential taxable payoff from that work.
Should I have built Boom in Texas, which has no state personal income tax? Should the next ambitious founder choose Colorado or somewhere else?
Colorado is at a crossroads. Do we want to stay true to our OG spirit of rugged independence, freedom, and fairness—or make Colorado a less attractive place to build?
Punishing success is morally wrong and bad policy to boot. We should be celebrating the people who build new things and create new wealth for themselves and others. Their work gives us companies, products, and jobs.
Let’s keep Colorado as one of the best places to live, build, create, and innovate—and to enjoy the rewards of our hard-fought efforts.
I’m voting no on Amendment 87.