News Archive January 2017 Dr. Akella was elected as an IEEE Distinguished Lecturer. Congratulations Dr. Akella! http://www.ae.utexas.edu/news/1168-akella-ieee-distinguished-lecturer November 2016 NASA Deputy Administrator Dr. Dava Newman visited the CDUS group in the AutoGNC Lab. October 2015 Dr. Akella describes one of the ongoing research projects on autonomous UAVs. Check out the department news! http://www.ae.utexas.edu/news/features/895-akella-uav-birds September 2015 Our former student Tyler Summers is now Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering at UT Dallas. Congratulations Tyler! http://me.utdallas.edu/people/summers.html September 2015 Dr. Maruthi Akella has been promoted to full professor. Congratulations Dr. Akella! August 2015 We have a postdoc and new students. Francesco De Dilectis, Jack Thompson and Marco Gulino. Welcome! August 2015 Summer internship wrapup August 2015 Dr. Maruthi Akella has been selected to receive the IEEE Aerospace and Electronic Systems Society’s (AESS) Judith A. Resnik Space Award for the year 2015. He will receive a personalized bronze plaque and $2,000 honorarium this November in National Harbor, Maryland. Congratulations Dr. Akella! Maruthi Akella Wins IEEE Judith A. Resnik Award February 2015 Dr. Maruthi Akella was selected as an Outstanding Young Aerospace Engineer to the Texas A&M Aerospace Alumni Academy for 2015. He will be honored this May during the academy’s Aerospace Enginnering Annual Awards Banquet. Congratulations Dr. Akella! Maruthi Akella Named Texas A&M’s Outstanding Young Aerospace Engineer August 2014 We have new students. Emily Kollin, Kirsten Tuggle, and Marcelino Almedia. Welcome! August 2014 John Edwin Freeze and Jonathan Michael Ashley finish their MS. Congratulations John! July 2014 Sonia Hernandez successfully defends her PhD dissertation on the subject of low-thrust trajectory design techniques with a focus on maintaining constant energy. Congratulations Sonia! May 2014 Divya Thakur successfully defends her PhD dissertation on the subject of adaptation, gyro-free stabilization, and smooth angular velocity observers for attitude tracking control applications. Congratulations Divya! April 2014 Mikiko Okamoto successfully defends his PhD dissertation on the subject of novel Potential function-based control schemes for non-holonomic multi-agent systems to prevent the local minimum problem. Congratulations Makiko! January 2014 Dr. Maruthi Akella was elected fellow of the American Astronautical Society (AAS). Congratulations Dr. Akella! Maruthi Akella Elected Fellow of American Astronautical Society American Astronautical Society December 2013 Miki Szmuk finishes his MS. Congratulations Miki! November 2013 Dr. Maruthi Akella was selected to receive Mechnics & Control of Flight Award from the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA). An engraved medal and a certificate of citation will be presented to him at the AIAA Science and Technology Forum and Exposition in January 2014. Congratulations Dr. Akella! Maruthi Akella Awarded AIAA Mechanics and Control of Flight Award Mechanics & Control of Flight Award Recipients October 2013 Dr. Maruthi Akella and Miki Szmuk performed a field test with a quadcoptor and a rover to demonstrate the autonomous flight capability of UAVs, which will be used by NASA’s IceBridge program to collect environmental data in the Arctic and polar regions, including data on melting glaciers. Coordinated UAV Teams to Collect Data About Melting Glaciers Akella Research Group Field Test in the News October 2013 Kelley Hutchins wins the NASA Harriett G. Jenkins Graduate Fellowship. Her research proposal “Active/Adaptive Flexible Motion Controls with Aeroservoelastic System Uncertainties,” was accepted by her mentor, Dr. Chan-Gi Pak who works with the structural dynamics group at the NASA Dryden Flight Research Center, and after final review, she was selected to receive the fellowship. Congratulations Kelley! Kelley Hutchins Wins Prestigious Graduate Fellowship July 2013 Divya Thakur wins the John Breakwell Student Travel Award from the American Astronautical Society. She presented her research at the August 2013 Astrodynamics Specialist Conference in Hilton Head, SC. Congratulations Divya! Graduate Student Wins Breakwell Travel Award June 2013 Miki Szmuk passes his PhD written qualifying exams! May 2013 Kelley Hutchins passes her PhD oral qualifying exams! November 2012 Sonia Hernandez wins the John Breakwell Student Travel Award from the American Astronautical Society for her paper on planar rendezvous schemes through the Levi-Civita transformation. She will present the paper at the February 2013 Space Flight Mechanics Meeting in Kaui, HI. Congratulations Sonia! November 2012 Apurva Chunodkar successfully defends his PhD dissertation on the subject of switching observers, consensus management, and time-delayed control with applications to rigid-body attitude stabilization and tracking. He plans to assume the position of senior controls engineer with Cummins Research. Apurva: Congratulations & Good luck. November 2012 Miki Szmuk presents a paper at the 65th APS Meeting on Fluid Dynamics in San Diego, CA. The paper is based on our research work on unstart detection and filtering schemes with applications to the control of unstart in hypersonic inlets. November 2012 Prof. Akella presents an invited seminar at the Department of Aerospace Engineering, Texas A&M University. His seminar is on the topic of Lyapunov Strictification and Filter Embedment Techniques for Control of Agile Aerospace Systems. October 2012 Sugnpil Yang passes his PhD Oral Qualifying Exam! Good job Sungpil! September 2012 Divya Thakur and Sonia Hernandez win the prestigious Amelia-Earhart Fellowships. They are both featured on the ASE/EM Department website. August 2012 CDUS welcomes two new members – Jonathan Ashley and John Freeze. They come to Texas from North Carolina and will be starting their MS in Aerospace Engineering. August 2012 Travis Mercker presents paper on adaptive estimation and control subject to rotational misalignment uncertainties at the AIAA Guidance, Navigation, and Controls Conference in Minneapolis, MN. July 2012 New two-year long research grant from the Missile Defense Agency awarded – for work on collaborative and optimal sensor fusion schemes for automated ballistic missile tracking applications. June 2012 Apurva Chunodkar’s research on switched time-delay systems with applications to rigid-body attitude control presented at the AAS Jer-Nan Juang Astrodynamics Symposium. June 2012 Sonia Hernandez’s work on closed-loop guidance schemes for in-plane orbit transfers using Levi-Civita regularization presented at the AAS Jer-Nan Juang Astrodynamics Symposium. June 2012 Kelley Hutchins presents her research paper at the AIAA Fluid Dynamics Conference in New Orleans, LA on detection schemes and system identification for unstart in hypersonic inlets. June 2012 Congratulations to Sungpil Yang and Kelley Hutchins for successfully clearing the PhD Written Qualifying Exam. May 2012 Travis Mercker successfully defends his PhD dissertation. He is headed off to AFRL, Sensors Directorate to join their research staff. Goodbye and Good luck Travis!
