Curriculum Vitae

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About

I am a research software engineer who is interested in extending current research capabilities with computational methods. I am currently an engineer in The AI Institute’s Robot API Development team. In personal time, I explore physical concepts through open-source software development.

Professional Experience

The AI Institute

Software Engineer: February 2024 — Present

  • Designed and developed motion planning and execution framework within ROS 2
  • Designed and developed kinematics & dynamics solvers, and inverse-dynamics impedance controller within the ros2_control framework

NASA Johnson Space Center

Integrated GN&C Analyst: July 2021 — January 2024

  • FTE in July 2021; supported Orion’s Launch Abort System GN&C development, analysis, verification
  • Integrated flexible structure model with linear and nonlinear simulation frameworks (MATLAB, C++)
  • Frequent dynamical studies through large-scale monte-carlo simulations; 150 pages of technical reports written in 2022
  • Used linear analysis to analyze vehicle performance, verify stability margins; validates linear models
  • Served as backup regression data approver for simulated Orion Launch Abort System performance
  • Led development for polarity tests; created novel \(6\)DOF kinematics simulation (Julia, Python); represented Orion GN&C at multiple lab tests in three states: Texas, Colorado, Florida
  • Developed LaTeX packages and classes to improve technical writing workflows
  • Cooperative internships across avionics, flight operations, and flight dynamics groups: 2017 — 2020

Space Systems Laboratory

Graduate Research Assistant: August 2019 — May 2021

  • Led core robot software development (C++, Orocos, ROS, CAN) as Graduate Assistant under Dr. Dave Akin
  • Developed novel Julia package to generate symbolic manipulator kinematics models; implemented and merged required changes to Symbolics.jl; intermediate Jacobian performance substantially improved over Orocos iterative solvers; implemented improved inverse-kinematics algorithm
  • Created C++ interfaces (templates) and implementations for control, including force/torque control
  • Maintained operator GUI (Python); diver for Neutral Buoyancy Research Facility Maintenance
  • Undergraduate research assistant: 2017 — 2019

Harris Corporation

Electrical Engineering Intern: May 2016 — August 2016

  • Implemented rain attenuation ITU Propagation Model components; MATLAB functions written to implement model calculations, C# used to gather terrain data
  • Developed VBA workflows for automatic data processing procedures

SRI International

Data Annotation Intern: May 2015 — December 2015

  • Annotated images and videos for deep learning research applications
  • Designed LED Array and circuit layouts for gaze tracking project using Eagle CAD

Education

M.S. Aerospace Engineering

University of Maryland, College Park

  • Research assistant under Dr. Akin; space robotics (manipulator) software lead, primary operator
  • Halo orbit & invariant-manifold research project with Instructor Barbee; now open source
  • Research emphasis in space robotics systems, prioritized dynamics & controls in coursework

B.S. Electrical Engineering

University of Maryland, College Park

  • Four control theory courses, four computer science courses; major emphasis in control theory
  • Undergraduate Research Assistant under Dr. Akin at SSL; ROS/Orocos software lead in third year
  • Implemented inertial and viscous friction compensation for SSL’s MGA Exoskeleton (Galil, UART)

Open Source Software

Nonlinear Dynamics

GeneralAstrodynamics.jl

  • Metapackage for three sub-packages; provides general calculations, visualizations, halo orbit solvers, and invariant manifold solvers
  • Models are integrated with the SciML Julia ecosystem
  • Presented at JuliaCon 2021: Going to Jupiter with Julia
  • Hosted in the JuliaAstro GitHub organization

EphemerisSources.jl

GalacticPotentials.jl

  • Provides select scalar potential field equations commonly used in galactic dynamics research
  • Models are integrated with the SciML Julia ecosystem
  • Selected potentials are ported from two popular galactic dynamics Python packages: gala and galpy

PolynomialGTM.jl

  • Provides approximate polynomial model for longitudinal flight dynamics of a passenger plane
  • Model is integrated with the SciML Julia ecosystem
  • Model equations are sourced from a nonlinear dynamics publication by Chakraborty, Seiler, and Balas (2011)

Utilities

DocumenterQuarto.jl

CommonLicenses.jl

  • Provides commonly-used licenses within Julia for use in interactive notebooks, and scripts

rich-admonitions

  • Extends rich (Python) with callout or admonition blocks

module-hygiene

  • Provides an __export__ key for namespace hygiene in Python

block-scopes

  • Allows for local or block scoping in Python through the with keyword

Publications

Journal of Open Source Software

EphemerisSources.jl: Idiomatic Ephemeris Sourcing and Parsing in Julia

First Author: Published October 10th, 2024

  • Describes four independently published Julia packages, and the EphemerisSources.jl metapackage
  • Provides ephemeris sourcing and parsing utilities for interacting with common solar system ephemeris platforms

ArXiv

Advancing The Robotics Software Development Experience: Bridging Julia’s Performance and Python’s Ecosystem

Second Author: Submitted June 6th, 2024

  • Describes contributions to the use of Julia for robot teleoperation in The AI Institute
  • Accompanying poster presentation at ICRA 2024

References

Chakraborty, Abhijit, Peter Seiler, and Gary J Balas. 2011. “Nonlinear Region of Attraction Analysis for Flight Control Verification and Validation.” Control Engineering Practice 19 (4): 335–45.