My primary interest is floating ice systems - Jupiter's moon Europa and Earth's ice shelves. I am interested in how these environments work and how they may become habitable. I have chosen to focus on Europa because of its potential to have what other places may not have: a stable source of energy from tides that can power geological cycles over the lifetime of the solar system. At its most basic form, life is like a battery, depending upon redox reactions to move electrons. A planetary proxy for this is activity, whereby a planet recycles through geologic processes, and maintains chemical gradients of which life can take advantage. Without recycling, it is possible that even once habitable environments can become inhospitable. This is where terrestrial process analogs come into the picture - by studying how ice and water interact in environments on Earth we can better understand the surface indications of such on Europa (and other icy worlds). My work provides a framework by which to remotely understand planetary cryospheres and test hypotheses, until such time as subsurface characterization becomes possible by radar sounding, landed seismology, or one day, roving submersibles. Much work remains to correlate observations and models of terrestrial icy environments - excellent process analogs for the icy satellites - with planetary observations. I think about how to incorporate melting, hydrofracture, hydraulic flow, and now brine infiltration as process analogs into constructing models for the formation of Europa's geologic terrain and to study the implications for ice shell recycling and ice-ocean interactions. The inclusion of realistic analogs in our backyard-Earth's poles -using imaging and geophysical techniques is a common thread of this work, giving tangible ways to generate and test hypotheses relevant to environments on Earth and Europa. In the long term, I envision constructing systems-science level models of the Europan environment to understand its habitability and enable future exploration. I'm lucky to work with a talented group of students, post docs, and collaborators who share this vision and continue to make my life's passion, understanding the worlds around us, tenable.

Jonathan Rogers joined the Georgia Tech faculty in Fall 2013 as an Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering. Prior to joining Georgia Tech, he was an Assistant Professor of Aerospace Engineering at Texas A&M University from 2011 to 2013.

Dr. Rehg's research interests include computer vision, computer graphics, machine learning, robotics, and distributed computing. He co-directs the Computational Perception Laboratory (CPL) and is affiliated with the GVU Center, Aware Home Research Institute, and the Center for Experimental Research in Computer Science. In past years he has taught "Computer Vision" (CS 4495/7495) and "Introduction to Probabilistic Graphical Models" (CS 8803). He is currently teaching "Pattern Recognition" (CS 4803) and "Computer Graphics" (CS 4451). Dr. Rehg received the 2005 Raytheon Faculty Fellowship Award from the College of Computing. His paper with Ph.D. student Yushi Jing and collaborator Vladimir Pavlovic was the recipient of a Distinguished Student Paper Award at the 2005 International Conference on Machine Learning. Dr. Rehg currently serves on the Editorial Board of the International Journal of Computer Vision. He was the Short Courses Chair for the International Conference on Computer Vision (ICCV) in 2005 and the Workshops Chair for ICCV 2003. Dr. Rehg consults for several companies and has served as an expert witness. His research is funded by the NSF, DARPA, Intel Research, Microsoft Research, and the Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratories.

Note: Rehg recently moved to the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign as the Founder Professor of Computer Science and Industrial and Enterprise Systems Engineering.

Harish is an Assistant Professor in the School of Interactive Computing at Georgia Institute of Technology. He is also a core faculty member of Georgia Tech’s Institute for Robotics and Intelligent Machines (IRIM). His research interests span the areas of robot learning, human-robot interaction, and multi-agent systems. He directs the Structured Techniques for Algorithmic Robotics (STAR) Lab, where he and his team works on structured algorithms that help robots reliably operate and collaborate in unstructured environments alongside humans.

Dr. J.V.R. Prasad is a professor in the School of Daniel Guggenheim School of Aerospace Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology working in the area of flight mechanics and control. He received his B.Tech degree from the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras, India and his M.S and Ph.D. degrees from the Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, USA. He is currently a co-principal investigator and the associate director for the US Army, Navy and NASA sponsored Vertical Lift Rotorcraft Center of Excellence (VLRCOE) program at Georgia Tech. He has extensive research and design experience in rotorcraft system modeling and control, propulsion system modeling and control, and autonomous air vehicle modeling and control. He published parts of four books, sixty refereed journal papers, more than 250 conference papers and 80 research project reports. He has 18 invention disclosures and five patents to his credit. He is a recipient of the 2009 Melville Medal award from the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) and the 2015 Aero Lion Technologies Outstanding Journal Paper award from the International Journal of Unmanned Systems. He served as the editor-in-chief of the Journal of the American Helicopter Society (AHS), chair of the Handling Qualities and UAV Tech Committees of the AHS, and as member and secretary of the Atmospheric. Flight Mechanics Technical Committee of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA). He currently serves as a member of the editorial board for the International Journal on Mathematical Modeling and Simulation and the advisory board for the International Journal of Unmanned Systems. He is a Fellow of the AIAA, a Technical Fellow of the AHS and a member of the ASME.

Prof. Pradalier is Associate Professor at GeorgiaTech Lorraine, the French campus of the Georgia Institute of Technology (a.k.a. GeorgiaTech) since September 2012. He defended his “Habilitation à Diriger des Recherches” (Authority to Supervise Research) in 2015 on the topic of “Autonomous Mobile Systems for Long-Term Operations in Spatio-Temporal Environments” at the National Polytechnic Institute of Toulouse (INPT). 

His objective is to extend the activity of the CNRS IRL2958 GT-CNRS towards robotics, leveraging on one side the strong robotic research inside CNRS and on the other side the collaboration potential with the Robotics and Intelligent Machines (RIM) laboratory at GTL. 

At the IRL, he is now the coordinator of the H2020 BugWright2 project, has been involved in H2020 project Flourish and PF7 project Noptilus, as well as in projects on environmental monitoring. 

From November 2007 until December 2012, Dr. Pradalier has been deputy director in the Autonomous Systems Lab at ETH Zürich. In this role, he was the technical coordinator of the V-Charge project (IP, 2010-2014) and also involved in the development of innovative robotic platforms such as autonomous boats for environment monitoring or prototype space rovers funded by the European Space Agency. He is a founding member of the ETH start-up Skybotix, within which he was responsible for software development and integration. 

From 2004 to 2007, Dr. Pradalier was a research scientist at CSIRO Australia. He was then involved in the development of software for autonomous large industrial robots and an autonomous underwater vehicle for the monitoring of the Great Barrier Reef, Australia. 

He received his Ph.D. in 2004 from the National Polytechnic Institute of Grenoble (INPG) on the topic of autonomous navigation of a small urban mobility system and he is Ingénieur from the National Engineering School for Computer Science and Applied Math in Grenoble (ENSIMAG).

Charles Pippin is a Senior Research Scientist at the Georgia Tech Research Institute, GTRI. His research interests include collaborative autonomy algorithms, machine learning, and multi-robot systems. In his current work, he is investigating cooperation between autonomous systems, as part of GTRI's Unmanned Systems Initiative. Charles received a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Georgia Tech in 2013. His research advisor was Prof. Henrik I. Christensen. Charles received an M.S. in Computer Science from Georgia Tech in 2004 and holds a B.S. in Computer Science from the University of Alabama in Huntsville.

Dr. Lonnie Parker is the Collaborative Autonomy Branch Chief in the Robotics and Autonomous Systems Division of the ATAS Laboratory at GTRI and serves as the PI for multiple programs. He has 10+ years of experience in managing DoD-sponsored projects and is focused on designing collaborative behaviors for unmanned systems in both the maritime and air domains. Prior to joining GTRI, Dr. Parker spent seven years at a NAVSEA warfare center, NUWC Division Newport, where he performed research into maritime autonomy through ONR-sponsored and internally funded efforts. Lonnie received a Ph.D. in Electrical & Computer Engineering from Georgia Tech in 2012. His research advisor was Prof. Ayanna M. Howard. Lonnie received an M.S. and B.S. in Electrical Engineering from the Rochester Institute of Technology in 2006.

Stuart Michelson is a member of the research faculty at the Georgia Tech Research Institute and is known as a subject matter expert in Human Systems Engineering. He leads Human Factors and Ergonomics and Human Systems Integration (HSI) efforts for DoD customers specializing in tactical display design spanning command and control, training, unmanned vehicle ground control stations, Manned-unmanned teaming, and mission planning. He has expertise in digital human modeling/ergonomic/anthropometric analyses to assess cockpit accommodation and experience with wearable soldier systems and tactical equipment design.

Since 2000, Michelson has organized the American venue and annual Symposium on Dynamic Flight Behavior for Aerial Robotics for the International Aerial Robotics Competition (IARC), the longest running collegiate aerial challenge in the world focused on advancing the state of the art in aerial robotic behavior.

Michelson has held an Associate Human Factors Professional status from the Board of Certification in Professional Ergonomics, is recognized as a graphic design professional by the International Academy of Computer Training, and is certified to conduct ethical Human Subjects Research.

Michelson has supported and led numerous programs within the Georgia Tech Research Institute leveraging his knowledge of soldier loadout and autonomous unmanned systems. Notably, he has designed graphical user interfaces, developed human-centered system requirements, led programs to quantify human performance, assessed anthropometric accommodations, and supported system test and evaluation for DoD stakeholders spanning the United States Navy, Air Force, Army, and Marine Corps.

After earning bachelor’s and master’s degrees in mechanical engineering from Georgia Tech, Gary McMurray interviewed for a number of jobs. Most were in the defense industry, and the job duties were very specific.

“I joke about one job that was to design fuel pumps for the aft section of cargo planes,” McMurray recalled. “I asked, ‘Well, what if I want to design fuel pumps for the front section?’ They said, ‘No. That’s a different skill set.’”

The job sounded too constraining and unappealing to McMurray, so he continued his job search, interviewing with the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) in 1989. He had been working in robotics, a relatively new field at the time.

“I was looking for something in robotics, and GTRI was trying to get into robotics,” he said. “They didn’t have anybody working in that field at all, so I was really the first person hired to work in that area. It gave me an opportunity to start from scratch and develop something unique and different. I really enjoyed that.”

Three decades later, McMurray still works at GTRI.

“I wear two hats in the organization,” he said. He is the division chief for the Intelligent Sustainable Technologies Division, and an associate director for the Institute for Robotics and Intelligent Machines (IRIM), working with director Seth Hutchinson.

The Intelligent Sustainable Technologies Division conducts research to improve the human condition through transforming the agricultural and food systems, sustainable use and access to energy and water, and improving workplace safety and pandemic response. IRIM is an umbrella under which robotics researchers, educators, and students from across campus can come together to advance a wide variety of robotics activities at the Institute.

The Intelligent Sustainable Technologies Division has approximately 36 research faculty and 40 students. The unit hires about 10% of all the students at GTRI and maintains close ties with the academic side of campus.

“One of the things I enjoy in my role as a division chief is the ability to set the vision and mission,” McMurray said. “We’re a little bit different from the rest of GTRI because we don’t do the Department of Defense work. We work a lot with the campus, but we also work with other universities on sustainability projects regarding food or energy. The projects have the potential to make a big impact. I describe it as having one foot on the basic research side and one foot on the applied side. We have master’s and Ph.D. students doing cutting-edge basic research, and we’re also building systems and applying research and deploying things into the field.”

The division’s food processing research includes improving yield, food quality, and food safety while minimizing the environmental impact by applying image processing, robotics, biosensors, and environmental treatment technologies. The division also conducts air quality research, including monitoring and reducing the effects of vehicular emissions.

So, what’s the connection between food processing and auto emissions?

“To solve problems in both of those areas we employ general research technologies — robotics, chemical and biological sensing, data analytics, machine learning, systems engineering, and then energy and materials,” McMurray said. “Approaches that work in traditional manufacturing may not work in the food industry. There is no CAD drawing for a boneless chicken breast or a chicken leg. Each one is different. It’s also wet, slippery, and could be spoiled.”

That’s where sensing and data analytics come into play. The same applies to analyzing vehicular emissions.

“When you look at food processing, our work really brings together all of these different skill sets. And then when you look at the data analytics side of air quality emissions, the team has the longest continuous set of data about air quality in the city. This has been the key database that the EPA uses for studying carbon emissions for automobiles,” McMurray said.

After more than 30 years at GTRI, McMurray still gets excited when a plan comes together.

“The most rewarding part of the work is when you can bring together the basic research and the applied, build a system that does something new and novel, put it into the field and test it, and have somebody come back and say, ‘That’s really cool. That worked.’”