People

Directors

Naira Hovakimyan, Director
W. Grafton and Lillian B. Wilkins Professor
Department of Mechanical Science and Engineering
2011 Mechanical Engineering Lab
(217) 244-1672
nhovakim@illinois.edu
Srinivasa Salapaka, Deputy Director
Professor
Department of Mechanical Science and Engineering
367 Coordinated Science Laboratory
(217) 244-4172
salapaka@illinois.edu 

Bringing Together World Experts

Multi-disciplinary team across diverse technical domains:

Verification and Validation 

Control Systems

Airspace Management

Multi-Institutional Expertise

Covering a broad National footprint across:

5 Universities

2 Industry Groups

1 FAA-designated UAS test site

University of Illinois Urbana Champaign

Lui Sha
Donald B. Gillies Chair, Professor
Computer Science 
Sayan Mitra
Professor
Electrical and Computer Engineering
Bo Li
Assistant Professor
Computer Science
Melkior Ornik
Assistant Professor
Aerospace Engineering

Georgia Institute of Technology

Evangelos Theodorou Associate Professor
Aerospace Engineering

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Chuchu Fan 
Wilson Assistant Professor
Aeronautics and Astronautics

University of Nevada, Reno 

Petros Voulgaris

Chair, Victor LaMar Lockhart Professor

Mechanical Engineering

Christos Papachristos

Assistant Professor

Computer Science and  Engineering

North Carolina A&T State University

Ali Karimoddini
Associate Professor
Electrical and Computer Engineering
Ioannis Raptis
Assistant Professor
Electrical and Computer Engineering

Lockheed Martin

Andrzej Banaszuk
Director of Strategy
Lockheed Martin Advanced Technology Labs
Greg Tallant (retired)
Lockheed Martin Fellow
Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Company
Christopher Elliott
Lockheed Martin Fellow
Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Company
Carley Mollica
Program Management Staff 
Lockheed Martin Advanced Technology Labs

Sierra Nevada Corporation

Andy Smith
Senior Business Development Manager
Jack Cross
Director of Technology, Mission Systems Technology

Advisory Board

Kevin Wise (chair)
Distinguished Senior Technical Fellow at Boeing
Boeing
Brandon Jones
Flight Automation Lead
 Wing, an Alphabet Company
Huafeng Yu
Senior Researcher
Boeing
Chris Anderson
COO, Head of Product
Kittyhawk