PI
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Zhaodan Kong
Ph.D. Aerospace Engineering and Mechanics (Minor: Cognitive Science), University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, Minneapolis, MN 2012 M.S. Astronautics and Mechanics, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin, China 2006 B.S. Astronautics and Mechanics, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin, China 2004 Position: Associate Professor in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Director of the Cyber-Human-Physical Systems Lab, Associate Director of CITRIS and the Banato Institute, Affiliated with the UC Davis Air Quality Research Center, the UC Davis Center for Neuroengineering & Medicine, and the UC Davis Wild Fire Group Website |
PhD Students
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Prabhash Ragbir M.S. Aerospace Engineering, Queen Mary University of London, UK, 2019 B.S. Mechanical Engineering, University of the West Indies, Trinidad, 2014 Position: PhD Student, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Research Area: UAS and machine learning for disaster response Prabhash is a certified UAS pilot. He won the second prize in the Grad Slam competition organized by UC Graduate Studies in 2024. |
MS Students
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Chris Andrade B.S. Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, UC Davis, 2023 Position: Master Student, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Research Area: Advanced attitude control of satellites Chris is co-supervised by Dr. Stephen Robinson. |
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Rachel Pride B.S. Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, UC Davis, 2023 Position: Master Student, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Research Area: Space debris removal Rachel is co-supervised by Dr. Stephen Robinson. She is the recipient of the 2026 Teaching Assistant Excellence Award. |
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Mahima Rudrapati B.E. Computer Engineering (Minor in Artificial Intelligence), University of Mumbai, 2024 Position: Master Student, Computer Science Research Area: Computer vision for space agriculture Mahima is co-supervised by Dr. Stephen Robinson. |
Undergraduate Student Researchers
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Lucas Bauckman
Position: Undergraduate Student, Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering Research Area: Interface design for AAM disaster response Lucas is a member of the team that won the Atech Award for Most Innovative Design for Air Mobility at the 2026 CITRIS Aviation Competition. |
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Alparslan Ege Erdogan Position: Undergraduate Student, Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering Research Area: Novel UAV design for whale monitoring Alparslan is the lead of the team that won the Atech Award for Most Innovative Design for Air Mobility at the 2026 CITRIS Aviation Competition, a member of the winning team of the last FNL Competition, and the 111-112th Picnic Day ASUCD Exhibits Director. |
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Kailey Gotfried Position: Undergraduate Student, Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering Research Area: Novel UAV design for whale monitoring Kailey is a member of the team that won the Atech Award for Most Innovative Design for Air Mobility at the 2026 CITRIS Aviation Competition and a member of the winning team of the 2025 NASA FNL Rocketry Competition. |
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Selene Han Position: Undergraduate Student, Electrical & Computer Engineering Research Area: EEG & brain state assessment Selene is partially supported by the NSF ExLENT Program. She is co-supervised by Dr. Richard Whittle. |
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Joshua Hill Position: Undergraduate Student, Mechanical Engineering Research Area: Air filtration system design & testing Joshua is a team member who won the Atech Award for Most Innovative Design for Air Mobility at the 2026 CITRIS Aviation Competition, the Principal Investigator for NASA's Proposal Writing and Evaluation Experience, and a Physics and Engineering tutor at UC Davis's AATC. |
Former Lab Members
- Fanyu Meng (2020-2026): PhD; First position after graduation: Meta.
- Sherry Lei (2026-2026): Undergraduate; Currently: Undergraduate in MAE at UC Davis. Sherry was supported by the CITRIS Workforce Innovation Program and the NSF ExLENT Program.
- Amelia Lipcsei (2026-2026): Undergraduate; Currently: Undergraduate in MAE at UC Davis
- Pranav Vemparala (2026-2026): Undergraduate; Currently: Undergraduate in MAE at UC Davis
- Eric Koo (2024-2026): Undergraduate (2024-2025), volunteer (2025-2026); First position after graduation: MS student at UC Davis
- Peng Wei (2016-2026): PhD (2016-2023), postdoc (2023-2026); First position after graduation: Assistant Professor, Bioproducts and Biosystems Engineering, University of Minnesota, Twin Cities
- Rachel Long (2025-2026): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: MS student at UC Davis. Rachel is a member of a team winning three final awards of the 2025 CITRIS Aviation Competition. Here is an article about Rachel's work on AAM.
- David Kim (2025-2026): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: PhD student at UC Davis. David was an Honors student and received partial support from the CITRIS Workforce Innovation Program.
- Ziquan Deng (2019-2026): PhD; First position after graduation: Assistant Professor, Mechanical and Nuclear Engineering, Virginia Commonwealth University
- Orfeas Magoulas (2025-2026): Undergraduate; Currently: Head of a startup. Orfeas is the lead of a team winning three final awards of the 2025 CITRIS Aviation Competition and a member of a team selected as one of the finalists of the 2025 NASA Gateways to Blue Skies Competition. Here are two articles about Orfeas' work, one on AAM and the other on AgAir.
- Oliver Austin (2024-2026): Undergraduate; Currently: Oliver was the lead of a team selected as one of the finalists of the 2025 NASA Gateways to Blue Skies Competition and a member of a team winning three final awards of the 2025 CITRIS Aviation Competition. Here are two articles about Oliver's work, one on AAM and the other on AgAir.
- Andreas Ritter (2025-2025): Undergraduate; Currently: Intern at Tesla
- Lucas Chis (2025-2025): Undergraduate; Currently: Undergraduate in MAE at UC Davis
- Yuzhang (Victor) Huang (2024-2025): MS; First position after graduation: PhD student at UC Davis
- Kyra Ruiz (2025-2025): Undergraduate; Currently: Undergraduate in ME at UC Merced. Kyra was supported by the UC LEADS program.
- Luuanne Chau (2023-2025): Undergraduate; Currently: Undergraduate in ECE at UC Davis. Luuanne was supported by the CITRIS Workforce Innovation Program and the NSF ExLENT Program.
- Yimin Qin (2023-2025): Postdoc; First position after graduation: Westwell
- Youssef Boutros (2023-2024): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: Symbotic. Youssef was partially supported by the AvenueE program.
- Huanglun (Adam) Zhu (2023-2024): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: PhD student at UC Davis
- Ashwitha Kassetty (2020-2023): MS; First position after graduation:
- Thomas Matthews (2020-2023): MS; First position after graduation: Lawrence Livermore National Lab
- Ashkan Zehfroosh (2022-2023): Postdoc; Currently with the California Department of Consumer Affairs
- Qikai Gao (2022-2023): Undergraduate; First position after graduation:
- Preet Amin (2022-2023): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: kW Engineering
- Eric Vanacker (2022-2023): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: InnerPlant
- Ziyan Xie (2021-2023): MS; First position after graduation: MicroPort
- Bill Zhang (2022-2023): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: MidLabs
- Shuchen Ye (2022-2023): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: MS student at UPenn
- Faress Zwain (2022-2023): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: MS student at Stanford
- Gregory Bales (2016-2023): PhD; First position after graduation: Research & Development Engineer at UC Davis
- Evan Foley (2020-2022): MS; First position after graduation: Lockheed Martin. Here is a news story about Evan's work on using UAVs for vaccine distribution.
- Graham Bough (2020-2022): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: Lumentum
- Jiemin Wu (2020-2022): MS; First position after graduation: Research & Development Engineer at UC Davis
- Marie Cor Cruz (2020-2022): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: US Air Force
- Ayush Patnaik (2020-2022): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: PhD student at UC Davis
- Siddhesh Yadav (2020-2022): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: PhD student at UC Davis
- Shuhao Yang (2021-2022): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: MS student at UCLA
- Srikumar Brundavanam (2021-2021): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: MS student at CMU
- Dinesh Kumar (2020-2021): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: MS student at UC Davis
- Jailan Sabet (2020-2021): MS; First position after graduation: Reltio
- Ryan Liang (2019-2021): MS; Currently with Sandia National Laboratories
- Andrew Michelmore (2019-2021): Volunteer; First position after graduation: Advanced Farm Technologies
- Eroz Fabian (2020-2021): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: Lockheed Martin
- Aravind Sreejith (2018-2020): MS; First position after graduation: Vicarious
- Frederica Finney-Long (2019-2020): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: MS student at SFSU
- Felipe Valdez (2018-2020): MS; First position after graduation: NASA Armstrong Flight Research Center
- Gang Chen (2015-2020): PhD; Currently an Associate Professor at South China University of Technology
- Daniel Genova (2017-2019): MS; First position after graduation: CACI International
- Alexander Batista (2016-2019): MS; First position after graduation: Stryker
- Roberto Hurtado (2017-2019): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: Lockheed Martin
- Erina Kitamura (2018-2019): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: Intel
- Gabriel Simmons (2017-2019): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: PhD student at UC Davis
- Grant Harman (2017-2019): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: NASA Johnson Space Center
- Daniel Andenmatten (2018-2019): MS; First position after graduation: Pacific Gas and Electric Company
- April Lynn Teske (2016-2018): MS; First position after graduation: Boeing
- Naveen Gowrishankar (2016-2018): MS; First position after graduation: Omron Adept Technologies
- Lucas Ang (2018-2018): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: US Air Force
- Salim Hasin (2015-2018): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: Boeing
- Sui Nam (Jason) Chan (2015-2017): MS; Currently with Xwing
- Dahlia Pham (2015-2017): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: NASA Ames Research Center
- Jonathan Summer (2016-2017): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: NASA Jet Propulsion Lab (JPL)
- Tung Tran (2015-2017): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: Boeing
- Albert Yeh (2015-2017): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: Cobham Advanced Electronic Solutions
- Eric Po (2016-2017): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: Tenex Health
- Anthony Thai (2015-2017): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: Apple
- Chenxiong Yi (2016-2017): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: Lumi United Technology Co.
- Wilhelmena Figueiredo (2015-2016): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: PhD student at MIT
- Jimmy Tran (2015-2016): Undergraduate; First position after graduation: Genentech