Curriculum Vitae

Education

• Ph.D. in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, University of California Irvine, June 2026 (Expected)
  • Dissertation: Collaborative Interactions in Heterogeneous Multi-Robot Systems
• M.S. in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, University of California Irvine, June 2022
  • Thesis: Aerial Vehicle Navigation with Terrestrial Signals of Opportunity: Performance Analysis and Transmitter Selection [PDF]
• B.S. with Honors in Mechanical Engineering, University of California Santa Barbara, June 2020
• A.S. with Honors in Mechanical Engineering, Diablo Valley College, May 2018

Research Experience

• Robot Ecology Laboratory (Irvine, CA), Graduate Student Researcher, Sept. 2022 - Present
  • Advisors: Magnus Egerstedt and Faryar Jabbari
    • Investigating why, how, and when heterogeneous multi-robot teams should collaborate—through the expansion of relevant sets, a hybrid automata-based framework, and the satisfaction of specific pairwise conditions—by leveraging ecological principles and control theory.
    • Organize and supervise robot-building sessions, overseeing task delegation among undergraduate and graduate lab members.
    • Contribute to assembling and programming the differential-wheeled and mecanum-wheeled robots that are deployed in the UCI Robotarium.
    • Lead lab tours, which include live demonstrations of mobile robots performing coordinated behaviors, to 300+ visitors.
• Multi-Robot Systems Laboratory (Monterrey, Nuevo Leon, Mexico), Visiting Researcher, Oct. 2023 - Nov. 2023
  • Advisor: Luis Guerrero-Bonilla
    • Developed a scalable, pairwise collaboration architecture that allows for large teams of heterogeneous robots to enhance their functionalities when working together.
    • Supported graduate and undergraduate students with programming the Dingo-O robot, which was deployed in the ITESM Robotarium.
    • Performed analysis and then designed a mechanical structure in SolidWorks for integration with the Dingo-O robot.
• Autonomous Systems, Perception, Intelligence, and Navigation Laboratory (Irvine, CA), Graduate Student Researcher, Sept. 2020 - June 2022
  • Advisor: Zak Kassas
    • Spearheaded the terrestrial-based opportunistic aerial vehicle navigation projects, which involved developing computationally efficient transmitter selection strategies and conducting performance analyses of aerial vehicle navigation with cellular signals in GPS-denied environments.
    • Specified the equipment needing to purchase for unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) flight experiments for the lab.
    • Collaborated with graduate students to mount equipment (e.g., antennas and receiver) on a UAV and configure its software for flight experiments.
    • Processed and analyzed data collected by the UAV from cellular towers during flight experiments.
• Biological Control Laboratory (Santa Barbara, CA), Undergraduate Research Assistant, Sept. 2019 - Mar. 2020
  • Advisor: Enoch Yeung
    • Investigated new data-driven methods for synthesis of genetic circuits for nonlinear biological systems.
    • Prepared synthetic biology experiments and performed data collection for graduate students and a junior research associate.

    • Work Experience

• Autonomy Technology Research Center Summer Program (Dayton, OH), Electrical Engineering Intern, June 2021 - Sept. 2021 &
  June 2022 - Sept. 2022
  • Mentors: Mark Carroll and Mark Smearcheck
    • Developed a simulation environment to study the performance of aircraft navigation using cellular signals of opportunity in GPS-denied environments.
    • Processed cellular signal data collected by a U.S. Air Force high-altitude aircraft during an extensive flight campaign at the Edwards Air Force Base.
    • Investigated the estimation accuracy and computation time of nonlinear stochastic filters (i.e., Kalman filter and its variants) with the processed cellular signal data.
    • Presented project findings at the ATR Center Summer Workshop as a talk, followed by a poster session, to 80+ attendees.

Journal Publications

• A. A. Nguyen , M. Rodriguez Curras, M. Egerstedt, and J. N. Pauli, ``Mutualisms as a Framework for Multi-Robot Collaboration,’’ in Frontiers in Robotics and AI , vol. 12, p. 1566452, Mar. 2025.
• A. A. Nguyen , F. Jabbari, and M. Egerstedt, ``Resiliency Through Collaboration in Heterogeneous Multi-Robot Systems,’’ in IEEE Open Journal of Control Systems , vol. 3, pp. 461-471, Sept. 2024.
• A. A. Nguyen , L. Guerrero-Bonilla, F. Jabbari, and M. Egerstedt, ``Scalable, Pairwise Collaborations in Heterogeneous Multi-Robot Teams,’’ in IEEE Control System Letters , vol. 8, pp. 604-609, May 2024.
• A. A. Nguyen and Z. Kassas, ``Efficient Transmitter Selection Strategies for Improved Information Gathering of Aerial Vehicle Navigation in GNSS-Denied Environments,’’ in IEEE Aerospace and Electronic Systems Magazine , vol. 38, no. 10, pp. 26-39, Oct. 2023.

Conference Publications

• A. A. Nguyen , F. Jabbari, and M. Egerstedt, ``Mutualistic Interactions in Heterogeneous Multi-Agent Systems,’’ in IEEE Conference on Decision and Control , 2023, pp. 411-418.
• A. A. Nguyen and Z. Kassas, ``Transmitter Selection for Improved Information Gathering in Aerial Vehicle Navigation with Terrestrial Signals of Opportunity,’’ in ION International Technical Meeting , 2022, pp. 723-734.
• A. A. Nguyen , Z. Shadram, and Z. Kassas, ``A Lower Bound for the Error Covariance of Radio SLAM with Terrestrial Signals of Opportunity,’’ in ION Global Navigation Satellite Systems Conference , 2021, pp. 2294-2306.

Presentations

• A. A. Nguyen , L. Guerrero-Bonilla, F. Jabbari, and M. Egerstedt, ``Scalable, Pairwise Collaborations in Heterogeneous Multi-Robot Systems,’’ at the 63rd IEEE Conference on Decision and Control, Milan, Italy, December 2024. (Conference Talk)
• A. A. Nguyen , L. Guerrero-Bonilla, F. Jabbari, and M. Egerstedt, ``Scalable, Pairwise Collaborations in Heterogeneous Multi-Robot Systems,’’ at the 43rd Southern Control Workshop, University of California, Los Angeles, April 2024. (Invited Talk)
• A. A. Nguyen , F. Jabbari, and M. Egerstedt, ``Mutualistic Interactions in Heterogeneous Multi-Agent Systems,’’ at the 62nd IEEE Conference on Decision and Control, Singapore, December 2023. (Conference Talk)
• A. A. Nguyen , F. Jabbari, and M. Egerstedt, ``Mutualistic Interactions in Heterogeneous Multi-Agent Systems,’’ for the Multi-Robot Systems Group, Tecnologico de Monterrey, November 2023. (Invited Talk)
• M. Egerstedt and A. A. Nguyen , ``Robot Ecology: Robots in the Wild,’’ at the Southern California Robotics Symposium, University of California, Irvine, September 2023. (Workshop Talk)
• A. A. Nguyen , ``Nonlinear Filter Performance Comparison for Aerial Vehicle Navigation with Terrestrial Signals of Opportunity,’’ for the Navigation \& Communication Branch at the Air Force Research Lab (AFRL/RYWN), Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Sept. 2022. (Invited Talk)
• A. A. Nguyen and Z. Kassas, ``Transmitter Selection for Improved Information Gathering in Aerial Vehicle Navigation with Terrestrial Signals of Opportunity,’’ at the ION ITM 2022, Long Beach, CA, USA, Jan. 2022. (Conference Talk)
• A. A. Nguyen , A. Abdallah, and Z. Kassas, ``Performance Evaluation of Radio SLAM with Terrestrial Signals of Opportunity,’’ at the ION GNSS+ 2021, St. Louis, MO, USA, Sept. 2021. (Conference Talk)
• A. A. Nguyen , ``Opportunistic Navigation Performance for Prolonged Flight Missions using Terrestrial SoOPs,’’ for the Navigation \& Communication Branch at the Air Force Research Lab (AFRL/RYWN), Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Sept. 2021. (Invited Talk)

Posters

• M. Rodriguez Curas, A. A. Nguyen , M. Egerstedt, and J. N. Pauli, ``From ecology to robotics and back: Mutualisms as a framework for multi-robot collaboration,’’ in the the Annual Meeting of the Ecological Society of America Annual, Long Beach, CA, USA, August 2024.

Honors and Awards

• Graduate Assistance in Areas of National Need Fellowship (2022 - 2025)
• IEEE CSS Student Travel Award and Workshop Support (2023, 2024)
• Mexico Graduate Research and Education Program Fellowship (2023)
• Graduate Assistance in Areas of National Need Fellowship (2020 - 2021)
• UCSB College of Engineering Honors Program (2018 - 2020)
• UCSB Dean’s Honors List (2018 - 2020)
• Eagle Scout (2015)

Media Coverage

• “UCI Robot Ecology Lab inspired by nature,” Daily Pilot, April 2025 [URL]

Review Activity

• Journals:
  • IEEE Control System Letters (2024, 2025)
  • The Journal of Supercomputing (2024)
• Conferences:
  • IEEE Conference on Decision and Control (2024, 2025)
  • IEEE Conference on Vehicular Technology (2022)

Skills

• Program: MATLAB & Simulink, Python, Mathematica, C++
• Software: LaTeX, Microsoft Office Suite, Git, Motion Capture Systems, Ipe, Solidworks, AutoCAD, KiCAD, LTSpice
• Machine Tools: Lathe, Mill, Band Saw, Drill Press, Soldering Iron, Laser Cutter
• Languages: English (Native) and French (Elementary)

Selected Coursework

• Dynamics and Control:
  • Nonlinear Control Systems, Synthetic Biological Design and Computing, Linear Systems I, Optimization Methods, Network Control, Network Science, Nonlinear Feedback Systems, Geometric Nonlinear Control, Learning Control Systems, Dynamics (Lagrangian Mechanics), Engineering Analysis I (Linear Algebra and Ordinary Differential Equations), Engineering Analysis II (Partial Differential Equations).
    
• Estimation Theory:
  • Parameter and State Estimation, Advanced Detection and Estimation Theory, GNSS Signal Processing and SDR Design, Random Processes.
    
• Robotics:
  • Robot Locomotion, Soft Robotics, Introduction to Robotics: Robot Dynamics and Control, Introduction to Robot Motion Planning & Navigation.

Professional Organizations

• American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Student Member
• Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers, Student Member
• IEEE Control System Society, Student Member
• Institute of Navigation, Student Member
• National Eagle Scout Association, Eagle Scout Member
• Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics, Student Member