Awards

Maison Clouatre, a graduate student in the Department of Aerospace Engineering at Texas A&M University, has received two prestigious awards, the 2022 National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate (NDSEG) Fellowship and the 2022 National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowships Program (GRFP).  Clouatre selected the NDSEG Fellowship, which is awarded annually to students in recognition of their academic excellence and STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) achievements.  Awardees receive full tuition and coverage for all mandatory fees for up to three years at any accredited U.S. college or university that provides advanced degrees in science and engineering, as well as a monthly stipend of $3,400.

Clouatre, a Ph.D. student, graduated in May 2022 with a double major in electrical engineering and mathematics from Mercer University.  He is both a Goldwater Scholar and Stamps Scholar, and previously held visiting research positions in the Electronic Systems (ELSYS) Laboratory at the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) and the Laboratory for Information & Decision Systems (LIDS) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

Clouatre is co-advised by professor John Valasek in the aerospace engineering department, and professor Mark Balas in the mechanical engineering department.  He first experienced engineering at Texas A&M University as an NSF Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) student in 2019, working with Valasek in the Vehicle Systems & Control Laboratory (VSCL).  Clouatre says “It is an overwhelming honor to receive the support of both NSF GRFP and DoD NDSEG.  However, without Professor Valasek, who has persistently invested in me since I was a freshman in college, these awards would not be possible.  His most recent investment was introducing me to Professor Balas—a kind mentor and truly keen mind.  After carefully considering both awards, I zealously look forward to using the NDSEG fellowship to innovate alongside Valasek and Balas as a graduate student at Texas A&M University.”

Clouatre’s research interests lie at the intersection of control theory, optimization, and learning, and he ventures to use these techniques to engineer advanced quantum information devices.  His NDSEG application identified a major hurdle for moving beyond Noisy Intermediate Scale Quantum (NISQ) devices: quantum bits which are strongly coupled with their environment.  In such regimes, a quantum bit dissipates quantum information into its environment and limits the lifetime of data stored in the qubit’s state.  Clouatre will use the NDSEG fellowship to work with Professors Valasek and Balas to develop new quantum control schemes which mitigate environmental couplings and lead to more robust quantum information units.

Valasek says that Clouatre “Maison is an exceptional person, and student, that personifies ‘hard work really does pay off’.  He brings tremendous energy and enthusiasm to learning and research, and especially elevates the experience of everyone around him.  I enjoyed working with him very much during REU, and now that he is attending TAMU for his doctorate I get to work with him every day.  We are very fortunate to have him in the Vehicle Systems & Control Laboratory.”

VSCL Graduate Student Maison Clouatre has been awarded the Avilés-Johnson Fellowship – Doctoral. The fellowship citation states “Texas A&M University believes that diversity is an indispensable component of academic excellence. The Dr. Dionel Avilés ’53 and Dr. James Johnson ’67 Fellowship Program seeks to increase diversity in the graduate and professional student population at Texas A&M University and support the development of high achieving scholars who show promise of distinguished careers for the benefit of all students.”

Clouatre is grateful to be awarded the fellowship, and says “I am most humbled by my selection as an Avilés-Johnson fellow, and I am thankful to be part of a department and university that celebrates diversity. I am also thankful for Dr. John Valasek and his continued efforts—since I was an undergraduate freshman—to mentor me and recruit me to Texas A&M. His kindness is representative of the Texas A&M community and his efforts reflect the core values behind the Avilés-Johnson fellowship program.”

Maison Clouatre is an incoming Ph.D. student in the aerospace engineering department. He will graduate in May 2022 with a double major in electrical engineering and mathematics from Mercer University. As an undergraduate, Clouatre held visiting research positions in the Electronic Systems (ELSYS) Laboratory at the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI), the Vehicle Systems & Control Laboratory (VSCL) at Texas A&M University, and the Laboratory for Information & Decision Systems (LIDS) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). His research interests lay at the intersection of control theory, optimization, and learning, and he focuses on applying his theory to the fields of quantum information science and aerospace engineering. Clouatre is both a Goldwater Scholar and Stamps Scholar. At VSCL, Clouatre will research quantum control and learning for quantum dynamics.

VSCL alumni Felix Turcios and current VSCL Ph.D. student Hannah Lehman are co-inventors on newly awarded US Patent 11,094,211, “Judgmental oversteering taxi aid system and method ”. The system creates a UI and integration system to guide the pilot for an autonomous taxi assistance program. The program is designed to help pilots taxi around airports, especially in situations where oversteer is required and may be difficult for the pilot to properly judge.

Felix Turcios currently works at Collins Aerospace in Cedar Rapids Iowa as a Sr. Systems Engineer. Hannah Lehman is a former Collins Aerospace summer intern with Felix’s team in the Advanced Concepts Group.

Click here to view the patent.

Alex Gross, a Junior Aerospace engineering student, has been awarded the prestigious AIAA Cary Spitzer Digital Avionics Scholarship. Gross has been a member of VSCL since 2020 and has focused his research on UAS autonomous guidance and landing, embedded systems, and user-interface integration. Read more about this award in the Texas A&M Engineering announcement.

VSCL Undergraduate researcher Alexander Gross ‘23 is the recipient of the AIAA Foundation Cary Spitzer Digital Avionics Scholarship for his research contributions on the Aided Threat Recognition from Mobile Cooperative and Autonomous Sensors project and in applications of the Cycle-of-Learning methodology for training of Mars rover vehicles and their interaction with human operators. He is currently working towards his bachelor’s degree in Aerospace Engineering with minors in Computer Science and Mathematics while in Engineering Honors. He has been conducting research in the Vehicle Systems & Control Laboratory under Dr. Valasek since his sophomore year.

VSCL alumni Tiffany Williamson and Felix Turcios and current VSCL Ph.D. student Hannah Lehman are co-inventors on newly awarded US Patent 11,037,455, “Autonomous judgmental oversteering determination system for aircraft taxiing”. The system uses reinforcement learning  to create a system for an autonomous taxi assistance program. The program is designed to help pilots taxi around airports, especially in situations where oversteer is required and may be difficult for the pilot to properly judge.

Tiffany Williamson and Felix Turcios currently work at Collins Aerospace in Cedar Rapids Iowa as an Engineering Leader and Sr. Systems Engineer respectively. Hannah Lehman is a former Collins Aerospace summer intern with Tiffany and Felix in the Advanced Concepts Group. The team is expecting one more patent for the autonomous taxiing user interface in conjunction with this project.

Click here to view the patent.

Chris Leshikar ’20, a graduate research assistant in the Vehicle Systems & Control Laboratory (VSCL), has been awarded the PhD Graduate Excellence Fellowship for Spring/Summer 2021. This competitive fellowship awards $20,000 over the span of 8 months , in addition to covering tuition and fees. All graduate research assistants within the department of aerospace engineering pursuing a PhD starting in Spring 2021 were considered for this Fellowship.

Leshikar has been an active member of VSCL since Spring 2017, focusing on system identification and nonlinear multiple-time-scale control theory. He graduated with a B.S. degree in Aerospace Engineering with Engineering Honors in December 2020. As a graduate research assistant in VSCL, Leshikar will be focusing his research on control of uncertain nonlinear multiple-time-scale systems and near real-time online system identification. Dr. John Valasek will serve as his research Advisor and Chair of dissertation committee.