Advanced Air Mobility (Autonomous) Intelligent Contingency Management Challenges and Opportunities
Discipline: Flight Mechanics
Abstract:
Aviation is undergoing a revolution and a paradigm change. New technologies are moving aviation towards on-demand transportation. To fully realize the promise of “anyone, anytime, anywhere” transportation, autonomy must play a key role. Our research team is focused on the intersection of new vehicle eVTOL configurations, popularly known as “air taxis”, and autonomous flight in complex urban environment. It has been widely recognized that dealing with contingencies, especially in safe, scalable and flexible way, is the most difficult challenge for autonomy. The presentation is intended to outline what we consider fundamental challenges and describe our current approaches. Moreover, we are working on establishing wide ranging collaborations to address these fundamental autonomy challenges in a relevant environment with real-world assumptions and constraints. Hence, we would like to take this opportunity to discuss open challenge problems with this research community.
About the Speaker:
Dr. Irene M. Gregory is the NASA Senior Researcher for Advanced Control Theory and Applications. She leads a multidisciplinary research team across multiple programs and projects focusing on robust autonomous systems, vehicle intelligent contingency management, resilient learning control for advanced, unconventional configurations with particular focus on Advanced Air Mobility and integration of autonomous cargo into the National Air Space. Her research has been documented in over 150 technical publications in peer-reviewed journals and conferences, and in numerous invited lectures and presentations.
Dr. Gregory serves in leadership or advisory roles on various government, industry and professional societies’ autonomy related committees. She is a recipient of the NASA Exceptional Service Medal. Dr. Gregory received a S.B. in Aeronautics and Astronautics from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a Ph.D. in Control and Dynamic Systems from California Institute of Technology. She is a Fellow of AIAA and a senior member of IEEE. She is a member of the AIAA GNC, IEEE Aerospace Control and IEEE intelligent Control Technical Committees.