ICON Panel: A Meeting with New ICON Faculty

Event Intro: In this panel, Laura Helen Blumenschein (ME), Ran Dai (AAE), Yiheng Feng (CE), and Philip E. Paré (ECE) (four new faculty members at Purdue) will introduce their research and share their perspectives. 

Schedule of the Event:  10:00am-11:00 (Introduction and Presentations by Panelists), 11:00am-12:00 (Panel Discussion)

Zoom Meeting Link: https://purdue-edu.zoom.us/j/7013099278 

Panelists:

Laura Blumenschein is an assistant professor of Mechanical Engineering at Purdue University. She received her PhD in Mechanical Engineering from Stanford in 2019 under the supervision of Professor Allison Okamura. Her research focuses on creating effective and robust soft robotic systems by bridging the gaps between theoretical modeling, experimental verification, and application, with a specific focus on soft robots inspired by plants, which explore their environments and build structures.

Ran Dai is an associate professor in School of Aeronautics and Astronautics at Purdue University. She received her M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Aerospace Engineering from Auburn University. Dr. Dai’s research focuses on the control of autonomous systems, numerical optimization, and networked dynamical systems. She is an associate editor of the IEEE Transactions on Aerospace and Electronic Systems, and a recipient of the National Science Foundation Career Award and NASA Early Faculty Career Award.

Yiheng Feng is an assistant professor in the Lyles School of Civil Engineering, Purdue University. He received his Ph.D. from Department of Systems and Industrial Engineering at University of Arizona. His research areas include connected and automated vehicles (CAVs) and smart transportation infrastructure, with a focus on traffic control with CAVs. He has rich experiences in deploying and testing CV/CAV technologies in the field and has been involved in several large-scale CV deployment projects.

Philip E. Paré is an assistant professor in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Purdue University. He received his Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) in 2018. Philip was the recipient of the 2017-2018 Robert T. Chien Memorial Award for excellence in research from UIUC. His research focuses on networked control systems, namely modeling, analysis, and control of virus spread over networks.

Panel Video: