George J. Pappas
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Research Group

Our research group consists of Ph.D. students and postdoctoral researchers in ESE, CIS and AMCS at Penn, and members of the GRASP Laboratory

Current Members

Current members of the Pappas research group with George J. Pappas in front of a living plant wall at Penn
Sribalaji C. Anand Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE Since October 2025
Tesshu Fujinami Ph.D. student, ESE Since September 2023
Kyle Horton Ph.D. student, ESE Since September 2025
Yash Jain Ph.D. student, CIS Since September 2026
Pavlos Kallinikidis Ph.D. student, ESE Since September 2021
Shayan Kiyani Ph.D. student, ESE Since September 2022
Sunggun Lee Ph.D. student, ESE Since September 2025
Sima Noorani Ph.D. student, ESE Since September 2022
Zac Ravichandran Ph.D. student, ESE Since September 2023
Nicholas Rober Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE Since September 2026
Mahdi Sabbaghi Ph.D. student, ESE Since September 2022
Pascal Sikorski Ph.D. student, ESE Since September 2026
David Snyder Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE Since September 2025
Anne Somalwar Ph.D. student, AMCS Since September 2023
Victoria Tuck Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE Since October 2025
Hangtao Zhang Ph.D. student, CIS Since September 2026

Former Ph.D. Students and Postdocs

Alumni of the Pappas research group on a rooftop terrace at dusk, with the Philadelphia skyline behind them

Faculty

Nikolay Atanasov Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2009–August 2015 Now Professor, ECE Department, University of California, San Diego, CA
Shun-ichi Azuma Visiting Postdoctoral Scholar, ESE, April 2009–April 2010 Now Professor, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
Thomas Beckers Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, January 2021–December 2022 Now Professor of Autonomous Systems, Ulm University, Germany
Philip Dames Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, September 2015–June 2016 Now Associate Professor, Mechanical Engineering, Temple University, Philadelphia, PA
Thao Dang Postdoctoral Researcher, CIS, January 2001–December 2001 Now Directeur de Recherche at VERIMAG, CNRS, Grenoble, France
Alessandro D'Innocenzo Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, March 2008–December 2008 Now Associate Professor, Università di L'Aquila, Italy
Chinwendu Enyioha Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2008–December 2014 Now Associate Professor, ECE Department, University of Central Florida, Orlando, FL
Mahyar Fazlyab Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, August 2018–August 2020 Now Assistant Professor, ECE Department, Johns Hopkins University, MD
Konstantinos Gatsis Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2010–October 2019 Now Visiting Teaching Assistant Professor, ECE Department, Villanova University, PA
Antoine Girard Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, October 2004–December 2005 Now CNRS Directeur de Recherche, Laboratoire des Signaux et Systèmes, CentraleSupélec, France
Shuo Han Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, October 2013–July 2017 Now Associate Professor, ECE Department, University of Illinois Chicago, IL
Radoslav Ivanov Postdoctoral Researcher, CIS, August 2017–December 2021 Now Assistant Professor, CS Department, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY
A. Agung Julius Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, June 2005–December 2008 Now Professor, ECSE Department, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY
Dionysios Kalogerias Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, June 2019–August 2020 Now Assistant Professor, EE Department, Yale University, CT
Ioannis Kantaros Postdoctoral Researcher, CIS, August 2018–December 2021 Now Assistant Professor, ESE Department, Washington University in St. Louis, MO
Hadas Kress-Gazit Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2003–August 2008 Now Geoffrey S.M. Hedrick Sr. Professor, Mechanical and Aerospace Eng., Cornell University
Lars Lindemann Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, November 2020–December 2022 Now Assistant Professor, Automatic Control Laboratory, ETH Zurich, Switzerland
Fei Miao Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2010–May 2016 Now Qiushi Distinguished Professor, Control Science and Engineering, Zhejiang University
Aritra Mitra Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, August 2020–December 2022 Now Assistant Professor, ECE, North Carolina State University, NC
Truong Nghiem Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2005–September 2012 Now Associate Professor, ECE Department, University of Central Florida, Orlando, FL
Cameron Nowzari Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, October 2013–July 2016 Now Associate Professor, ECE Department, George Mason University, Fairfax, VA
Erfan Nozari Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, August 2019–June 2020 Now Assistant Professor, ME Department, University of California, Riverside, CA
Jerome Le Ny Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, September 2008–April 2012 Now Professor, Electrical Engineering, École Polytechnique de Montréal, Canada
Miroslav Pajic Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, September 2012–July 2015 Now Professor, ECE Department, Duke University, NC
Sergio Pequito Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, August 2014–July 2017 Now Associate Professor, Instituto Superior Técnico, University of Lisbon, Portugal
Indranil Saha Postdoctoral Researcher, CIS, July 2013–August 2015 Now Professor and Soma and Manas Mandal Chair, CSE Department, IIT Kanpur, India
M. Selman Sakar Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2005–December 2010 Now Associate Professor at EPFL, Lausanne, Switzerland
Rajiv Sambharya Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, September 2024–July 2026 Now Assistant Professor, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX
Yasser Shoukry Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, September 2015–July 2017 Now Associate Professor, ECE, University of California, Irvine, CA
Igor Spasojevic Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, August 2022–June 2025 Now Assistant Professor, ECE Department, University of California, Riverside, CA
Shreyas Sundaram Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, September 2009–April 2010 Now Marie Gordon Professor, ECE, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN
Paulo Tabuada Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, January 2002–August 2003 Now Professor and Vijay K. Dhir Chair in Engineering, ECE Department, UCLA
Herbert Tanner Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, June 2001–August 2003 Now Professor and Chair, Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Delaware
Anastasios Tsiamis Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2015–March 2022 Now Assistant Professor, ECE Department, University of Patras, Greece
Vasileios Tzoumas Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2012–June 2018 Now Assistant Professor, Aerospace Department, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
Michael Zavlanos Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2003–August 2008 Now Professor, Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science, Duke University, NC

Research institutes and laboratories

Kong Yao Chee Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2019–December 2024 Now Senior Member of Technical Staff, DSO National Laboratories, Singapore
Matthew Cleaveland Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2018–May 2025 Now Technical Staff, MIT Lincoln Laboratory, Cambridge, MA
T. John Koo Postdoctoral Researcher, EE, August 2000–January 2001 Now at LSCM R&D Centre, Hong Kong, China
Charis Stamouli Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2020–July 2026 Now Postdoctoral Researcher, ETH Zurich, Switzerland
Pedro Paulo Ventura Tecchio Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2013–July 2019 Now at Brazilian Institute of Robotics, Salvador, Brazil
Nicholas Watkins Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2013–December 2018 Now Senior Professional Staff, Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory

Industry

Ali Ahmadzadeh Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2003–August 2008 Now Quantitative Strategist, Citadel Energy Marketing, CT
Andreea Alexandru Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2015–May 2021 Now Senior Scientist, Duality Technologies
Victor Amelkin Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, July 2018–June 2020 Now Research Scientist, Amazon Robotics
Mohamed Babaali Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, July 2004–May 2005 Now Principal Software Engineer at Mathworks, Boston, MA
Nikolaos Bousias Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2019–July 2026 Now at Ghost Robotics, Philadelphia, PA
Sean Bowman Ph.D. graduate student, CIS, September 2012–December 2021 Now Lead Robotics Software Engineer, Exyn Technologies, Philadelphia, PA
Austin Chen Ph.D. graduate student, CIS, September 2018–May 2025 Now Mission Autonomy Lead at HavocAI, San Diego, CA
Nicolo Dal Fabbro Postdoctoral Researcher, ESE, November 2023–July 2026 Now at NASDAQ Inc
Georgios Fainekos Ph.D. graduate student, CIS, September 2002–August 2008 Now Senior Principal Scientist, Toyota Motor North America R&D
Heejin Chloe Jeong Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, January 2016–May 2020 Now Staff Research Engineer, Waymo
Fragkiskos Koufogiannis Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2011–July 2017 Now at Tanius Technology
Matthew Malencia Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2018–May 2023 Now Senior Technical Project Manager, Exyn Technologies, Philadelphia, PA
Alexander Robey Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2018–2024 Now Member of Technical Staff, Thinking Machines Lab
Alena Rodionova Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2017–December 2022 Now Senior Software Engineer, Waabi, Boston, MA
Orlando Romero Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2020–May 2025 Now Senior Specialist, Data Science, Nasdaq Inc
Kelsey Saulnier Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2014–December 2022 Now Robotics Engineer, Pattern Labs
Brent Schlotfeldt Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2016–May 2021 Now Staff Software Engineer, Waymo
Jacob Seidman Ph.D. graduate student, AMCS, September 2015–September 2022 Now Director of Applied AI, Reality Defender, New York, NY
Maria Elizabeth Tzes Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2018–May 2024 Now Applied Scientist II, Amazon Fulfillment Technologies and Robotics
Shuo Yang Ph.D. graduate student, ESE, September 2022–December 2025 Now Quantitative Researcher, Point72
Ingvar Ziemann Postdoctoral Scholar, ESE, March 2023–June 2025 Now at Xantium (Tudor Investment Corporation), New York, NY

Former Master’s Students

Haimin Hu MSE Graduate Student, ESE, September 2018–May 2020 Now Assistant Professor, Computer Science, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD
Jingqi Li MSE Graduate Student, ESE, September 2017–May 2019 Now Peter O’Donnell Jr. Postdoctoral Fellow, Oden Institute, UT Austin, TX
Saad Aleem MSE Graduate Student, ESE, September 2014–May 2016 Now at Oracle, Redwood Shores, CA
Hakan Yazarel MSE Graduate Student, ESE, September 2002–December 2005 Now Senior Principal Software Engineer at Carefusion, Orange County, CA
Selcuk Bayraktar MSE Graduate Student, ESE, September 2002–September 2004 Now Chairman and CTO, Baykar, Istanbul, Turkey
Pradyumna K. Mishra MSE Graduate Student, CIS, September 2000–December 2002 Now Co-Founder and CEO, Fingertips Lab, San Jose, CA

Join the Group

Prospective Ph.D. students apply through the ESE or CIS doctoral programs. Postdoctoral candidates can write with a CV and a short research statement.

For how I approach advising, see my essay “Mentor the Researcher, Not the Research” (Penn Almanac, 2017). This mentoring has been recognized with the IEEE Leon K. Kirchmayer Graduate Teaching Award and the Penn Provost’s Award for Distinguished Ph.D. Teaching and Mentoring.

Email George Pappas