Photo of Prof Prathyush P Menon

Prof Prathyush P Menon

Associate Professor

Email:

Location: Harrison 272

Telephone: 01392 726498

Extension: (Streatham) 6498

Prof Prathyush P Menon is Associate Professor of Control and Autonomy, at the Department of Engineering in the Faculty of Environment, Science and Economy. He is Deputy Director of the Centre for Future Clean Mobility and leads the research activities in Cooperative Robotics and Autonomus NEtworks (CRANE) lab. The research focus of the lab is on: 

1. Enabling autonomy in land, air and sea

2. Decision making in pesence of uncertainty

3. Information driven planning

4. Embedding cooperation and resilience among agents/assets

He received Ph.D. in control engineering from Department of Engineering, University of Leicester, UK in 2007. From 2007 to 2008, He worked at University of Leicester as a European Space Agency (ESA) funded post-doctoral research associate (PDRA), and then as lecturer. He joined College of Engineering, Mathematics and Physical Sciences, University of Exeter in 2010. He is author of over 100 peer reviewed refereed papers in these areas, including 50 journal publications.

His research is funded by UKRI, NERC, Innovate UK, STFC, ESA-ESTEC/Industry, UKIERI and KTP. While at Exeter, he has developed strong international academic collaborations with faculties at LAAS-CNRS, University of Pavia, Univesity of Sevilla, University of Groningen, Texas A&M University, University of Texas at Arlington, University of Alabama at Huntsville, Indian Institute of Science, IIT Madras, IIT Bombay, IIIT-Delhi, ISER Bhopal, and Seoul National University. 

 

Current research projects include:

  • ERDF: Accelarated Flaoting Offshore Wind in Cornwall
  • DSTL - SERAPIS SSE11: Learn to Fly
  • InnovateUK: Connected Secure In Cable Control and Protection Device for Electrical Vehicle
  • KTP with Lynch Motors: Design of DC Motor for Marine Drivetrain Application
  • KTP with SC Group Ltd: Optionally Manned All Terrain Mobile Platform
  • ESA-ESTEC and SENER Ltd: Enhanced Techniques for AOCS GNC Functional Verification
  • UKRI-GCRF: Emergency Flood Planning and Management using Unmanned Aerial Systems
  • UKRI-NERC: Combining Autonomous Observations and Models for Predicting and Understanding Shelf Seas

Contact me for PhD studentship in the following areas:

  • Optimal in-situ ocean sampling
  • Probabilistic worst-case analysis for space applications
  • Teaming of UAV-UGV
  • Decision making in cooperative UAS operation for Emergency response

Previous research projects include: 

  • Adaptive Autonomous Ocean Sampling Network (NERC & DSTL with NOC, Southampton), 2015 - 
  • Probabilistic Worst Case Analysis Tools, 2014 -  
  • Modern Attitude Control of Earth Observation Satellites With Large Flexible Elements, 2014-2015, Supported by European Space Agency (Collaboration with Astrium Ltd. UK.)
  • Generic Rover Dynamics Model Framework for Autonomous Capability Development, 2013-2014, Supported by UKSA-CREST2 (Collaboration with Astrium Ltd. UK.)
  • Contamination Monitoring using Mobile Sensor Networks, 2012-2014, Supported by UKIERI (Collaboration with IISc Bangalore, India)
  • Integrated Guidance Navigation and Control for Mars Sample Return (AIR-GNC), 2013-2014, Supported by European Space Agency, (Collaboration with GMV, Spain) (Investigator with Prof. Bates during 2011 - March 2013)
  • Robust Flight Control System Design Verification and Validation Framework (SAFE-V), 2011-2013, Supported by European Space Agency, (Collaboration with Astrium Space Transportation-France). 

Research Interests:

Collective Robotics, Autonomy, Verification, Validation and Certification, Distributed Control and Estimation, Formation/Cooperative Control, Optimisation, Performance Recovery In Presence of Amplitude and Rate Saturation.

Software:

Worst Case Analysis Tools (WCAT-II) supported by European Space Agency, Contract Manager: Samir Bennani, ESTEC. ESA.

Current PhD Students:

1. Midhun Parackal Unni - Hybrid system modelling of Parkinsonian Gate

2. Ke Wang - Bayesian analysis approach to analysis of AOCS

3. Mohammad Hajkarim - Decision support for cooperative autonomy

 

Past PhD Students:

1. Chiara Mellucci Environmental monitoring using Single Autonomous vehicle

2. Anusha Mujumdhar: Simulation and Entropy Based Worst Case Analysis for Space Systems 

3. Siyi Dong: Efficient Monte Carlo Methods for Verification of Launch Vehicle Performance

4. Nathan Owen: Gaussian Process and Polynomial Chaos Methods

5. Atul Kamath: Surrogate Assisted Optimisation-Based Worst-Case and Safety Margin Analysis Submitted 2014. Research Fellow at University of Exeter on GRDM Project. Presently R&D engineer at GE Global Research, Bangalore, India

6. Paresh Deshpande: Performance based coordination control of multi agent systems subject to time delays; Post-Doc at University of Oxford (2012) Presently at ASML Holding N.V., Netherlands.

7. Anup Das: Co-supervision (50%) Graduated in 2012; Presently Post-Doc at University of Warwick.

8. Wenfei Wang: Co-supervision (50%) Graduated in 2012; Presently Post-Doc at University of Warwick.

Academic Collaborators:

1. Debasish Ghose - IISc, Bangalore, India. 

2. Animesh Chakravarthy - University of Witchita, USA. 

3. Abhay A Pashilkar - National Aerospace Lab, Bangalore, India. 

4. Antonella Ferrara - University of Pavia, Pavia, Italy. 

3. Alexandre Seuret - LAAS, CNRS, France. 

4. Matthew Turner - University of Leicester, Leicester, UK. 

5. Samir Bennani - ESTEC, ESA, The Netherlands 

6. Yuri Shtessel - University of Alabama, Alabama, USA. 

7. Christopher Edwards - University of Exeter, Exeter, UK. 

8. Dwaipayan Mukharjee - Indian Institute of Technology, Mumbai, India.

9. P.B. Sujit - IISER, Bhopal, India.

Courses Taught:

1. Nonlinear Systems and Control (ECM 3711)

2. Systems, Series and Transformation (ECM 2707)

3. Control Engineering (ECM 2105)

  Course/Workshop:   A COURSE IN MARINE ROBOTICS: THEORY AND PRACTICE (27-31 Jan 2015)

UK-INDIA EDUCATION AND RESEARCH INITIATIVE (UKIERI) WORKSHOP ON FORMATION, CONTROL AND ENVIRONMENTAL MONITORING. EXETER, 8-9 APRIL, 2014. 

Visiting Researchers:

1. Chiara Mellucci (University of Pavia): Robust Nonlinear Observers for Fault Detection in Differential Algebraic Dynamical Systems (March 2014 - September 2014)

2. Anoop Jain (IISc, Bangalore): Formation Control for Environmental Mapping (August 2013 - October 2013)

3. Dwaipayan Mukharjee (IISc, Bangalore): Cyclic Pursuit (August 2013 - October 2013)

 

Chiara Mellucci (started in 2016)

2. Anusha Mujumdhar: Simulation and Entropy Based Worst Case Analysis for Space Systems 

3. Siyi Dong: Efficient Monte Carlo Methods for Verification of Launch Vehicle Performance

4. Nathan Owen: Gaussian Process and Polynomial Chaos Methods