Derya Aksaray

Derya Aksaray
Assistant Professor, Department of Aerospace Engineering and MechanicsContact
Akerman Hall Room 226 110 Union Street SEMinneapolis, MN 55455
Education
Ph.D., Aerospace Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2014
M.S., Aerospace Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2011
B.S., Aerospace Engineering, Middle East Technical University, Ankara, Turkey, 2008
Research Lab | Research Overview
Professional Background
2018 - present: Assistant Professor, Aerospace Engineering & Mechanics, University of Minnesota
2016 - 2017: Postdoctoral Associate, Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
2014 - 2016: Postdoctoral Researcher, Boston University
2008 - 2014: Graduate Research Assistant, Aerospace Systems Design Laboratory, Georgia Institute of Technology
Scientific & Professional Societies
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA)Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)Professor Aksaray's research mainly focuses on design and control of verifiable autonomous systems for resilient operation in partially known and unstructured environments. In particular, she is interested in developing reactive planning strategies for resilient operation of robots in the face of disturbances, synthesizing provably-correct controllers to guarantee desired behaviors, and designing models and algorithms that enable autonomous systems to effectively team with humans and other robots. Overall, her research interests primarily lie in the areas of control theory, formal methods, and machine learning, with applications to aerospace systems and robotics.
Honors and Awards
2013: AIAA Infotech@Aerospace Conference, Travel Grant awarded by poster competition
2013: American Control Conference, Best Presentation in Session award
2008: AHA Helicopter Design Competition, Member/Coordinator of Best New Entrant Team
2007: EUROAVIA Design Workshop (1 of 25 participants across Europe)
Selected Publications
R. Peterson, A. T. Buyukkocak, D. Aksaray, and Y. Yazicioglu, “Safe Reactive Motion Planning Using Time Window Temporal Logic Specifications”, Robotics and Autonomous Systems, 2021.
A.T. Buyukkocak, D. Aksaray, and Y. Yazicioglu, "Planning of Heterogeneous Multi-Agent Systems under Signal Temporal Logic Specifications with Integral Predicates", IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters (RA-L), vol 6, no 2, 1375-1382, 2021.
C.I. Vasile, D. Aksaray, and C. Belta, “Time Window Temporal Logic”, Theoretical Computer Science Journal, 691, 27-54, 2017.
D. Aksaray, A. Jones, Z. Kong, M. Schwager, and C. Belta, “Q-Learning for Robust Satisfaction of Signal Temporal Logic Specifications”, IEEE Conference on Decision and Control, Las Vegas, NV, 2016.
D. Aksaray, A.Y. Yazicioglu, E. Feron, and D. Mavris, “Message Passing Strategy for Decentralized Connectivity Maintenance in Multiagent Surveillance”, AIAA Journal of Guidance, Control, and Dynamics, vol. 39, no. 3, 2016.