Research With NASA Langley Research Center
Had the opportunity with my NSF Grant to conduct research with NASA Langley in March 2026 during the LSU Spring Break. Was able to perform 75 experiments testing an input shaper controller our lab had developed to reduce vibrations of payloads after undergoing movement operations. Used ROS2 on the NASA Lunar Surface Manipulation System (LSMS) to control robust input shaper showing that after it was applied a reduction in vibrations was shown.
Programmed a waypoint based drone navigation system using ROS2 and Python. The system allowed for parameters for each waypoint to be adjusted causing the drone to vary in speed, altitude, yaw, and other settings per waypoint. Setup was built on a raspberry pi made to take ROS2 commands and communicated with a SITL environment set up on a WSL desktop system. Program will be used to arm a larger drone with a camera attached to it allowing it to map out rooms where the movement system will be updated as obstacles are detected.
(Drone in flight video is a WIP)
Designed a liquid metal printer in Fusion 360 and vibrating baseplate to conduct research on an EGaIn liquid metal and PDMS resin sample. Printer has a frame with an adjustable syringe head connected to a motor to finely distribute liquid metal onto baseplate. The baseplate has motors and piezoelectric pads under the plate to vibrate the liquid metal where it would then be observed under a microscope.