Abhishek Halder

Abhishek Halder is an Associate Professor in the Department of Aerospace Engineering at Iowa State University and an Associate Adjunct Professor in the Department of Applied Mathematics at the University of California, Santa Cruz. He is also a member of the Translational AI Center at Iowa State University. His academic journey includes joining Iowa State University as an Assistant Professor in July 2023 and previously serving as faculty at UC Santa Cruz starting from October 2017.

Dr. Halder's educational background includes studies at IIT Kharagpur and Texas A&M University, where he developed expertise in systems and control theory with applications to matrix analysis, probability, and optimization. His research has been recognized with prestigious awards including the O. Hugo Schuck Best Application Paper Award from the American Automatic Control Council, Applied Mathematics Research Award from UC Santa Cruz, Outstanding Doctoral Student Award from Texas A&M, and Best Dual Degree Thesis Award from IIT Kharagpur.

His research focuses on stochastic systems, control and optimization with applications to large scale cyber-physical systems. Dr. Halder has made significant contributions to the fields of optimal transport, Schrödinger Bridge theory, distributional control, and uncertainty propagation in dynamical systems. His work bridges theoretical developments with practical applications in power systems, aerospace engineering, and machine learning. He has secured multiple research grants from NSF, including a CPS Frontier project on Computation-Aware Algorithmic Design for Cyber-Physical Systems.

Dr. Halder has demonstrated leadership in the control systems community through editorial roles including Associate Editor for IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control (2025-present), ASME Journal of Dynamic Systems, Measurement, and Control (2025-present), Systems & Control Letters (2022-present), and previously for IEEE Control Systems Society Conference Editorial Board (2019-2025) and IEEE Transactions on Aerospace and Electronic Systems (2019-2022). He is a Senior Member of IEEE and a member of IFAC, SIAM and ASME.

His research group has produced numerous publications in top-tier journals and conferences, with recent work focusing on connections between optimal transport theory, stochastic control, and machine learning. The publication trends show increasing integration of Schrödinger Bridge formulations with machine learning techniques for distributional control problems across various domains including power systems, aerospace applications, and resource allocation.

• O. Hugo Schuck Best Application Paper Award (2024)
• Applied Mathematics Research Award from UC Santa Cruz (2022)
• IEEE Senior Member (2021)
• Outstanding Doctoral Student Award from Texas A&M
• Best Dual Degree Thesis Award from IIT Kharagpur

Dr. Halder has mentored numerous PhD students including Alexis, Georgiy, Iman, Shadi, and Kenneth, many of whom have received prestigious fellowships. His research group maintains strong collaborations with national laboratories including Lawrence Livermore National Lab and Los Alamos National Lab, as well as industry partners. Dr. Halder is also committed to education and outreach, having created and taught the 'Feedback Control' course for high school students in the California State Summer School for Mathematics and Science (COSMOS), introducing complex control theory concepts without calculus or linear algebra.