Derya Aksaray

Derya Aksaray is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Northeastern University, where she directs the Dependable Autonomy Lab (DAL). She holds a PhD in Aerospace Engineering from Georgia Tech (2014) and has prior roles as an Assistant Professor at the University of Minnesota (2018-2022), and postdoctoral positions at MIT CSAIL (2016-2017) and Boston University (2014-2016). Her research focuses on control theory, formal methods, and machine learning for robotics and autonomous systems, particularly in uncertain and dynamic environments.

Education:

• PhD, Aerospace Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology (2014)
• MS, Aerospace Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology (2011)
• BS, Aerospace Engineering, Middle East Technical University (2008)

Research Interests:

• Formal methods for autonomous systems
• Reinforcement learning with temporal logic constraints
• Multi-agent coordination and distributed planning
• Resilient control for robotics and aerospace systems
• Energy-aware planning for UAVs and heterogeneous systems

Lab Activities: The Dependable Autonomy Lab develops theory and algorithms for achieving reliable autonomous robot behaviors, with experimental validation on ground and aerial robots. Current projects include resilient planning under uncertainty, distributed multi-agent systems, and reinforcement learning with formal guarantees.

Advising: Prof. Aksaray supervises graduate students in PhD and MS programs, focusing on control theory, formal methods, and robotics applications. Former advisees include Ali Tevfik Buyukkocak (PhD, 2024) and Ryan Peterson (MS, 2020).

Professional Affiliations: Member of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) and Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE).