PEOPLE

Stéphane D'Urso

M.S. Student, Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering
Benjamin M. Statler College of Engineering & Mineral Resources
West Virginia University

Contact:
Engineering Sciences Building (ESB), Room 264

Short Bio:
Stéphane D'Urso is a dual national (Italian-French) aerospace engineer from Naples, Italy. He is an alumnus of "Nunziatella" Military School of Naples, Italy. He took his academic degree at the University of Naples "Federico II", Department of Industrial Engineering - Aerospace Section. He attended the Ecole Nationale Supérieure de l'Aéronautique et de l'Espace (SUPAERO) in Toulouse (France) for SOCRATES stage project where he was involved in studies about flight dynamics of the flying wings. He has a one year experience in a private company in Italy as CAD/CAM draftsman and designer supervisor in the field of composite boats manufacturing. For a little bit over 5 years he has been a consultant for a research group at University of Naples "Federico II", Department of Industrial Engineering - Aerospace Section, working on wind tunnel tests and towing tank tests.

Stéphane's graduate project will be focused on the robust navigation and model-aided navigation (with aerodynamic modeling and system identification) for various remote sensing applications. His work will also involve processing Global Positioning System (GPS) data using NASA JPL's GISPY-OASIS software. At the same time is working on the hardware/software of a small UAV and of a RC pathfinder for a few different projects of the group (e.g. determining how to best model/calibrate UWB in a filter, and considering multipath mitigation strategies for indoor greenhouse navigation). He has collaborated with WVU's IRL for the NASA's 2015 Sample Return Robot Challenge.