Journal Articles
2023 - “A Terminal Set Feasibility Governor for Linear Model Predictive Control”, T. Skibik, D. Liao-McPherson, M.M. Nicotra, IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control, available on Early Access.
2023 - “Modeling and Control of Ultracold Atoms Trapped in an Optical Lattice: An Example-driven Tutorial on Quantum Control”, M.M. Nicotra, J. Shao, J. Combes, A.C. Theurkauf, P. Axelrad, L.-Y. Chih, M. Holland, A.A. Zozulya, C.K. LeDesma, K. Mehling, D.Z. Anderson, IEEE Control Systems Magazine, vol. 43(1), pp. 28-43.
2022 - “Analysis of time-distributed model predictive control when using a regularized primal-dual gradient optimizer”, T. Skibik, M.M. Nicotra, IEEE Control Systems Letters, vol. 7, pp. 235-240.
2022 - “Constrained power reference control for wind turbines”, D.S. Zalkind, M.M. Nicotra, L.Y. Pao, Wind Energy, vol. 25(5), pp. 914-934.
2022 - “Efficient Trajectory Optimization for Constrained Spacecraft Attitude Maneuvers”, T.L. Dearing, J. Hauser, X. Chen, M.M. Nicotra, C. Petersen, IAAA Journal of Guidance, Control, and Dynamics, vol. 45(4), pp. 638-650.
2022 - “Projection-operator-based Newton method for the trajectory optimization of closed quantum systems”, J. Shao, J. Combes, J. Hauser, M.M. Nicotra, Physical Review A, vol. 105(3), p. 032605.
2022 - “Safe, Fast, and Efficient Distributed Receding Horizon Constrained Control of Aerial Robot Swarms”, B. Convens, K. Merckaert, M.M. Nicotra, B. Vanderborght, IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters, vol. 7(2), pp. 4173-4180.
2022 - “Real-time motion control of robotic manipulators for safe human-robot coexistence”, K. Merckaert, B. Convens, C.-J. Wu, A. Roncone, M.M. Nicotra, B. Vanderborght, Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing, vol. 73, p. 102223.
2021 - “A feasibility governor for enlarging the region of attraction of linear model predictive controllers”, T. Skibik, D. Liao-McPherson, T. Cunis, I. Kolmanovsky, M.M. Nicotra, IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control, vol. 67(10), pp. 5501-5508.
2021 - “Invariant set distributed explicit reference governors for provably safe on-board control of nano-quadrotor swarms”, B. Convens, K. Merckaert, B. Vanderborght, M.M. Nicotra, Frontiers in Robotics and AI, vol. 8, p. 129.
2021 - “An analysis of closed-loop stability for linear model predictive control based on time-distributed optimization”, D. Liao-McPherson, T. Skibik, J. Leung, I. Kolmanovsky, M.M. Nicotra, IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control, vol. 67(5), pp. 2618-2625.
2021 - “Low-Complexity Fast Charging Strategies Based on Explicit Reference Governors for Li-Ion Battery Cells”, A. Goldar, R. Romagnoli, L.D. Couto, M.M. Nicotra, M. Kinnaert, E. Garone, IEEE Transactions on Control Systems Technology, vol. 29(4), pp. 1597-1608.
2020 - “Stabilizing Formation Systems with Nonholonomic Agents”, T.L. Dearing, X. Chen, M.M. Nicotra, IEEE Control Systems Letters, vol. 5(2), pp. 403-408.
2020 - “Sensitivity-based Warmstarting for Nonlinear Model Predictive Control with Polyhedral State and Control Constraints”, D. Liao-McPherson, M.M. Nicotra, A.L. Dontchev, I.V. Kolmanovsky, V. Veliov, IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control, vol. 65(10), pp. 4288-4294.
2020 - “Spacecraft Attitude Control with Nonconvex Constraints: An Explicit Reference Governor Approach”, M.M. Nicotra, D. Liao-McPherson, L. Burlion, I.V. Kolmanovsky, IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control, vol. 65(8), pp. 3677-3684.
2020 - “Time-distributed optimization for real-time model predictive control: Stability, robustness, and constraint satisfaction”, D. Liao-McPherson, M.M. Nicotra, I.V. Kolmanovsky, Automatica, vol. 117, p.108973.
2020 - “Geodesic Approach for the Control of Tethered Quadrotors”, T.W. Nguyen, M.M. Nicotra, E. Garone, IAAA Journal of Guidance, Control, and Dynamics, vol. 43(4), pp. 854-862.
2019 - “Inexact Newton-Kantorovich methods for Constrained Nonlinear Model Predictive Control”, A.L. Dontchev, M. Huang, I.V. Kolmanovsky, M.M. Nicotra, IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control, vol. 64(9), pp. 3602-3615.
2019 - “Explicit Reference Governor for the constrained control of Linear Time-Delay Systems”, M.M. Nicotra, T.W. Nguyen, E. Garone, I.V. Kolmanovsky, IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control, vol. 64(7), pp. 2883-2889.
2019 - “Embedding constrained Model Predictive Control in a continuous-time dynamic feedback”, M.M. Nicotra, D. Liao-McPherson, I.V. Kolmanovsky, IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control, vol. 64(5), pp. 1932-1946.
2019 - “Lipschitz Stability in discretized optimal control with application to SQP”, A.L. Dontchev, I.V. Kolmanovsky, M.I. Krastanov, M.M. Nicotra, V.M. Veliov, SIAM Journal on Control and Optimization, vol. 57(1), pp. 468-489.
2018 - “The Explicit Reference Governor: A general framework for the closed-form control of constrained nonlinear systems”, M.M. Nicotra, E. Garone, IEEE Control Systems Magazine, vol. 38(4), pp. 89-107.
2018 - “Explicit Reference Governor for linear systems”, E. Garone, M.M. Nicotra, L. Ntogramatzidis, International Journal of Control, vol. 91(6), pp. 1415-1430.
2017 - “Nonlinear control of a tethered UAV: the taut cable case”, M.M. Nicotra, R. Naldi, E. Garone, Automatica, vol. 78, pp 174-184.
2016 - “Fast Reference Governor for linear systems”, M.M. Nicotra, E. Garone, I. V. Kolmanovsky, AIAA Journal of Guidance, Control, and Dynamics, vol 40(2), pp. 461-465.
2016 - “Explicit Reference Governor for constrained nonlinear systems”, E. Garone, M.M. Nicotra, IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control, vol. 61(5), pp. 1379-1384.
2015 - “Sufficient conditions for the stability of a class of second order systems”, M.M. Nicotra, R. Naldi, E. Garone, Systems and Control Letters, vol. 84, pp. 1-6.
Conference Proceedings
2023 - “Influence of Discretization in Dynamically Embedded Model Predictive Control”, Y. Gautam, M.M. Nicotra, IFAC World Congress, to appear.
2023 - “Attitude Trajectory Optimization and Momentum Conservation with Control Moment Gyroscopes”, T. Dearing, J. Hauser, C. Petersen, M.M. Nicotra, X. Chen, IFAC World Congress, to appear.
2023 - “Application of Quantum Optimal Control to Shaken Lattice Interferometry”, J. Shao, L.-Y. Chih, M. Naris, M. Holland, M.M. Nicotra, Proc. of the American Control Conference, to appear.
2022 - “Analysis of time-distributed model predictive control when using a regularized primal-dual gradient optimizer”, T. Skibik, M.M. Nicotra, IEEE 61st Conference on Decision and Control (L-CSS option).
2022 - “A Lyapunov-based Shaking Function for a Class of Non-bilinear Quantum Systems”, J. Shao, M.M. Nicotra, Proc. of the American Control Conference, pp. 850-855.
2022 - “A Nonlinear Predictive Control Strategy for Landing on an Asteroid”, S. Van Leeuwen, T. Skibik, M.M. Nicotra, I. Kolmanovsky, D. Liao-McPherson, Proc. of the American Control Conference, pp. 443-449.
2021 - “Feasibility Governor for Linear Model Predictive Control”, T. Skibik, D. Liao-McPherson, T. Cunis, I.V. Kolmanovsky, M.M. Nicotra, Proc. of the American Control Conference, pp. 2329-2335.
2020 - “Stabilizing Formation Systems with Nonholonomic Agents”, T.L. Dearing, X. Chen, M.M. Nicotra, IEEE 59thConference on Decision and Control (L-CSS option).
2020 - “Fuel-Balanced Formation Flight Control of Underactuated Satellites”, T.L. Dearing, C.D. Petersen, M.M. Nicotra, X. Chen, Proc. of the American Control Conference, pp. 4319-4324.
2020 - “Mobile Sensing for Wind Field Estimation in Wind Farms”, D.J. Pasley, M.M. Nicotra, L. Pao, J. King, C. Bay, Proc. of the American Control Conference, pp. 4071-4076.
2020 - “Distributed Reinforcement Learning for Cooperative Multi-Robot Object Manipulation”, G. Ding, J.J. Koh, K. Merckaert, B. Vanderborght, M.M. Nicotra, C. Heckman, A. Roncone, L. Chen, Proc. of 19th International Conference on Autonomous Agents and MultiAgent Systems, pp. 1831-1833.
2019 - “A Semismooth Predictor Corrector Method for Suboptimal Model Predictive Control”, D. Liao-McPherson, M.M. Nicotra, I.V. Kolmanovsky, Proc. of IEEE 18th European Control Conference, pp. 2749-2755.
Finalist for the Best Student Paper Award
2018 - “A Fast Reference Governor for the constrained control of linear discrete-time systems with parametric uncertainties”, L. Burlion, M.M. Nicotra, I.V. Kolmanovsky, Proc. of IEEE 57th Conference on Decision and Control, pp. 6289-6294.
2018 - “A semismooth predictor corrector method for Real-Time parametric optimization with applications in Model Predictive Control”, D. Liao-McPherson, M.M. Nicotra, I.V. Kolmanovsky, Proc. of IEEE 57th Conference on Decision and Control, pp. 3600-3607.
2018 - “Explicit Reference Governor Toolbox (ERGT)”, A. Cotorruelo Jiménez, D. Limón, M.M. Nicotra, E. Garone, Proc. of IEEE 4th International Forum on Research and Technology for Society and Industry, pp. 1-6.
2018 - “Constrained control of robotic manipulators using the Explicit Reference Governor”, K. Merckaert, M.M. Nicotra, B. Vanderborght, E. Garone, Proc. of IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems, pp. 5155-5162.
2018 - “Dynamically Embedded Model Predictive Control”, M.M. Nicotra, D. Liao-McPherson, I.V. Kolmanovsky, Proc. of the American Control Conference, pp. 4957-4962.
2017 - “Computationally-efficient constrained control of the State-of-Charge of a Li-ion battery cell”, R. Romagnoli, L.D. Couto, M.M. Nicotra, M. Kinnaert, E. Garone, Proc. of the IEEE 56th Conference on Decision and Control, pp. 1433-1439.
2017 - “Control of fully actuated Unmanned Aerial Vehicles with actuator saturation”, B. Convens, K. Merckaert, M.M. Nicotra, R. Naldi, E. Garone, IFAC-PapersOnLine (20th IFAC World Congress), vol. 50, pp. 12715-12720.
2016 - “An Explicit Reference Governor for the robust constrained control of nonlinear systems”, M.M. Nicotra, E. Garone, Proc. of the IEEE 55th Conference on Decision and Control, pp. 1502-1507.
2016 - “A Robust Explicit Reference Governor for the constrained control of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles”, M.M. Nicotra, R. Naldi, E. Garone, Proc. of the American Control Conference, pp. 6284-6289.
2016 - “SOC and SOH estimation for Li-ion batteries based on an equivalent hydraulic model. Part I: SOC and surface concentration estimation”, L.D. Couto, J. Schorsh, M.M. Nicotra, M. Kinnaert, Proc. of the American Control Conference, pp. 4022-4028.
2015 - “Control of Euler-Lagrange systems subject to constraints: an Explicit Reference Governor approach”, M.M. Nicotra, E. Garone, Proc. of the IEEE 54th Conference on Decision and Control, pp. 1154-1159.
2015 - “Explicit Reference Governor for continuous time nonlinear systems subject to convex constraints”, M.M. Nicotra, E. Garone, Proc. of the American Control Conference, pp. 4561-4566.
2015 - “A Distributed Explicit Reference Governor for constrained control of multiple UAVs”, M.M. Nicotra, M. Bartulovic, E. Garone, B. Sinopoli, IFAC Proceedings Volumes (5th IFAC Workshop on Distributed Estimation and Control in Networked Systems), vol. 48 (22), pp. 156-161.
2014 - “Taut cable control of a tethered UAV”, M.M. Nicotra, R. Naldi, E. Garone, IFAC Proceedings Volumes (19th IFAC World Congress), vol. 47(3), pp. 3190-3195.
Honourable Mention for the Young Author Prize
2014 - “Nonlinear control of an actuated tethered airfoil”, S. Eeckout, M.M. Nicotra, R. Naldi, E. Garone, Proc. of the 22nd Mediterranean Conference on Control and Automation, pp. 1412-1417.
2014 - “Nested saturation control of an UAV carrying a suspended load”, M.M. Nicotra, E. Garone, R. Naldi, Proc. of American Control Conference, pp. 3585-3590.
2012 - “Hybrid model for haptic lung palpation”, M.M. Nicotra, A. Buttafuoco, M. Kinnaert, IFAC Proceedings Volumes (16th IFAC Symposium on System Identification), vol. 16 (1), pp. 1431-1436.