Curriculum vitae Alberto Bemporad

Personal data

• Born in Florence, Italy, on March 26, 1970
• Marital status: married, two children
• Tel. +39 0583 432 6600, Fax +39 02 700 543345
• Email: alberto.bemporad@imtlucca.it
  
• Home page: http://cse.lab.imtlucca.it/~bemporad

Work experience

• 2011-today: Full professor, IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca, Italy
• 2011-today: Cofounder of the company ODYS S.r.l.
• 2012-2015: Director of the IMT Institute for Advanced Studies Lucca
• 2010-2011: Associate professor, Faculty of Engineering, University of Trento, Italy
• 2005-2009: Associate professor, Faculty of Engineering, University of Siena, Italy
• 1999-2005: Assistant professor ("Ricercatore"), Faculty of Engineering, University of Siena, Italy
• 1997-2002: Postdoctoral fellow and then senior researcher at the Automatic Control Laboratory, ETH, Zurich, Switzerland
• 1994/1995: Officer in the "Corpo Tecnico" of the Italian Army (Electronic and Precision Equipment Military Factory, Roma, Italy)
  
• 1993/1994: Research assistant, University of Florence, Italy
• Visiting professor at Stanford University (2017), University of Michigan (2016) and Zhejiang University (2015)
  

Education

• 1997: Ph.D. degree in Control Engineering, University of Florence, Dipartimento di Sistemi e Informatica. Advisor: Prof. Edoardo Mosca
• 1996/1997: visiting researcher at the Center for Robotics and Automation, Dept. Systems Science and Math, Washington University, St. Louis, MO, USA (invited by Prof. T.J. Tarn)
• 1993: Degree granted in Electrical Engineering summa cum laude, University of Florence (average mark 29.8/30; 19 out of 28 exams cum laude)
• 1988: Scientific High School leaving certificate, with full marks (60/60)

Awards and professional recognitions

• IFAC High-Impact Paper Award for the 2011-14 triennial
• IEEE Fellow (since January 2010)
• Certificate of scientific ability for the position of full professor by the Commission for Scientific Merits of the Italian Control Association "C.I.R.A." (Centro Interuniversitario di Ricerca in Automatica), December 2005
• Senior Member of the IEEE Control Systems Society (since July 2006)
• Best master thesis award "G. Barzilai", IEEE Centre and South Italy section, 4th edition
• Best master thesis award "R. Mariani", AEI (Italian Electrotechnical Association) for year 1993

Language skills

• Italian: Mother tongue
• English: Fluent. TOEFL score 607 (August 1995). Graduate Record Examinations (GRE) score: 610 (verbal), 750 (quantitative), 710 (analytical) (December 1996)

Research activities

My research activities concern embedded real-time optimization for control of dynamical processes, with efforts covering the investigation of theoretical aspects, the development of numerical algorithms and software tools, and their application to real-life problems of industrial and economic interest, such as in the areas of automotive and aerospace systems, financial engineering, smart grids and energy markets, process control.

The research activities carried out starting in 1993 are summarized below. Such activities lead to more than 300 scientific publications, detailed in the publication list, and 10 patents issued (plus some more pending). My H-number in Google Scholar is equal to 71, with the five most cited papers having 2883, 2647, 864, 778, 692 citations (see my Google Scholar page), and is equal to 55 in Scopus (data acquired on October 8, 2018).

• Model predictive control. Model Predictive Control (MPC) is widely adopted in industry as an effective means to control large multivariable constrained systems. The main idea of MPC is to choose the control action by solving an optimal control problem on line that minimizes a performance criterion over a future horizon,  subject to constraints on process variables. Several issues in MPC were investigated: embedded optimization methods for linear MPC; stochastic MPC for constrained linear systems; decentralized MPC for spatially-distributed large-scale systems; MPC based on wireless sensor feedback; reference governors that supervise conventional controller operations by "smoothing out" the reference trajectory for linear, nonlinear, uncertain systems, for systems teleoperated in the presence of arbitrarily large network delays, for robotic manipulators with constraints; robust MPC based on set-membership state estimation and min-max MPC; explicit MPC for computing the control law off line and development of multiparametric solvers for linear, hybrid, uncertain, quantized systems, and anti-windup L₂ synthesis.
  
  
• Hybrid systems. Hybrid models based on mixed-integer models for describing systems composed of both continuous and discrete dynamic components. Accomplished research results: modeling,  MPC, formal verification and reachability analysis, observability analysis, fault detection and state estimation, scheduling and optimal control, stochastic hybrid systems, event-based hybrid systems, identification of hybrid models, numerical solvers for mixed-integer quadratic optimization and suboptimal techniques.
  

• Automotive applications. Several case studies in automotive applications investigated using MPC and hybrid techniques in collaboration with industrial research centers (Ford Motor Company, General Motors, Jaguar UK, Fiat Research Center Italy): adaptive cruise control, semiactive suspension, magnetic actuators, hybrid electrical vehicles, active steering, idle speed control, control of air-to-fuel ratio, traction control, control of direct injection engines, of dry-clutch engagement, of robotized gearbox for reduction of consumptions and emissions; Synthesis of sliding-mode controllers for anti-skid systems. Several other MPC applications in the automotive domain carried out as a scientific consultant of ODYS S.r.l..
  
  
• Aerospace applications. MPC of satellite attitude (in collaboration with Thales Alenia Space, France), MPC of formations of unmanned air vehicles (quadcopters) with experimental realization of laboratory prototypes.
   
• Financial engineering applications. Stochastic MPC for dynamic option hedging(in collaboration with MPS Capital Services, Italy).
  

• Energy systems. Recent activities started in stochastic MPC for bidding on day-ahead/ancillary services/balancing electricity markets, and for power dispatch in smart microgrids (within the European project E-PRICE "Price-based control of electrical power systems" and in collaboration with Dolomiti Energia, Italy).
   
• Wireless sensor networks. MPC over wireless sensor feedback was tested experimentally in wireless automation laboratory activities. Wireless monitoring applications were also experimentally carried out in the laboratory for estimating environmental parameters in agricultural applications (temperature, humidity, speed and wind direction, leaf wetness, soil moisture, solar radiation), for vehicle detection through magnetoresistive sensors, human motion detection through pyroelectric sensors and accelerometers (testbed: Telos nodes and data acquisition directly in the MATLAB environment).

• Computational geometry. Developed theory and algorithms for convexity recognition and computation of the union of polyhedra, for inner and outer approximation of polyhedra via unions of hyper-rectangles, for computing polyhedral invariant sets from invariant ellipsoidal sets using DC (difference of convex functions) optimization ideas.

• Robotics. Path planning for mobile robots. Investigated on-line path planners based on velocity fields for car-like mobile robots in the presence of obstacles,Navigation of mobile robots using sonar sensors, with experiments on two mobile robots constructed at the Dipartimento di Sistemi e Informatica, University of Florence, Italy;on-line trajectory planning for robotic manipulators with experiments on a PUMA 560 robot (Washington University, St.Louis). Design and construction of a mobile robot based on the Motorola 68HC11F1 microcontroller (during the military service).
  
  
• Development of MATLAB/Simulink toolboxes. Development of the Hybrid Toolbox for the analysis and design of hybrid systems and hybrid/explicit MPC controllers, which has been applied since 2003 to numerous control problems in industry and in academia and downloaded about 7000 times; development of the Model Predictive Control Toolbox distributed by The Mathworks, Inc.; development of the MPCTOOL toolbox and of the MPCSofT toolbox for the European Space Agency, and other MPC software tailored to industrial production.

Teaching activities

• Undergraduate courses:
  
  • 2009/10 - 2010/11: "Automatic Control", University of Trento, Engineering School
    
  • 2001/02 - 2008/09: "Digital Control", University of Siena, Engineering School
  • 2001/02 - 2008/09: "Control Systems Technology", University of Siena, Engineering School
  • 2003/04 - 2008/09: "Process Control", University of Siena, Engineering School
  • 2001/02: "Introduction to Linear Systems", University of Siena, Engineering School
  • From 2001/02 to 2007/08: "Laboratory of Control Systems Technology and PLC", University of Siena, Engineering School
  • 2000/01: "Linear Systems", University of Siena, Engineering School 
  • 1997-2002: "Model Predictive Control" ETH Zurich (lectures)
  • 1999-2000: "Control Systems II", ETH Zurich (lectures and assistance)
  • 1997: Teaching Assistant in "Optimization" (Prof. M.Amin), Washington University, St. Louis, MO
  • 1994: Teaching assistant in Automatic Control (Prof. A. Vicino), University of Siena
    
    
• PhD schools (organization and teaching):
  
  • 2017: "7th oCPS PhD School on Cyber-Physical Systems," Lucca, June 12-15, 2017.
  • 2015: "6th DISC Summer School on Control for Cyber-Physical Systems", Zandvoort (Amsterdam, The Netherlands), June 1-4, 2015
    
  • 2013: "5th HYCON2 PhD School on Control of Networked and Large-Scale Systems and EFFINET PhD School on Control of Drinking Water Networks", Lucca, July 1-5, 2013
  • 2011: "4th HYCON PhD School on Control of Networked and Large-Scale Systems", organization and participation as a lecturer, Trento, June 21-24, 2011
  • 2009: "3rd WIDE PhD School on Networked Control Systems", organization and participation as a lecturer, Siena, July 7-9, 2009
  • 2007: "2nd HYCON PhD School on Hybrid Systems", organization and participation as a lecturer, Siena, July 16-19, 2007
  • 2005: "1st HYCON PhD School on Hybrid Systems", organization and participation as a lecturer, Siena, July 19-22, 2005 
  • 2003: "DISC Summer School on Modeling and Control of Hybrid Systems", organization and participation as a lecturer, June 23-26, 2003
    
    
• Graduate courses & workshops:
  
  • 2012-18: PhD course Model Predictive Control, IMT Lucca.
    
  • 2016-18: PhD course Identification, Analysis and Control of Dynamical Systems, IMT Lucca.
  • 2018: PhD course Numerical Optimization, IMT Lucca.
    
  • Industrial course on "Model Predictive Control,", Ford Motor Company, Dearborn (MI), October 24-28, 2016.
  • PhD course on "Model Predictive Control", Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China, May 25-29, 2015.
    
  • Lecture on "Stochastic Dynamic Optimization for Trading and Dispatching on Intra-day Electricity Markets", E-Quant Bootcamp on Quantitative Analysis and Modelling for Energy Trading and Risk Management, IMT Lucca, October 17, 2014.
  • PhD course on Model Predictive Control, Univ. Nazarbayev, Astana, Kazakhstan, October 20-24, 2014.
  • PhD course on Stochastic and Hybrid MPC, Univ. Stuttgart, Germany, April 23-27, 2012.
  • Lectures on "Explicit and hybrid MPC", Workshop on Model Predictive Control, IFAC World Congress, Milano, August 28, 2011
  • Lecture on "MPC design methods for networked systems," Final WIDE Workshop on Networked Control Systems, IFAC World Congress, Milano, August 27, 2011
  • Lectures on "Explicit MPC, hybrid MPC, future trends in MPC", Italian PhD school on control, Bertinoro (July 14-16, 2011) (Slides 1,2,3)
  • 2008: Short course "Modeling and Control of Hybrid Systems", Summer School on Hybrid Simulation / E-Learning, Malignano (SI), September 1, 2008
  • 2008: Short course "Optimization models and methods", Danieli Automation, Buttrio (UD), April 17, 2008
  • 2008: PhD course "Hybrid predictive control and wireless sensor networkd", PhD School in Information Engineering, University of Naples "Federico II", February 25-29, 2008
  • 2006: PhD course "Model Predictive Control of Hybrid Systems", Escuela de doctorado en control predictivo de sistemas hìbridos y con restricciones, UPC, Barcelona, Spain, July 17-21, 2006
  • 2005: Workshop on "Model Predictive Control of Hybrid Systems" at the joint Conference on Decision and Control and European Control Conference, Sevilla, Spain, December 11, 2005
  • 2004, 2005: "Decision support systems - Mathematical programming models", Master in Digital Economy and E-Business, University of Siena
  • 2004: Intensive course on "Model Predictive Control", Dept. of Electrical Engineering, University of Linköpings, Sweden, September 22-24, 2004
  • 2003: Short course on "Hybrid and Explicit Model Predictive Control", Ford Research Laboratories, Dearborn, MI, December 2-4, 2003
  • 2003-2008: Short course on "Advanced Robust and Optimal Control Techniques - Hybrid Systems", Fiat Research Center, Orbassano (TO), Italy. From 2003 to 2008 editions
  • 2003: PhD School on "Hybrid Systems", Bertinoro, Italy, July 16-19, 2003
  • 2003: Short course on "Model Predictive Control", KTH Stockholm, Sweden, April 7-9, 2003
    
  • 2003: Short course on "Modeling, Control, and Reachability Analysis of Hybrid Systems", Dutch Institute of Systems and Control (DISC) School, March 31, 2003
    
  • 2001: Short course on Hybrid Systems, University of Pisa, December 11-12, 2001
    
  • 2001: Short course on Hybrid Systems, University of Florence, May 10-11, 2001
  • 2001: PhD School on "Hybrid and Explicit Model Predictive Control", Bertinoro, Italy, July 18-21, 2001
    
  • 2001: short course "Model Predictive Control", Ford Research Laboratories, Dearborn, MI, June 21-22, 2001

Industrial collaborations

• ODYS S.r.l. (cofounder and scientific advisor), The Mathworks, Inc., Ford Motor Company, General Motors, ABB Corporate Research, Fiat Research Center, Kawasaki Steel, Danieli Automation, ENEL, United Technologies Research Center, Thales Alenia Space, Airbus, MPS Capital Services, DENSO Automotive GmbH.

Scientific collaborations

• UC Berkeley (USA), UC Santa Barbara (USA), Stanford University (USA), University of Michigan (USA), Zhejiang University (China), University of Pennsylvania (USA), KU Leuven (Belgium), KTH Stockholm (Sweden), University of Linköpings (Sweden), Washington University (USA), Georgia Institute of Technology (USA), University of Pennsylvania (USA), ETH Zurich (Switzerland), CalTech (USA), Instituto Superior Técnico (Portugal), Eindhoven University of Technology (The Netherlands), Delft University of Technology (The Netherlands), University of Trondheim (Norway), University of Sevilla (Spain), University of Zaragoza (Spain), UPC Barcelona (Spain), University of Florence (Italy), University of Pisa (Italy), University of Roma II "Tor Vergata" (Italy), University of Cagliari (Italy), University of Padova (Italy).
  

Research projects

• European Commission
  • 2015-2018: European project DISIRE - Integrated Process Control based on Distributed In-Situ Sensors into Raw Material and Energy Feedstock, H2020-SPIRE-2014 (2015-2018, 447k euro)
  • 2012-2014: European project EFFINET - Efficient Integrated Real-time Monitoring and Control of Drinking Water Networks, 7th framework programme (422k euro)
    
  • 2008-2011: European project WIDE - Decentralized and Wireless Control of Large-Scale Systems, 7th framework programme (490k euro, project coordinator, total budget 1.8M euro)
  • 2010-2013: European Network of Excellence HYCON2 - Highly Complex and Networked Control Systems, European Commission, FP7-ICT Network of Excellence (280k euro)
  • 2009-2012: European project E-PRICE - Price-based Control of Electrical Power Systems, 7th framework programme (371k euro)
  • 2009-2012: European project MOBY-DIC - Model-based synthesis of digital electronic circuits for embedded control, 7th framework programme (322k euro)
  • 2004-2008: European network of excellence, HYCON - Hybrid Control: Taming Heterogeneity and Complexity of Networked Embedded Systems, 6th framework programme (340k euro)
  • 2003: European project CC - Control and computation, fifth framework programme (100k euro)
  • 2002-2005: Marie Curie Control Training Site, fifth framework programme, for hosting three visiting researchers (10k euro, 10k euro, 5k euro).
  • 1998-2000: European project, VHS - Verificationof Hybrid Systems, fourth framework programme (co-responsible for the ETH unit) (150k euro)
    
    
• European Agencies
  
  • 2012-2015: ESA Networking Partnering Agreement "Model Predictive Control for Adaptable Space Applications", Contract no. 4000106153 (2012-2015, 90k)
  • 2011: Research project "QP Solver for the Enhancement of the MPCSofT Tool", ESA Contract no. 4000104425 (2011, 10k)
  • 2010-2012: Research project NICE - Nonlinear innovative control designs and evaluation, European Defence Agency (155k euro)
  • 2010-2012: Research project ROBMPC - Robust model predictive control of space constrained systems, European Space Agency (132k euro)
  • 2009-2010: Research project ORCSAT - On-line Reconfiguration Control System and Avionics Technologies, European Space Agency (80k euro)
    
    
• National and local funding
  
  • 2005-2006: PRIN project MACSI - Advanced control methodologies for hybrid dynamical systems (37k euro)
  • 2003-2004: PRIN project Models for optimization, control and coordination of distributedmanufacturing systems (50k euro)
  • 2007: National Research Council project within the FIRB project Public debt management for the application of advanced mathematical models,MPC, and stochastic optimization (10k euro)
  • 2003: Research project Optimization methods for hybrid systems, University of Siena (14k euro)
  • 2005-2006: Research project Optimization-based decision-making algorithms for heterogeneous networkedcooperative systems, University of Siena, 23k euro (project coordinator).
    
    
• Industrial funding: several research collaborations funded by different companies.
  
  
• Reviewer of research projects for several funding agencies: European Commission (European Research Council and VI, VII framework programme), Italian Ministry of "Attività Produttive", Italian Ministry of Education, Research and University, Dutch Science Foundation, Irish Science Foundation, Swedish Science Foundation, INRIA (France), Veneto Region, Emilia Romagna Region, Marche Region.

Services to the scientific community

• Associate Editor, IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control (2001-2005)
• Chair of the IEEE Control Systems Society Technical Committee on Hybrid Systems (2002-2010)
• Member of the Technical Activities Board, Control Systems Society. Served on the Program Committee of the IEEE CDC 2002, 2004, 2008.
• Program Committee member of the "Hybrid Systems Computation and Control" workshops 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010
• International Program Committee member of the "1st IFAC Workshop on Estimation and Control of Networked Systems (NecSys'09), 24-26 September, 2009, Venice, Italy.
• International Program Committee member of the IFAC Conference on the Analysis and Design of Hybrid Systems (ADHS), 2006 and 2009 editions.
• Program Committee member of the Int. Conf. on Informatics in Control, Automation and Robotics, 2004, 2005 editions.
• Reviewer for several international journals and conferences, reviewer of research projects.
• Participated as a PhD examiner in many foreign and Italian universities.

• Organizer of the 0th, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th PhD Schools on Control of Hybrid/Networked/Cyber-Physical Systems (with M. Heemels, M. Johansson, S. Chakraborty).
• Organizer of the "Workshop on Embedded Optimization (EMBOPT'14)", Lucca, September 8-10, 2014 (with S. Di Cairano and P. Patrinos).
• Organizer of the workshop "Optimization and control of supply chains", Siena, October 23-25, 2005 (with A. Agnetis and D. Giglio).
• Organizer of the meeting for the EU project "Computation and Control", Siena, September 2003. http://www.dii.unisi.it/cohes/cc/meetings/siena03/.
• Organizer of invited sessions at the American Control Conference, at the Conference on Decision and Control, and at the Conference on Analysis and Design of Hybrid Systems. 
  

Plenary lectures

• "Recent Advances in Model Predictive Control", 22nd International Conference on System Theory, Control and Computing, Sinaia, Romania, October 11, 2018 (plenary)
• "Model Predictive Control: Dreams, Possibilities, and Reality", 6th IFAC Conference on Nonlinear Model Predictive Control (NMPC'18), Madison, WI, August 19, 2018 (keynote)
• "Simple and Certifiable QP Algorithms for Embedded Linear MPC", 4th IFAC Conference on Nonlinear Model Predictive Control (NMPC'12), Noordwijkerhout, The Netherlands, August 23, 2012 (semi-plenary)
• "Hybrid modelling, analysis, and optimization-based control", 4th IFAC Conference on Analysis and Design of Hybrid Systems (ADHS'12), Eindhoven, The Netherlands, June 8, 2012 (plenary)
• "Modelling and Optimization-based Control of Hybrid Dynamical Systems", 6th Vienna International Conference on Mathematical Modelling (MATHMOD 2009), February 13, 2009 (plenary)
• "Explicit Model Predictive Control: A Survey", Int. Workshop on Assessment and Future Directions of Nonlinear Model Predictive Control (NMPC'08), September 5-9, 2008 (plenary)
• "Model Predictive Control of Hybrid Systems", Advanced Process Control Applications for Industry Workshop (APC2007), May 14-16, 2007 (invited half-day tutorial)
• "Optimization-based Control of Hybrid Dynamical Systems", 7th Portuguese Conference on Automatic Control (CONTROLO'2006), September 11, 2006 (plenary)
• "Modeling and Control of Hybrid Systems", 16th Mathematical Theory of Networks and Systems Conference (MTNS2004), July 8, 2004 (semi-plenary)

Student supervision

Supervisor of many postdoctoral fellows, PhD students, visiting students, research collaborators, and master thesis students.

Lucca, October 8, 2018                                                                            Alberto Bemporad