Sonia Martínez

Benjamin W. Zweifach Endowed Chair
Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering

Research Interests

Broadly, my general areas of interest are Dynamic Systems, Robotics, and Control. I am particularly interested in the development of mathematics, analysis tools and algorithms for multi-agent systems. A multi-agent system consists of multiple parts, robots, processors or decision-makers (humans/agents) that interact with each other over a network and in an environment. Multi-agent systems can be natural or engineered, and include many exmples such as physical and social networks, epidemic networks, infrastructure (power/traffic) systems, or mixed human-robot groups.

The analysis of multi-agent systems requires the integration of several mathematical disciplines including Nonlinear/Hybrid Systems Control, Control under Uncertainty, Distributed Decision Making and Optimization, Distributed Estimation and Inference, Game Theory, and Parallel Processing, among others. I have a special interest in developing the mathematical theory and tools that can provide a basis for provably-correct algorithms for controls and robotics systems applications.

Current research focus are on data-driven control resilience of control systems and robots , safety and privacy algorithms for networked systems, and game theory for multi-agent coordination. Applications of interest include not only robotic systems (see some work in the MURO lab here), but also the analysis and design of infrastructure/complex networks. In this way, I am part of the UCSD DER Connect infrastructure project; see more information here .

For further details on our research, please read the current list of papers and visit the websites of current students listed here.


Currently Advised Students


PhD Students
  • Guillem Pascual Astivill (PhD Student, MAE - UCSD)
  • Meghan Sills (PhD Student, MAE - UCSD, co-advised with Prof. Cortes)
  • Xuting Gao (PhD Student, MAE - UCSD)
  • Benjamin Hwang (PhD Student, MAE - UCSD, co-advised with Prof. Cortes)
  • Neilabh Banzal (PhD Student, MAE - UCSD, co-advised with Prof. Cortes)
  • Avik Ghosh (PhD Student, MAE - UCSD, co-advised with Prof. Kleissl)
  • Nirabhra Mandal (PhD Student, MAE - UCSD)
  • Jun Xiang (PhD Student, SDSU - UCSD joint student, co-advised with Prof. Chen)
  • Scott Brown (PhD Student, MAE UCSD)
    Website: https://sbrown.dev/


MS Students
  • Tayna Arora (MAE MS student, Fall 2024 -present)
  • Mihir Salot (MAE MS student, Fall 2024 - Winter 2025)
  • Sam Dang (MAE MS student, Fall 2024 - Winter 2025)
  • Subhadeep Chatterjee (ECE MS student, Fall 2024 -present)


Previously Advised Students

Postdoctoral Students
  • Fei Chen (Postdoctoral student, MAE UCSD, co-advised with Prof. Cortes, December 2023-December 2024, now a postdoctoral student at MIT)
  • Mohammad Khajenejad (Postdoctoral student, MAE UCSD, Feb 2022-Sep 2024, now Professor at the University of Tulsa)
    Website: https://sites.google.com/view/mohammad-khajenejad
  • Shenyu Liu (Postdoctoral student, MAE UCSD, 2020 - 2022, now Professor at BIT)
    Website: https://shenyu-liu.github.io
  • Dimitris Boskos (Postdoctoral Student, MAE UCSD, now Professor at Delft University of Technology)
    Website: https://sites.google.com/view/dimitris-boskos/
  • Dariush Fooladivanda (Postdoctoral Student, MAE UCSD, 2018-2019 )
  • Chin-Yao Chang (Postdoctoral Student, MAE UCSD, 2017-2018, now a Senior Engineer at NREL)
    Website: https://www.nrel.gov/research/staff/chin-yao-chang.html
  • Mike Ouimet, previous website: (Postdoctoral student 2014-2015, now staff software engineer at Singular Genomics)
  • Solmaz Sajjadi Kia, website: http://carmenere.ucsd.edu/solmaz/ (UC President postdoctoral student, 2012-2014, now associate professor at UC Irvine)
  • Yu Ru (Postdoctoral Student, 2010-2012 MAE UCSD, now a senior engineer at General Electric, Shanghai, China)


PhD students
  • Paul Lathrop (PhD Student, MAE UCSD 2019 - 2023, now Software Engineer at Nuro)
  • Pengcheng Wu (PhD Student, SDSU - UCSD joint student, co-advised with Prof. Chen)
  • Parth Paritosh (PhD Student, MAE UCSD 2017 - 2023, co-advised with Prof. Atanasov, now postdoctoral fellow at DEVCOM ARL)
    Website: https://pptx.github.io/pparitosh/index.html
  • Aamodh Suresh (MAE PhD Student, 2016 - 2022, now Postdoctoral Fellow at the Devcom ARL)
  • Dan Li (MAE PhD Student, 2016 - 2021, now at Rockwell Automation)
  • Vishaal Krishnan (MAE PhD Student, 2014 - 2019, now postdoctoral fellow at Harvard University and Lund University)
    Website: http://nodes.ucsd.edu/vishaal
  • Tor Anderson (MAE PhD Student, 2015 - 2020, now at ASML)
  • Beth Boardman (PhD Student and LANL Intern, MAE UCSD, 2012-2017, now Senior Engineer at LANL)
  • Evan Gravelle (PhD Student, MAE UCSD, 2012-2017, now Senior Autonomy Engineer at Shield A.I.)
  • Eduardo José Ramírez-Llanos (PhD Student, MAE UCSD, 2012-2017, now Senior Algorithm Research Engineer at Continental AG)
  • Andrés Iván Cortés (PhD Student, 2011-2014, now at Fluence Energy)
  • Hamed Shisheh Foroush (PhD Student, 2010-2014, MAE UCSD)
  • Minghui Zhu (PhD Student, 2007-2011 MAE UCSD, now an Associate Professor at Penn State University) Website: http://www.personal.psu.edu/muz16/
  • Andrew Kwok (PhD Student, 2006-2011, MAE UCSD)
  • Sara Susca (PhD student, coadvised with Francesco Bullo during 2004-2006).
    Now a senior engineer at JPL Robotics Division


MS students
  • Shudhansu Shankar (MS Thesis Student, MAE - UCSD, 2023 - 2024, now at muranocorp)
  • Shantanu Shukla (MS Thesis Student, MAE - UCSD, 2023 - 2024, now Controls Engineer Intern at Lucid Motors, CA)
  • Tianmu Wang (MS Student, MAE - UCSD, 2022-2023, now Controls Engineer, China))
  • Brandon Bao (MS Thesis Student, MAE UCSD, 2021-2023, Now Staff Engineer at Lawrence Livermore National Lab LLNL)
  • Yunhai Han (MS Thesis Student, MAE UCSD, 2020-2021, now doing his PhD at Georgia Tech)
  • Jack Messerly (MS student, 2019-2020 ECE UCSD, now at Qualcomm)
  • Simon Hu (MS student, 2019-2020 ECE UCSD, now intern at In-Q-Tel)
  • Yasuhiro Todoya (MS Thesis Student, 2019-2020 MAE UCSD, Senior Engineer at Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Japan)
  • John Davis (MS Thesis Student, 2019-2020 MAE UCSD, now graduate research assistant of Dr. Martin UCSD Med)
  • Javier Ruiz (MS Thesis Student and LANL Intern, MAE UCSD, now at LANL)
  • Jonathan Hetchbauer (MS Thesis Student, University of Applied Sciences in Innsbruck, Austria, 2016)
  • Teymur Sadikhov (MS Student, 2008-2009, MAE UCSD, obtained his PhD
    at Georgia Tech)
  • Tianjia Chen (MS Thesis Student, 2011-2013, MAE UCSD)
  • Sulema Aranda (MS Thesis Student, 2003-2004, UIUC)


Visiting students and undergraduate interns (a very incomplete list)
  • Ana Pons (Technical University of Catalonia, visiting undergraduate student researcher, Fall 2024 -- Winter 2025)
  • Eduardo Rueda (UCSD GEAR undergraduate student researcher, Winter - Spring 2024)
  • Michael Ramirez (UCSD GEAR undergraduate student researcher, Winter - Spring 2024)
  • Matt Fan (UC Regents scholar and CSE undergraduate student, Fall 2023 - Spring 2023)
  • Liam Manatt (UCSD CSE undergraduate student researcher, Winter 2024 - Spring 2024)
  • Guillem Pascual (Technical University of Catalonia, visiting undergraduate student researcher, Summer 2023 - Spring 2024)
  • Saimai Lau (UCSD MAE undergraduate student researcher, Summer 2023 - Spring 2024, now MS student at Stanford University)
  • Zeyu Chen (UCSD MAE undergraduate student researcher, Summer 2023 - Summer 2024, now MS student at the University of Michigan)
  • Christopher Galarze-Gonzales (UCSD GEAR undergraduate student researcher, Winter-Spring 2023)
  • Pranav Vijay (UCSD CSE undergraduate student researcher, Fall 2022)
  • Natalie Nguyen, (UCSD MAE undergraduate student researcher, Fall 2022)
  • David Glukhov, (UCSD Math undergraduate student researcher, Winter-Spring 2021)
  • Pablo de Juan, (Technical University of Catalonia, visiting undergraduate student researcher, Winter-Spring 2021)
  • Melcior Pijoan, (Technical University of Catalonia, visiting undergraduate student researcher, Fall - Winter 2019)
  • Sumega Mandadi (UCSD MAE undergraduate research student, summer 2015)
  • Randy Lewis (Regents Scholar undergraduate research student, summer 2013-2014)
  • Vu Dihn (UC LEADS undergraduate research student, summer 2013)
  • Caris Moses (STARS intern undergraduate research student, summer 2012)
  • Eduardo Montijano (PhD Visiting Student, March - July 2009, University of Zaragoza, Spain,
    now Associate Professor in the Dept of Informatics and Engineering at the Universidad de, Zaragoza, Spain)
    Website: https://sites.google.com/unizar.es/eduardo-montijano
  • Ambrish Patel (Undergraduate Research Student, 2009, UCSD)
  • John Nguyen (Undergraduate Student, Spring 2009, UCSD)


Advice to students who would like to get a postgraduate degree

  • If you are an undergraduate student considering a higher education (postbachelor) degree in Systems/Controls/Robotics/Autonomy, and to be hired as a PhD student to that end, you should prepare in the following ways:
    • Take graduate-level courses on the topics that you would like to learn more about. These courses will be in general more challenging that the standard undergraduate courses. This will help you decide if the area really interests you.
    • Maintain a high GPA on the undergraduate subjects that align with systems and controls (linear circuits, signals and systems, linear controls), or the area that you like.
    • Take courses with a rigorous math content that go beyond the basic requirements of the BS degree. This includes graduate courses for MS students at your school and even undergraduate courses offered in the math department (for a BS in mathematics). These courses will prepare you to read and understand research papers and books on other graduate courses at the school of engineering. Example courses at UCSD include (280A and 289A in this order).
      Unfortunately, given the existing constraints in curriculum, an undergraduate student in MAE has not been able to learn the math concepts used in systems and controls, which pose a significant barrier to do research in this area. Sometimes, it is possible to enroll in small special topic courses in your department; you should check them out.
    • Get involved (as much as possible) with the research tasks in a lab at your school. A serious commitment is shown by learning all you need in order to contribute (persistence), identify a research task that interests you and on which you can contribute (initiative and curiosity), and then deliver on it despite problems (which shows grit, and again persistence). This requires that you put the time (typically a year) in order to see some of the fruits of your effort.