Unmanned Dynamics -- About Us

About Us

Marius Niculescu

Email: marius@u-dynamics.com

Marius Niculescu founded Unmanned Dynamics in April 2002. The newly created company provides software products such as the AeroSim aeronautical simulation blockset for Matlab, as well as consulting services in the areas of unmanned vehicles, simulation, navigation, and control system design. Unmanned Dynamics has been working closely with Cloud Cap Technology in the development of the Piccolo Avionics System.

Marius’ experience includes research and development work in aircraft dynamics and simulation, Kalman filters for navigation, and rapid prototyping of autopilot algorithms using the Matlab/Simulink/Real-Time Workshop environment. While he was holding an aeronautical engineer position with Aerosonde Robotic Aircraft Ltd., Marius developed a 6-DOF nonlinear model for the Aerosonde aircraft and implemented autopilot algorithms, including a Tropical Cyclone Navigation method. He also performed research in the area of GPS/INS integration using nonlinear Kalman filters – the results of which were presented in the paper “Sensor Fusion Algorithms for Unmanned Air Vehicles” at the IEEE Information Decision and Control 2002 conference in Adelaide, Australia.

Marius received his M.S. degree in Aeronautics and Astronautics from University of Washington in Seattle. While at the university, he performed autopilot design, simulation, and flight-testing for the Raven human-powered airplane. At the same time he became involved in the Aerosonde UAV project for which he performed autopilot gain optimization and flight control law design. His paper “Lateral Track Controller for Aerosonde UAV” (AIAA 2001-016) has won the first place in the AIAA regional student competition and it was presented at the 39^th AIAA Aerospace Sciences Meeting and Exhibit.

Before the graduate studies, Marius obtained his B.S. degree in Aeronautical Engineering in Romania, in 1997. During his undergraduate studies he accumulated knowledge in the areas of Aerodynamics, Flight Mechanics, Aircraft Structures and Manufacturing. After graduation he worked for one year as a mechanical engineer for Wacker Siltronic Corp., a semiconductor manufacturing division of Wacker-Chemie GmbH from Germany. This position provided him with hands-on knowledge in mechanical design and chemical process control.