inControl
Episodes
ep43 - Steve Brunton: DMD, Koopman, SINDy, Eigensteve Channel, HydroGym, Optimization, and much more
15 Apr 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 - Intro01:15 - Origin story: early path and the road to science 04:20 - On graphical visualization and aphantasia 08:08 - The interest ...
ep42 - inControl guide to ... the Nyquist criterion
16 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 – Intro04:43 – Life and background08:45 – Bell Labs13:42 – Inventing the negative feedback amplifier18:15 – Nyquist's land...
ep41 - A minimal history of optimal control
16 Feb 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 - Intro02:55 - Brachistochrone problem20:52 - Beginning of the calculus of variations32:00 - Principle of least action42:37 - Maximum pri...
ep40 Jeff Shamma: gain scheduling, nonlinear control, learning & dissipativity in games, jiu-jitsu
15 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 - Intro03:18 - Early days: why control, M. Athans, and IDSS12:21 - What is gain scheduling?33:37 - Paradigm shifts & the ‘90s: Minn...
ep39 - Female influencers in control
16 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 - Intro05:01 - Female Influencers in Control — The Backstory08:08 - Sofya Kovalevskaya15:21 - Irmgard Lotz26:16 - A new wave of control...
ep38 - inControl guide to ... Feedback
17 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 – Intro07:22 – Anatomy of a feedback loop15:12 – A brief historical recap on the history of feedback23:40 – Inventing the negativ...
ep37 - A. M. Lyapunov: The General Problem of Stability of Motion
16 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Outline 00:00 - Intro 03:12 - Early life 09:07 - St. Petersburg: Stability of Ellipsoidal Bodies 20:13 - Kharkov: The General Problem of the Stability...
ep36 - Markos Papageorgiou: Traffic Control — Theory and Practice
15 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 – Intro00:51 – Early steps in research09:55 – Historical overview of traffic control25:20 – What is traffic?34:06 – Road traffi...
ep35 - Cosimo Della Santina: From Dexterous Manipulation to Soft Robotics and Embodied Intelligence
15 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Outline 00:00 – Intro 01:19 – Early steps: PhD journey & robotic hands 15:42 – What is a soft robot?23:35 – MIT years & models of soft...
ep34 - inControl guide to ... Controllability & Observability
17 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 - Intro01:06 - The big idea03:42 - Controllability, observability, and ... the space race!14:52 - Kálmán and the state-space paradigm...
ep33 - Mathukumalli Vidyasagar: control synthesis, robotics, randomized algorithms, learning, compressed sensing, non-convex optimization
16 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 - Intro00:42 - “Research should be fun”02:02 - Early steps in research09:00 - Book writing and meeting C. Desoer18:33 - Control synth...
ep32 - Anders Rantzer: robust control, IQCs, nonlinear and hybrid systems, positivity and scalable control, adaptive control
16 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 - Intro and early steps in control06:42 - Journey to the US08:30 - Kharitonov's theorem and early influences12:10 - From Lund to KTH...
ep31 - Miroslav Krstić: nonlinear adaptive control, PDEs, delays, extremum seeking, safety, neural operators for control
15 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 - Intro01:07 - Early steps02:47 - Why control?05:20 - The move to the US07:40 - The first journal paper13:30 - What is backstepping?17:08...
ep30 - Manfred Morari: A pioneer’s journey through robust, predictive and computational control
17 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 - Intro03:26 - Development: ETH Zürich07:15 - Growth: Minnesota and Wisconsin36:16 - Productivity: Caltech53:28 - Change: ETH Zürich01:...
ep29 - Richard Bellman: The Father of Dynamic Programming
17 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Outline 00:00 - Intro02:42 - Early life10:24 - WWII, Johns Hopkins, Belleville, Madison 17:17 - Princeton 20:30 - Los Alamos24:12 - Back to Princeton3...
ep28 - Karl Henrik Johansson: Semper in Motu - Hybrid Systems, Wireless and Event-Based Control, Mobility, Cybersecurity, and Societal Challenges
15 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 Intro01:19 Swedish control heritage and early steps05:21 PhD at Lund and relay feedback systems15:40 Berkeley years19:58 Hybrid systems26...
ep27 - Munther Dahleh: L1 control, agile robotic maneuvering, abstractions, cascaded failures, markets, data and systems for societal problems
17 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 - Intro02:14 - Early steps in control05:36 - L1 control17:09 - Relay feedback systems24:32 - Agile robotic maneuvers29:31 - Abstractions ...
ep26 - Bart De Moor: subspace identification, linear & multilinear algebra, quantum information, ML
21 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 - Intro00:49 - Early education and PhD in control10:35 - Non-negative linear algebra & modelling uncertainty principle22:50 - Influen...
ep25 - Francesco Bullo: Geometric control, robotic networks, networked systems, mathematical sociology, contraction theory
15 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Outline01:16 - Intro02:28 - Early steps in Italy and California13:00 - From Riemannian geometry …17:01 - … to geometric control, robotics and loco...
ep24 - Brian Douglas: Boeing, Control Videos, Resourcium, Map of Control Theory, Cartoons, Mathworks
14 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 - Intro01:00 - From Boeing to Planetary Resources08:57 - The origin of control videos17:07 - About teaching style20:52 - The (unnecessary...
ep23 - Bassam Bamieh: Sampled Data Systems, PDEs, Distributed Control of Spatially Invariant Systems, Coherence, Resistive Losses, Cochlear Instabilities, and Stochasticity in Feedback Loops
15 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 - Intro01:17 - Early Years04:17 - The “Scenic Route” to Control Theory12:44 - Sampled Data Systems22:26 - Linear Parameter Varying (L...
ep22 - Alberto Sangiovanni Vincentelli, Part II: Cyberphysical and hybrid systems, Contracts, Chiplets, Models of computation, Time, Innovative Ecosystems, BioBricks, Neuromorphics
15 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 - Intro01:28 - Platform-based design (PBD) in biology16:42 - Cyberphysical systems, automotive industry, hybrid systems27:32 - Contra...
ep21 - Alberto Sangiovanni Vincentelli, Part I: Classics, EDA, Logic Synthesis, SPICE, Intel x386, Cadence, Synopsis, Platform-based design
15 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 - Intro02:40 - Classic Studies06:51 - Early Steps in Berkeley between Optimization and Circuits Theory16:04 - Back to Italy... and back t...
ep20 - Aude Billard: From Robot learning to Dexterous Manipulation and Human-Robot Interaction
16 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 - Intro00:58 - Early steps… in physics!05:17 - AI in Edinburgh08:00 - Connectionism10:37 - Robot learning19:02 - Imitation learning23:0...
ep19 - Naomi Ehrich Leonard, Part II: Unveiling the Dynamics of Collective Decision-Making from Flocking Starlings to Desert Ants, Political Polarization, and the Creative Dance Between Arts and Control Theory
15 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 - Intro01:33 - Starling Flock Formations07:17 - Harvesters ants in the desert16:54 - Decision making in the natural world and opinion dyn...
ep18 - Naomi Ehrich Leonard, Part I: Geometric Control on Lie Groups, Underwater Vehicles and Collective Motion, Coordination in Animal Groups, Decision Making in Honeybees and Bifurcation Theory
13 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 - Intro01:05 - Dancing and control theory03:31 - Geometric control on Lie groups09:14 - Underwater vehicles and geometric mechanics18:45 ...
ep17 - Tryphon Georgiou, Part II: Power spectra, optimal mass transport, Wasserstein geometry, turbulence, thermodynamics, quantum mechanics, adjustable one-ports
11 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 - Intro00:47 - Mind the gap (metric)03:16 - Moment problems and Nevanlinna interpolation06:53 - “Everything relates to everything else”...
ep16 - Tryphon Georgiou, Part I: Marathons, Interpolation problems, Metrics, and the Arrow of Time
14 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Outline00:00 - Intro01:50 - Running marathons 05:19 - The Center13:28 - On creativity15:24 - From algebraic system theory to moment problems43:39 - T...
ep15 - Davide Scaramuzza: Vision-Based Navigation, Agile Drone Racing, Perception-Aware Control, and Event Cameras
16 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, we dive into the world of flying robots with Davide Scaramuzza (University of Zürich), a leading expert in vision-based navigation, ...
ep14 - Cleve Moler: Numerical Analyst, First MATLAB Programmer, and MathWorks Co-Founder
09 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, we chat with Cleve Moler, a pioneer in numerical mathematics, creator of MATLAB and co-founder of MathWorks. We cover the birth of ...
ep13 - John Doyle, Part II: Architectures, Universal laws, Layers, Levels, and Diversity-enabled Sweet Spots
14 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, we chat again with John Doyle about the frontiers of control theory. Starting from the fascinating interplay between bacteria, physic...
ep12 - John Doyle, Part I: A Pioneer's Guide to Robust Control - The Past, Present, and Future
15 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, we sit down with John Doyle, a living legend in the field of robust control, to delve into his incredible journey in control theory. ...
ep11 - Mustafa Khammash: Cybergenetics
14 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, our guest is Mustafa Khammash. Mustafa is the director of the Control Theory and Systems Biology Lab at ETH Zürich and guides us in ...
ep10 - Stephen Boyd: Linear Matrix Inequalities, Convex Optimization, Disciplined Convex Programming, Rock & Roll
15 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, our guest is Stephen Boyd. Stephen is the Samsung Professor in the School of Engineering at Stanford University. Join as we dive de...
ep9 - Rodolphe Sepulchre: Spiking control systems, nonlinear control, neuroscience and optimization on manifolds
15 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Our guest in this episode is Rodolphe Sepulchre, Professor of Engineering at KU Leuven in the Deparment of Electrical Engineering (STADIUS) and at the...
ep8 - Anuradha Annaswamy: Adaptive Control - From the "Brave Era" to Reinforcement Learning and Back
16 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, our guest is Anuradha Annaswamy. Anu is the Director of the Active-Adaptive Control Laboratory and Senior Research Scientist at the M...
ep7 - Jean-Jacques Slotine: Sliding, nonlinear and adaptive control, contraction theory, complex networks, optimization, and machine learning
29 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, our guest is Jean-Jacques Slotine, Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Information Sciences as well as Brain and Cognitive Scienc...
ep6 - Norbert Wiener and Cybernetics
17 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, we delve into the extraordinary life of Norbert Wiener, the founding father of cybernetics - the science “control and communication...
ep5 - Sean Meyn: Markov chains, networks, reinforcement learning, beekeeping and jazz
18 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, our guest is Sean Meyn, Professor and Robert C. Pittman Eminent Scholar Chair in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineerin...
ep4 - Alessandro Chiuso: From system identification to computer vision and back
12 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, our guest is Alessandro Chiuso. Alessandro is a Professor in the Department of Information Engineering at the University of Padova. T...
ep3 - Ben Recht: A tour of optimization, machine learning, and control
16 May 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, our guest is Ben Recht. Ben is a Professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences at the University of Cal...
ep2 - Florian Dörfler: Power is nothing without control
16 May 2022
Contributed by Lukas
This episode features an interview with Florian Dörfler, who is an Associate Professor at the Automatic Control Laboratory at ETH Zürich, Switzerlan...
ep1 - A brief prehistory of control theory
16 May 2022
Contributed by Lukas
This episode breaks the ice with a bit of the pre-history of control theory. We discuss three iconic ancestors of the science of feedback, including w...