Michael Rotkowitz Explained

Michael C. Rotkowitz
Birth Date:	12 September 1974
Workplaces:	University of Maryland University of Melbourne Australian National University Royal Institute of Technology
Alma Mater:	Stanford University
Thesis Title:	Tractable Problems in Optimal Decentralized Control
Thesis Url:	https://mcrotk.github.io/publications/thesis_notes.html
Thesis Year:	2005
Doctoral Advisor:	Sanjay Lall
Awards:	PECASE (2014) NSF CAREER Award (2014) SIAM Control and Systems Theory Prize (2011) IEEE Axelby Award (2007)
Website:	https://mcrotk.github.io/

Michael Charles Rotkowitz (born 1974) is an applied mathematician best known for his work in decentralized control theory. He was a professor at the University of Maryland, College Park, where he held appointments in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) and the Institute for Systems Research (ISR), and was also affiliated with the Applied Mathematics & Statistics, and Scientific Computation Program (AMSC).

Rotkowitz took leave from his university position to work as a staff research scientist with Lyft Marketplace Labs in San Francisco, subsequently worked with Amazon Transportation Services’ Middle Mile team, and now works with Instacart.

Born in Brooklyn, Rotkowitz grew up in Old Bridge Township, New Jersey.^[1]

Education

Rotkowitz received a B.S. in mathematical and computational science, an M.S. in statistics, and an M.S. and Ph.D. in aeronautics and astronautics, all from Stanford University.

Academic career

Rotkowitz was the postdoctoral fellow in networked embedded control at the Royal Institute of Technology (KTH) in Stockholm, Sweden from 2005 to 2006, and a research fellow with the Australian National University in Canberra, Australia from 2006 to 2008. From 2008 to 2011 he served as a research fellow, senior research fellow, and Queen Elizabeth II Fellow at the University of Melbourne. From 2012 to 2019 he was assistant professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) and the Institute for Systems Research (ISR), and was also affiliated with the Applied Mathematics & Statistics, and Scientific Computation Program (AMSC), taking leave in 2018 to work in the tech industry.

Honors and awards

• IEEE George S. Axelby Outstanding Paper Award (2007) for "A Characterization of Convex Problems in Decentralized Control"^[2]
• SIAM Control and Systems Theory Prize (2011) Conferred: "for Contributions to the theory of optimal controller synthesis for decentralized systems subject to information and control constraints."^{[3] [4]}
• National Science Foundation (NSF) CAREER Award (2014)
• Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE)^[5]

External links

• https://mcrotk.github.io/
• https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=WX3W4zUAAAAJ&hl=en

Notes and References

1. Rotkowitz, Michael; and Lall, Sanjay. "A Characterization of Convex Problems in Decentralized Control", IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control, Vol. 51, No. 2, February 2006. Accessed June 1, 2018. "Michael Rotkowitz was born in Brooklyn, NY, in 1974, and was raised in Old Bridge, NJ."
2. https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/1593901/ "A Characterization of Convex Problems in Decentralized Control"
3. https://www.siam.org/prizes/sponsored/siagcst.php Control and Systems Theory Prize
4. Web site: SIAM award for Dr Michael Rotkowitz - The Melbourne Engineer. The Melbourne Engineer. 6 July 2011.
5. Web site: President Obama names Michael Rotkowitz a recipient of the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers. www.ece.umd.edu. 24 May 2018. en.